There's many a slip twixt the cup and the lip.
I wouldn't call this election just yet. 60+ days is a long time in politics, especially when there's a war on and some deranged religious yahoos are still keen on blowing themselves up in public places. See Russian Airliner news.
Who should the Dems have run?
Well, this time around all that Bush has is the incumbency. The rest of the situation is an exploitable shambles. I don't think you had to be Miss Cleo to see that during the Democratic primaries.
So then. In no particular order, these folks threw their hats in the ring.
KERRY, KUCINICH, SHARPTON, EDWARDS, DEAN, CLARK, LIEBERMAN, GEPHARDT, MOSELEY BRAUN, GRAHAM
The first "get real" pass would eliminate Sharpton and Moseley Braun.
The second "let's see" pass would probably have eliminated Dean, Edwards, Clark and Kucinich.
That would leave Kerry, Lieberman, Gephardt and Graham, all somewhat well known Democratic politicians with enough record to run on.
So they pick the absolutely most liberal of the bunch, the one with probably the worst Congressional record to run on. The one that came home and P.O.'ed a whole lot of people with his anti-war activities. This is the clever strategy to capture the "undecided swing voters" that obviously are in the middle of the "right wing/left wing" continuum.
I'd have voted for Lieberman this year. I probably would have voted for Gephardt. I'd have to think long on Graham as I never really examined his record in detail. No forking chance on Kerry.
None, zip, zilch, nada.
WTG, Democratic strateegeristies!