Let's Review...

January

Dean Screams

Kerry Channels Deerhunter, Dean Mirrors Kozmo, etc

Bush team attacks Kerry for being weak on security (talk about blowing your wad early).

My mom points out that almost everyone in the Dem primary other than Sharpton is basically Jewish. She excluded Gephardt because he seems "like a nice man" and Kucinich because, well, everyone excluded Kucinich.

February

Look. Janet's boob! Who would have guessed that a single tit could forever change our nation? (+ Cialis becomes a household name.)

America talks foreign policy, Georgia talks evolution. Rove puts Georgia in the win column.

Kerry takes the home loan that may have changed America.

Joementum, no-mentum.

Early Dem poll numbers released

Lieberman: Shabbat Shalom.

Howard Dean starts smiling (the end was near).

Tenet's bad prediction: "When the facts of Iraq are all in, we will neither be completely right nor completely wrong."

W's approval rating dips to 47% and the Bush team releases the twins.

What election? Scarborough continues to focus his MSNBC show on Janet's knocker.

Bush does Meet the Press. It was a shockingly nervous and poor performance. A foreshadowing of debates to come.

Clark Drops Out.

Drudge and the Kerry sex scandal that wasn't.

W's credibility bubble bursts (the final nail in any thought of a positive GOP campaign).

SF's Gavin Newsom starts the gay marriage ball rolling.

Dean drops out.

Nader announces that he will run. Fittingly, he came out on Fox News.

Bush endorses marriage amendment.

Chalabi: "We are heroes in error."

March

Edwards says goodbye, for awhile.

Kerry wraps up the nomination.

Arnold wins big.

W kicks off the general election with an ad showing the twisted steel and burning embers of ground zero.

Here are the Reuters headlines from March 7, 2004:



McCain veep rumors start.

Kerry on videotape: "Oh yeah, don't worry, man. We're going to keep pounding, let me tell you -- we're just beginning to fight here. These guys are the most crooked, you know, lying group of people I've ever seen."

Madrid bombing

Bush pushes missile defense system.

Kerry says foreign leaders like him more. Bush momentarily pushes back but then realizes he likes the sound of that.

Spain's election, an upset (the incumbent was ousted in part because of an attempt to distort terrorism-related intelligence to gain votes).

Biden: "I think that this is time for unity in this country, and maybe it is time to have a guy like John McCain - a Republican - on the ticket with a guy he does like. They do get along. And they don't have fundamental disagreements on major policies."

Scalia refuses to recuse himself or give up duck hunting.

"The senator from Massachusetts has given us ample doubts about his judgment and the attitude he brings to bear on vital issues of national security." -- Dick Cheney

"I don't think that. I think that John Kerry is a good and decent man. I think he has served his country. I think he has different points of view on different issues and he will have to explain his voting record. But this kind of rhetoric, I think, is not helpful in educating and helping the American people make a choice." -- John McCain

March 19, from W: "And it is a good thing that the men and women across the Middle East, looking to Iraq, are getting a glimpse of what life in a free country can be like."

Richard Clarke does 60 Minutes

White House begins attacks on Clarke

9-11 Commission hearings begin, Bush and Cheney insist on testifying together (Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy threaten legal action).

I nominate Beyonce for VP.

Under God pledge case hits the airwaves.

Kerry goes snowboarding. Takes time off. Bush approval hole deepens.

Richard Clarke testifies: "Your government failed you, those entrusted with protecting you failed you and I failed you." (Bush joins chorus - Richard Clarke failed you.)

Howard endorses Kerry.

AirAmerica launches; raises level of discourse by yelling at the other side.

April

The Jersey Girls keep up the pressure.

Ny Times offers the worst non-Fox political analysis ever: "Yet Mr. Kerry was off the campaign trail yet again on Wednesday, this time for shoulder surgery in Boston, an operation expected to sideline him through Sunday. The surgery followed his weeklong disappearance to the slopes of Sun Valley. Some Democrats said that should Mr. Kerry lose in November, he might well remember this month as the time when he seriously undermined his hopes of defeating Mr. Bush." (Kerry missed one day. It was early April.)

Kerry raised more than $50 million on the web in first three months (and that's still more than $45 million even after Howard Dean got his commission).

Karen Hughes re-emerges, in a weird looking shirt.

More McCain veep rumors.

Kerry: "Why is the United States of America almost alone in carrying this burden and the risks which the world has a stake in? There is no Arab country that is advanced by a failed Iraq. There is no European country that is safer by a failed Iraq. Yet, those countries are distinctly absent from risk-bearing. . . . This is essentially an American occupation... George Bush and the Republicans in Washington today have run the most arrogant, inept, reckless and ideological foreign policy in the modern history of this country." (Seems like he's had a pretty consistent message, no?)

Howard Stern begins his cultural war.

Bush press conference pre-empts American Idol (goes poorly).

Woodward book comes out (it took awhile for the Bushies to realize it made their man look bad). His Oedipal complex oozes from page to page.

Pat Tillman killed in Afghanistan.

In April, Americans still seemed to have no idea that Saddam was not connected to 9-11 and didn't have WMDs.

The Jane Fonda-ization of Kerry's military career begins in earnest.

Karen Hughes tries to connect 9-11 and abortion.

Sinclair pre-empts Nightline when Ted Koppel reads the names of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq.

Dick Cheney endorses Fox News: "I end up spending a lot of time watching Fox News, because they're more accurate in my experience, in those events that I'm personally involved in, than many of the other outlets."

Both candidate's websites break 1.5 million visitors.

May

New Yorker story on Abu Ghraib breaks.

PDiddy and Franken prep for a 2008 run?

Dems demand soundbite and a message.

Bush accidentally frames the election for Kerry: "Peace and freedom depend upon this election. Prosperity for the people depend upon this election."

We get the first hints that Ahmed Chalabi makes Joe Isuzu look like Abe Lincoln.

Michael Moore turns an old Disney distribution story into big pre-F911 buzz.

W introduces his main campaign theme along with its most ridiculous and glaring flaw: "My opponent says he approves of bold action in the world, but only if other countries do not object. I'm all for united action, but I will never turn over America's national security decisions to leaders of other foreign countries. In order to keep the peace, there must be truth in the words of the president."

Roy Moore considers a run for the White House. Rove convinces him he's too liberal.

Rush clarifies the Abu Ghraib story: "This is no different than what happens at the Skull and Bones initiation and we're going to ruin people's lives over it and we're going to hamper our military effort, and then we are going to really hammer them because they had a good time. You know, these people are being fired at every day. I'm talking about people having a good time, these people, you ever heard of emotional release? You of heard of need to blow some steam off?"

Nancy Reagan brings back the stem cell issue.

Kerry opens up first early edge in some battleground states.

My own megalomania begins to creep into my blogging as I offer up Me for Vice President wherein I compare my career to Cheney's:

Cheney: After a stint working as the right hand man to Donald Rumsfeld, Cheney becomes one of youngest people (34) ever to serve as White House Chief of Staff (under Gerald Ford).

Pell: My dad buys me a soccer ball as a reward for not wetting the bed the night before (I was 9). To thank him, I wet the bed every night for the next week. (continued...)

Rummy on Abu Ghraib: "I take full responsibility ... I offer my deepest apology ... I feel terrible about what happened to these Iraqi detainees ... They're human beings." (Yes, he still holds his position...)

Joe Lieberman hits rock bottom as he demands credit for the fact that we were quicker to apologize than the terrorists:"The behavior by Americans at the prison in Iraq is, as we all acknowledge, immoral, intolerable and un-American. It deserves the apology that you have given today and that have been given by others in high positions in our government and our military. I cannot help but say, however, that those who were responsible for killing 3,000 Americans on September 11th, 2001, never apologized. Those who have killed hundreds of Americans in uniform in Iraq working to liberate Iraq and protect our security have never apologized. And those who murdered and burned and humiliated four Americans in Fallujah a while ago never received an apology from anybody."

Cheney begins lying freely and in earnest: "Don Rumsfeld is the best secretary of defense the United States has ever had."

The Army Times: "This was a failure that ran straight to the top. Accountability here is essential -- even if that means relieving top leaders from duty in a time of war."

Bush, chilling at 46% approval level.

Senator James Inhofe lets his small brain be seen by all: "I'm probably not the only one up at this table that is more outraged by the outrage than we are by the treatment ... These prisoners, you know they're not there for traffic violations."

We hear that bloggers get credentials to the Dem Convention. I begin to lose weight, frantically. I can't let Wonkette see me looking this zaftig.

Gay weddings in Massachusetts.

A Kerry in a see though dress. Voter turnout already looks good.

MTV and USA Today compare Bush and Kerry resumes to see who would be more employable if they were going for, well, a real job: "One candidate earned debate honors and spoke at Yale's commencement. The other was president of his fraternity and participated in intramural sports."

Lynndie England becomes a household name.

Ahmed Chalabi's house in Iraq is raided.

Zinni: "I blame the civilian leadership of the Pentagon directly. Because if they were given the responsibility, and if this was their war, and by everything that I understand, they promoted it and pushed it - certain elements in there certainly - even to the point of creating their own intelligence to match their needs, then they should bear the responsibility."

MoveOn offers up an ad featuring a hooded Statue of Liberty. Call it a 527 warm-up.

Al Gore comes alive: "How dare they subject us to such dishonor and disgrace! How dare they drag the good name of the United States of America through the mud of Saddam Hussein's torture prison! I am calling today for Republicans as well as Democrats to join me in asking for the immediate resignations of those immediately below George Bush and Dick Cheney, who are most responsible for creating the catastrophe we are facing in Iraq."

Percent still undecided on Bush, Kerry:
Zogby: 1%, 21%
Quinnipiac: 2%, 16%
Newsweek: 8%, 14%
Annenberg: 12%, 21%
CBS News: 16%, 35%

Sure, we've all got our differences, but a nice ass is a nice ass!

June

Newsweek gets the sock-puppet quote: ""Kerry did not address Iraq as clearly as I would have liked. But my dislike of George Bush overrides everything at this point. You can put a sock puppet next to Bush and I would vote for it."

Bush attacks sock puppets for being soft on terror.

Tenet resigns.

Backdoor draft is announced.

Sharpton fails to get a decent TV gig despite his big laughs during the primaries.

Rummy blames the media for Iraq.

GOP breaks another story: Kerry rich.

Reagan dies.

Under God case dismissed on a technicality.

Clinton (waist up) portrait unveiled at the White House.

Bush clings: "The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda [is] because there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda."

Bush pushes gay marriage amendment. Going to Mars, backburnered.

Was Iraq involved in 9-11?
Cheney: "We don't know."

Clinton's book comes out.

Wolfie blames the press: "Frankly, part of our problem is a lot of the press are afraid to travel very much, so they sit in Baghdad and they publish rumors."

Gore on Red Bull: "They dare not admit the truth lest they look like complete fools for launching our country into a reckless, discretionary war against a nation that posed no immediate threat to us whatsoever ... If they believe these flimsy scraps, then who would want them in charge? Are they too dishonest or too gullible? Take your pick."

Cheney drops an F bomb on the Senate floor.

The Greens say no thanks to Ralph (Apparently they feel his election efforts are more about himself than them. Hmmm.)

Interim government kicks in. Bremer gets the hell out of Iraq.

July

Saddam charged in an Iraqi court.

Kerry picks Edwards (The Unnatural). NY Post front page says he picked Gephardt.

McCain veep rumors subside, a bit.

Bush goes after Edwards' experience.

Ron Reagan gets on the Dem Convention speaking schedule.

Ditka considers a run in Illinois. At the time, the GOP thought that was about as embarrassing as it could get.

Some guy named Barack is tapped to give the keynote in Boston.

Bush twins do Vogue.

Whoopi is dropped as Slimfast spokesperson for an anti-Bush diatribe (and not for being, well, fat).

Kerry "fills in" for Bush at an NAACP speech.

Cheney off the ticket rumors fill the airwaves.

Indy 500 champ Buddy Rice visits the White House where Bush explains, "I'm the driver of our team here." Someone should tell this guy that he's been driving around with his blinker on for four years.

Troops from the Philippines pull out of Iraq.

Jenna sticks out her tongue and Chris Matthews goes wood (so does Mary Cheney).

9-11 Commission Report comes out. House fanatics pass a marriage protection act.

Dems convene in Boston. Ted Kennedy not allowed to go up to his luxury box. Obama kills. Clinton rocks. I schmooze with Josh Marshall but still don't make his blogroll. Kerry mentions something about Vietnam.

August

Bush pretends he was for the 9-11 Commission and then pretends he has been pushing for many of the same reforms that they suggested.

The Boston bounce. Not.

Springsteen gets political with a NY Times editorial: "Our American government has strayed too far from American values. It is time to move forward. The country we carry in our hearts is waiting."

Keyes enters race against Obama. Madness.

Ron Silver tries not getting work as a mediocre Republican actor. It works as well as it did when he was a mediocre Democratic actor.

Washington Post joins NYT in admitting they were too easy on the administration when it came to covering the march to war. Right wing bloggers take this to be an admission that these publications were too hard on the administration when it came to the march to war.

Kerry opens a 2-1 advantage among young voters. Those are R. Kelly like numbers.

Bush-Cheney attack Kerry for this line: "I believe I can fight a more effective, more thoughtful, more strategic, more proactive, more sensitive war on terror that reaches out to other nations and brings them to our side and lives up to American values in history."

James E. McGreevey: "My truth is that I am a gay American." (Gary Bauer goes wood.)

As of this moment, everyone in America has a blog.

Mayor Bloomberg makes his pitch to protesters: "New York is the place to get your message out, any message. It's no fun to protest on an empty stomach. So you might want to try a restaurant. Or you might want to go shopping, maybe for another pair of sneakers for the march."

Swift Boat Vets begin their journey up bullshit creek.

Zell Miller tapped to give GOP Convention keynote. Warden at Georgia mental institution wonders how he plans to escape.

Ted Kennedy's name found on no-fly list.

Bob Dole joins in on the distorting of Kerry's military career.

I have lunch with Chris Hitchens. He drinks scotch, smokes and refers to Mother Teresa as a whore in the first 20 minutes. Blogger heaven.

Bush bashes Hollywood. Invites Arnold to speak in primetime.

Cheney does the unthinkable; mentions Mary.

Max Cleland visits the Bush ranch.

Bush pretends to be against 527s to appease John McCain. McCain doesn't come to senses.

Kerry, not funny on The Daily Show.

Web reaches new heights with introduction of the Pleasureboat Captains for Truth.

Bush: "Had we had to do it over again, we would look at the consequences of catastrophic success." (Turns out he was referring the writing of the twins upcoming convention speech...)

September

GOP Convention slash 9-11 revival takes on NY. Arnold salutes Nixon. The twins joke around. Zell challenges Chris Matthews to a duel. Bush performs in the round. Ticket gets a bounce.

Kerry responds at Midnight after the Convention. Campaigns swing into high gear. JK takes the gloves off: "The vice president even called me unfit for office last night. I guess I'll leave it up to the voters whether five deferments makes someone more qualified to defend this nation than two tours of duty. Let me tell you what I think makes someone unfit for duty. Misleading our nation into war in Iraq makes you unfit to lead this nation. Doing nothing while this nation loses millions of jobs makes you unfit to lead this nation. Letting 45 million Americans go without health care makes you unfit to lead this nation."

Vietnam dominates election coverage.

Cheney turns up the fear factor: "It's absolutely essential that eight weeks from today, on Nov. 2, we make the right choice, because if we make the wrong choice then the danger is that we'll get hit again and we'll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States."

Kerry responds: "It is outrageous and shameful to make the war on terror an instrument of their politics. I defended this country when I was a young man, and they chose not to. And I will defend this country as president of the United States."

Clinton gives Kerry advice, team. Enters hospital.

Cheney introduces new economic indicator: "That's a source that didn't even exist 10 years ago. Four hundred thousand people make some money trading on eBay."

Russian school attacked. Putin pulls back on the Democracy thing.

Assault weapons back. Hunters rejoice.

CBS deals with memogate

Cat Stevens sent home.

Iraq descends into chaos. Bush reframes the issue: "I saw a poll that said the right track/wrong track in Iraq was better than here in America."

GOP mailing suggests that Dems are out to ban the bible.

Kerry and Bush both appear on Dr. Phil. Millions of voters consider Canada.

The President comes unraveled during the first debate. The race is really on. Karen Hughes spins W's performance this way: "He was answering the senator with his face."

October

W's lead evaporates.

Dean on position changing: "If new information comes in then you ought to change your position. Otherwise you're an idiot."

Mary Matalin refers to Edward as "the man with the golden tongue." (James Carville goes limp. Matalin goes wood.)

Bremer admits we never had enough troops. So does everyone else.

Veep debate. Edwards holds his own. Cheney goofs when he says the two had never met. Mary Cheney is a lesbian (much more the come on that one). And the night's biggest comment? Cheney: "I have not suggested there is a connection between Iraq and 9-11."

Debates going poorly. Iraq going worse. Send in the politics of personal destruction:





Cheney argues that the Duelfer report actually bolsters the administration's case for war. (Orders his stock broker to buy another hundred thousand shares of Webvan.)

Electablog offers up the official Second Debate Glue Sniffing Game.

Apparently Bush played it, because the townhall debate didn't go that well either. America makes a statement: No. We don't need some wood.

The bulge in W's back during the first debate picks up steam as an object of curiosity.

Several Marines on the ground in Iraq complain about policies and leadership: "We don't give a crap. What are they going to do, send us to Iraq?"

Sinclair goes into politics. Gets creamed by bloggers.

Residents of Toledo, Ohio watch their 14,273rd campaign commercial.

Presidential tailor Georges de Paris says the bulge was just a seam in W's jacket.

William Safire lowers the bar for Bush's debate performances: "This not only showed that Bush knew these allies personally, but could also pronounce Kwasniewski's name, which reminded Polish-Americans that Poland's president had responded angrily to Kerry's brushoff of his country's sacrifices in the first debate."

Debate three. Bush has some spittle in the corner of his mouth. I haven't seen that kind of foaming at the mouth since Tommy Chong was in his prime. Bush says he's not getting a flu shot. Kerry mentions that Mary Cheney is gay. That consumes the media for days. But Bush lost the debate. Dead heat remains in place.

Jon Stewart calls Tucker Carlson a dick and makes fun of his bowtie. America rejoices.

The bulge makes it into an MTP conversation between spin doctors:

Mehlman: The president, in fact, was receiving secret signals from aliens in outer space. You heard it here on Meet the Press.
Shrum: You mean you sent Rove into orbit?

Bush accused Kerry of "shameless scare tactics."

Arnold backs CA's stem cell proposition.

Rice hits the campaign trail.

No. No. No. Not the camouflageÊ hunting outfit. You're not getting it. The point is not to kill the birds. The point is to hang out with Scalia.

Bill O'Reilly talks dirty, get sued, feels like he's the one being attacked. (Bill O'Reilly goes wood.)

Pat Robertson shares the details of his conversations with Bush and the Burning Bush.

Kerry wins the Nickelodeon election by 14 points.

A poll reminds us that many Bush supporters have no idea about what's going on in Iraq or in terms of the connections between Saddam and 9/11.

Rove sends in the wolves.

NYT breaks story of the missing munitions.

Lawrence O'Donnell lets a Swift Boater really have it.

Allawi blames the U.S. for "great negligence."

Bush blames his shirt (and not his jacket) for the bulge.

The munitions story explodes.

Clinton returns to the trail (although not wearing a hospital gown and pulling along his I.V. as I suggested).

The Boss plays Kerry events.

Missing absentee ballots in Florida.

Bush jumps the shark: "A political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts is not a person you want as your commander in chief."

Red Sox win it all: A team of northeast liberals who everyone thought couldn't come through in the clutch just gave a whole lot better performance in the midwest than anybody thought they would.

Mayor Rudy: Don't blame the President. Blame the troops.

Eminem releases Mash video ripping W. Even Kerry supporters who think that Eminem is a stupid asshole (including Moby, but no so far including Triumph the Insult Comic Dog) find themselves saying nice things the previously evil rapper, proving once and for all that politics can soil anyone.

Bin Laden, remixed.

Washington Redskins lose their last home game before the election. Translation: The incumbent loses.

Hey, has Kucinich dropped out yet?

Ohio court rules that GOP cannot put "challengers" into polling places. Another Ohio courts says that they can. These may not be the last election-related court cases.

Last pre-election polls are in. Weather looks clear in most swing states. Republicans start blaming the media. Democrats start blaming themselves. Let's get it on.

Campaigns and their support groups will have spent more than $5 billion by the time this is over.

November 2

White powder at Jersey polling place: Salt.

Drudge spreads Philly voter fraud story. Drudge is wrong again.

Early exits favor Kerry. But they seem way off.

GOP reports that someone slashed the tires on 30 of their swing state get out the vote vans. (Uh, ever heard of a conicidence?)

Americans drop the carb craze (a new era of reason?).

Bush wins Guam. Their straw poll has correctly predicted the outcome of the presidential race every time since Carter/Reagan.

Blogs bog down under heavy traffic. Turnout looks incredible.

Shared victory: Soon on TV, no more Gillespie, no more McAuliffe. Surprise. At this point in the election night, they're both confident.

Zogby predicts a big win for Kerry with his final poll. On Tradesports.com, traders sell off Bush.

First states are called by the networks.

CNN reports that Miami-Dade will probably not be able to count a majority of the absentee ballots until Thursday.

Bob Novak says his GOP sources in Ohio are extremely pessimistic.

Kerry takes Jersey.

Long lines and after hours court cases in Penn and Ohio.

Apathy sucks. Twice as many people between the ages of 18-29 voted this year compared to 2000. 13% of voters in Florida were 1st time voters.

Will the hurricanes help Bush?

Things start trending better for Bush.

Bill Bennett leaves his office for Vegas.

Was Novak lying about Ohio?

Youth vote didn't show. Eminem now Vanilla Ice.

Polls close. Mary Cheney shows up at GOP campaign headquarters with her boyfriend and asks, "Well, did it work?"

Long night ahead.

Not so long. It's over. Early breakfast. Race for 2008 begins at dawn. Look at it this way: In 100 yeears, all anyone will remember from 2004 is the Red Sox. Between now and then, in the words of my urologist, this will be incredibly uncomfortable.

Kerry wants to wrap us up and embrace each and every one of us. No can do. I go wood just watching this stuff on TV.

BACK TO ELECTABLOG