Republicans are afraid themselves

Notes on the Atrocities has a great post chronicling the Republican spinster meltdown that's occuring after a fantastic Democratic Convention. Very on-target. I just have one small quarrel with the last paragraph of the post.

So the spinsters are going on the crazy attack and Bush is going warm and fuzzy. As always, the coordination is evident. It's the message that's confused. The convention changed everything. The GOP are still trying to figure out what.

I actually think they know exactly what's changed. People are excited about Kerry. It's not that any Republican votes are changing (which is why they keep reassuring themselves with the "no bounce" bullshit). It's that the Democratic base is energized.

I've said it before but it bears repeating--the entire Rovian strategy is built not around selling a candidate but by manipulating public sentiment so that the "right" people vote and the "wrong" people don't bother. That's why all the emphasis on Kerry as wishy-washy or boring--they're not hoping that people vote for a Manly Bush, but just hoping that people who dislike Bush also dislike Kerry and just blow off voting altogether. The other side is issuing the call-to-arms for the party faithful. The anti-gay thing is part of that strategy.

But their entire plan is based around stoking Kerry voters' dislike of Kerry in order to convince them to stay at home. And the convention might have screwed them on that, since Kerry came off as so likeable. So now the idea is to pull out all the attack dogs on Kerry and hope that they can convince people start disliking him again.

Just remember to tell your friends, family, everyone that not voting altogether is just as bad as voting for Bush.

Via The Sideshow.