August 31, 2020--Dukakis Redux

The Republican convention behind him, Trump immediately took to the road.

First stop, all in one day, New Hampshire then Louisiana and Texas hit hard last week by Hurricane Laura. This was not going to be his Katrina.

Then, he announced, that on Tuesday, tomorrow, he plans to visit Kenosha, Wisconsin where Jacob Blake was shot in the back seven times by local police. 

God knows what he'll say and do while there.

Next, he'll probably make his way to Portland, Oregon, where over the weekend a Trump supporter was shot and killed during a confrontation between far-left and far-right demonstrators. Trump's visit will likely be inflammatory.

All the while where was Joe Biden and what was he up to as Tump was making these telegenic stops?

In his basement, delivering a speech remotely to the American Legion convention.

Oh yes, he also announced he'll resume in-person campaigning after Labor Day.

After Labor Day? What's wrong with today? What was wrong with last week?

Does he want to be president? Is he aware of what his absence from the campaign trail suggests about his 77 year-old stamina? 

Trust me, nothing good.

This reminds me of Michael Dukakis's ill-fated 1988 run for the presidency. His opponent was the not-very-popular or charismatic George H.W. Bush, Ronald Reagan's vice president. 

For a while Dukakis's's strategy seemed to be working. A few months before Election Day he built a 17-point lead in the polls. And so, what did he do? Sat on his lead while he effectively stopped campaigning, he said, so he could concentrate on his day job--governor of Massachusetts. And I assume, practice his inaugural speech. 

But every once in a while Dukakis did get out to participate in a campaign stunt. The best known of these was his ride in a military issue 68-ton M1-A1 Abrams Tank. 

Pictures of the diminutive governor with his head barely visible above the armor plate made H.W. by comparison look like a super hero. And from the minute pictures of this began to circulate, Dukakis's poll numbers began to plummet and a few months later George H.W. Bush was the one measuring drapes for the Oval Office.

(Of course it didn't help that Republicans played the race card when  they circulated pictures of the very black menacing murderer, Willie Horton, who Governor Dukakis ordered released on weekend furlough and while free committed armed robbery and rape.)

Unless Biden gets mobilized, a few weeks from now I suspect that he and Trump will be in a statistical dead-heat and who knows where things will wind up.