Playing Poker

Maybe Democrats would have a better chance of explaining Kerry's position on going into Iraq if they stopped trying to patiently explain the details to an audience primed to believe Kerry is a flip-flopper. What they need is a simple, common experience that can be used to draw a comparison that "regular people" can understand.

This morning, the idea of a poker game comes to mind. Saddam was bluffing. He had nothing. We had the stronger hand, and we knew it. A good player would have worked to convince Saddam that the hand he was holding wouldn't win, so he would fold. Kerry voted to make that convincing. By voting for the resolution, he was strengthening our hand. But Bush, instead of waiting for the hand to play out, for Saddam to fold, chose to abruptly toss over the table.

No, it's not a great analogy. But the point is, there are things in everyday life that people do which involve "nuance". The Bush people have done a great job of making the situation seem like it was simply either war or no war. But it wasn't. But neither is it a swamp of complexity. People encounter similarly subtle situations all the time. And people need to start thinking of Bush's actions in terms that everyone is familiar with. He was a "hothead". He "squirrelled the deal" by being "uncool". If he'd been a good player, he could have "stared Saddam down" and we could have taken all the chips. Kerry is saying that we need a player who knows how to play out a good hand.