by JAMES TARANTO
Tuesday, September 28, 2004 4:07 P.M. EDT

Vietnam: The Parody
The American left, including the liberal media, are so eager for failure in Iraq that they are turning into parodies of their Vietnam-era selves. Today the New York Times dusts off the septuagenarian Daniel Ellsberg, of Pentagon Papers infamy, who in an op-ed piece urges government officials to leak to the press the full contents of the classified National Intelligence Assessment on Iraq, which reportedly paints a gloomy picture of the situation there.

Already, unnamed "government officials" leaked to the Times' Douglas Jehl a characterization of the assessment, but Ellsberg wants them to leak the whole thing. Didn't it strike Gail Collins as unseemly to publish an op-ed piece urging public officials to violate the law and jeopardize national security in order to benefit the newsgathering efforts of the New York Times?

Ellsberg, of course, is less concerned with helping the Times get a scoop than with furthering a political agenda. "Since the White House has refused to release the full report, someone else should do so. . . . It would be a great public service to reveal a true picture of the administration's plans for Iraq--especially before this week's debate on foreign policy between Mr. Bush and Senator John Kerry," he writes.

This just goes to show how out of touch Ellsberg is with the realities of 21st-century America. Let's say he gets his wish and Jehl publishes a piece tomorrow revealing the specifics of the National Intelligence Assessment's gloomy guesstimate about Iraq's future. By our fake-but-accurate count, the Times has already published 4,716 articles painting a gloomy picture of Iraq. Is Ellsberg really so behind the times that he thinks the 4,717th will swing the election?

Gloom Is Not a Plan
Pro-Kerry pundits were all atwitter over the weekend about what a great week John Kerry had. He finally has a message! He's challenging the president on Iraq! Never mind that, as Christopher Hitchens points out, Kerry's "message" amounts to the hope that things will go badly over the next five weeks. Winning is everything.

Well, Kerry's strategy didn't look winning to us last week, and now there's polling evidence to back us up. The latest Washington Post/ABC poll asks registered voters if they think John Kerry has "a clear plan for handling the situation in Iraq." A majority, 56%, say he does not. Only 38% say he does. This after a week of touting his putative plan.

Kerry's numbers on this question have actually gotten worse since the last time it was posed, in June. Then, 42% thought Kerry had a plan and 52% said he didn't. By contrast, Bush has improved from 48% yes and 50% no in June to 53% yes and 44% no in September.

At Thursday's debate, of course, Kerry has perhaps his only remaining opportunity to persuade Americans that he has a clear plan for handling the situation in Iraq. To do so, however, would require one thing he lacks--namely a clear plan for handling the situation in Iraq.

Generation Roe
For another interesting finding of the Post/ABC poll, look at this table, which shows the breakdown of registered voters' presidential preferences by age:

(To see the original data, go to the link atop this item and then select a breakdown by age.)

Bush's overall margin is 7%, but his 12% margin among 18- to 30-year-olds exceeds that of all other age groups. This is the group born since 1973, when the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade. The antiabortion candidate's lead among this group is another bit of evidence supporting the Roe effect. Take that, Ellen Goodman!

Bush Attracts Unlikely Voters
Yet another interesting finding of both the Post/ABC and Gallup polls: President Bush does better among registered voters than among the smaller group of likely voters. Gallup has Bush up by 8% among likely voters (52% to 44%) and 13% among registered voters (54% to 41%). Post/ABC has Bush up by 6% among likely voters (51% to 45%) and 7% among registered voters (51% to 44%).

This may or may not mean anything, but it is unusual. Most of the time Democrats do better among registered voters than among likely voters. One possible interpretation of these numbers is that Democratic base voters are more motivated than usual, and thus more likely to be "likely." But these results also show that the Democratic base isn't enough to win an election. After all, a vote cast with enthusiasm is worth exactly the same as one cast with ennui.

Some have argued that the Gallup poll in particular overstates Bush's lead, but the Los Angeles Times, which recently hired Michael "Monkeyfishing" Kinsley, reports that "clairvoyant canines, who are owned by Jacqueline Stallone (Sylvester's mom)," are predicting a Bush victory by 15%.

Kerry Cries Uncle
"Democratic presidential challenger John Kerry appealed for an end to the TV advertising war that has marked his election battle against President George W. Bush," Agence France-Presse reports from Spring Green, Wis. "Kerry said the avalanche of negative television spots and attacks being shown on US screens was scaring off voters."

Well well. Remember a month ago when Kerry was whining about the Swift Boat ads and demanding that President Bush silence Vietnam veterans who dissent from the Kerry line? Bush countered by calling for an end to all independent ads on both sides. The Dems were outraged! Now their man is calling for the same thing, albeit too late.

Kerry Calling Orson
Remember "Mork & Mindy"? The late-'70s TV series featured Robin Williams as a space alien who, among other things, was flummoxed by humor. When someone made a joke, he would always belatedly realize it and exclaim: "Oh, humor! Ar, ar!"

We felt a bit like Mork when we read Nedra Pickler's Associated Press dispatch titled "Kerry Learning to Wield Humor as a Weapon." Here are some examples Pickler gives of the haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat's comic stylings:

• "Kerry said the occupation of Iraq is riddled with problems, 'yet today, President Bush tells us that he would do everything all over again, the same way.' Kerry paused for affect [sic] before asking sarcastically, 'How can he possibly be serious?' "
  
  
• "Kerry used an idiom likely to be heard among teenagers in a shopping mall, but not on the Senate floor. 'You're going to hear all this talk, "Oh, we've turned the corner, we're doing better, blah, blah," ' he said, running on the phrase as his Wisconsin audience erupted in laughter. 'You know, blah and blah and blah.' "
  
  
• "He's thrown in a couple of old-fashioned folksy phrases, too. 'Heavens to Betsy,' he said earlier this month when remarking on Republicans' failure to reinstate the assault weapons ban. 'You bet your boots I know what I'm talking about,' Kerry said Monday when promising to be more fiscally responsible than Bush."
  
  
• "Kerry was cracking up his partisan crowd by telling Wisconsin voters they shouldn't be wary of changing horses midstream when the horse is drowning. He tied the metaphor to reports that the Bush campaign insisted that podiums in Thursday's debate be set relatively far apart to obscure Kerry's five-inch height advantage. 'May I also suggest that we need a taller horse?' he said. 'You can get through deeper waters that way.' "

Pickler's colleague Scott Lindlaw quotes Kerry as saying yesterday that "the American people don't want jokes and fantasy spin from their president." So perhaps it's just as well that Kerry's wit is considerably less swift than that boat on which he by the way served in Vietnam.

Tangerine Dream
John Kerry is on "orange alert," according to the Drudge report:

Is it the late September Wisconsin sun during debate prep that has turned Kerry's face to rich pumpkin-colored hues? Or has he been campaigning in the rust-belt?

Reader Kevin Skedsvold offers one theory:

Take a look at this picture and tell me it doesn't make you think of the "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" characters, the Oompa Loompas.

Everybody now: "Oompa Loompa doompety doo, I've got a perfect puzzle for you. Oompa Loompa doompety dee, if you are wise you'll listen to me."

Another possibility is that Kerry is seeking votes among that all-important Florida constituency, Citrus-Americans.

Kerry Has a Cow
"Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry told voters in America's Dairyland on Monday that President Bush had a secret plan that would hurt milk producers after the election," our pal Nedra Pickler reports from Spring Green, Wis.:

Kerry tried to convince voters in this rural community, where he is practicing for Thursday's debate, that he would look out for dairy farms here even though he hadn't always in the past.

Two questions: If the plan is secret, how does Kerry know about it? Is Daniel Ellsberg leaking milk?

And what's Kerry doing looking out for dairy farms? Didn't he say he was going to make Osama bin Laden the priority?

Great Orators of the Democratic Party

• "One man with courage makes a majority."--Andrew Jackson
  
  
• "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."--Franklin Roosevelt
  
  
• "The buck stops here."--Harry Truman
  
  
• "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."--John Kennedy
  
  
• "The only thing America has to fear is four more years of George Bush."--Ted Kennedy

Hungry Heart Eats Boss's Brain
"I am a dedicated [New York] Times reader, and I've found enormous sustenance from Paul Krugman and Maureen Dowd on the op-ed page."--Bruce Springsteen, Rolling Stone, Sept. 22

Kerry's Favorite Ally
"France said Monday that it would take part in a proposed international conference on Iraq only if the agenda included a possible U.S. troop withdrawal," the Paris edition of the New York Times reports from Washington. It gets better: "Paris also wants representatives of Iraq's insurgent groups to be invited to a conference."

Reuterville Retreat
Camera, the pro-Israel media watchdog group, reports Reuters has acknowledged it erred in publishing a weepy piece about the family of a Palestinian terrorist (or, as Reuters would put it, "a Palestinian 'terrorist' "). Here's the text of the letter Camera received from editor in chief Geert Linnebank:

Thank you for your e-mail. I have reviewed the Sept 22 story, titled Bomber's Stunned Family Has Little Time To Grieve, to which your e-mail refers and proper care was not taken in the editing of the copy. Reuters is committed to the highest standards of balanced reporting and I regret that this story did not meet those standards. We are reinforcing our editing safeguards.

Maybe This Explains Those CBS 'Memos'
"Web Site Offers After-Death E-Mail"--headline, CNN.com, Sept. 27

Another Senate Democrat Endorses Bush
"With critical work left to do to address the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, approve the federal budget and help our struggling economy, Washington state needs strong representation in Congress. While Senator Murray returned to her job on behalf of Washington state residents last week, George Nethercutt missed 16 important votes," Sen. Patty Murray complains in a recent press release. Rep. Nethercutt, her GOP opponent, is the underdog, though that was true too when he knocked off then-Speaker Tom Foley in 1994.

What's interesting here, though, is that Murray's colleague, the junior senator from Massachusetts, has missed a lot more than 16 important votes. So if you read between the lines, Murray has joined Zell Miller, a Georgia Democrat, in endorsing President Bush.

Now That Child Slavery Is Illegal
"Urchin Industry a Skeleton of Former Self"--headline, Associated Press, Sept. 28

The Editorial Oui
Rush & Molloy, a gossip duo at New York's Daily News, had this odd report last week (third item):

Luckily for us, it seems that Paris Hilton has time to read only newspapers that have big pictures.

When Paris and Merle Ginsberg, her co-author on her autobiography, "Confessions of an Heiress," ran into each other at Mr. Chow in Beverly Hills on Friday, Ginsberg congratulated the party princess on reaching No. 5 on The Wall Street Journal's best-seller list.

"What's The Wall Street Journal? Is that good?" Paris asked.

Ginsberg, unfazed, replied: "Paris, you don't need to know what The Wall Street Journal is. Let's just say you're bigger than Bill Clinton."

OK, we'll bite. What's this about a talking hotel, and why isn't the Paris Hilton speaking French?

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Today on OpinionJournal:

• Review & Outlook: Dems spin tales about Florida 2000 to boost black turnout.
• Brendan Miniter: The military is in much better shape than Kerry acknowledges.
• Colin McGinn: The case for exuberance isn't entirely persuasive.