The Dartmouth Beacon

Liberal:

Let’s dispense with the bull. George W. Bush did not win because of his policies. George W. Bush’s so-called mandate does not imply that the American public supports pre-emptive war, privatized social security, tax cuts for the wealthy, reduction of civil liberties, weakened environmental protections, an enormous deficit, the net job loss of the past 4 years, or the hundreds of soldiers who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan despite our being no safer. If the election were actually a referendum on any of the GOP’s actions or policies, it would have been a miserable failure for them. They won for two reasons.

On the issue of terrorism, Vice President Dick Cheney went as far as implying that the election of John Kerry would result in a terrorist attack. Statistically, there has been no decrease in terrorism under the Bush administration, yet they claimed that there was. The American people were deceived into thinking the war in Iraq was just, that Al-Qaeda was no longer a threat, that the war in Iraq was successful, that the Iraqi insurgents were not a result of our war, that George Bush was making us safer, and that John Kerry would not. This campaign of fear continued into the social arena, where George Bush cried about the sanctity of marriage and life and those dangerous activist judges and liberals who were pursuing an agenda of gay marriage and abortion for all. Gay marriage was most effective here, and the Republicans capitalized on every popular misconception surrounding homosexuality to convince religiously conservative Americans that a vote for John Kerry would absolve the lines separating earth and hell.

Finally, there is a great deal of skepticism regarding how legitimate this victory was. Verifiable stories of suppression of student and minority vote, outright voter intimidation, electronic glitches and ballot spoilage that vastly favor George Bush, and contrasts to exit polling so dramatic that they seem impossible (counties in Florida where 80% of registered Democrats would have had to vote Republican), coupled with a campaign of fear and misinformation mean that, to me at least, George W. Bush won nothing.

By NIRAL T. SHAH '08

Conservative:

Why did President Bush win reelection on November 2nd? The question is impossible to answer easily. One must consider the long list of blunders and miscalculations by the Democrats over the course of the entire election campaign, in addition to the personalities of the candidates. First mistake was the selection of candidates in the democratic primary. John Kerry was definitely one of the less-favorable candidates the Democrats could have come up with, and the Republicans were able to effectively capitalize on this. Kerry, in spite of over three long terms in the Senate, had no real record he could point to other than his Vietnam days. This too was a bit of a fallacy, given that he began meeting secretly with the Viet Cong overseas while the war was still going on. Clearly the Democrats were unable to portray Kerry as the decisive, effective leader that America needs. Rather, the predominant image of Kerry was that of the unprincipled flip-flopper, which failed to inspire the confidence he needed to unseat the president.

The Democrats also failed to capitalize effectively on the weaknesses of the Bush platform. On the national level they were unable to turn out the youth vote that they had counted on, which may very well have turned things in their favor. They also did not effectively capitalize on the differences between Bush’s plans and Kerry’s, mostly because they did not seem to have any clear plans, either for domestic or foreign policy issues. The Democrats’ biggest weakness was that they were unable to convince the American public that they had a clear plan if given power. This was different than Bush’s reputation. Whether or not you like the President, you do know where he stands, and this may have been the biggest reason for his victory.

By JOHN WILLIAMSON '08