Campaign Advisors Relive Election Drama

The masterminds behind the 2004 presidential campaign traded war stories last night at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum.

Mary Beth Cahill, campaign manager for Kerry-Edwards 2004, and Kenneth B. Mehlman, manager of this year’s Bush-Cheney campaign, served on a panel assembled to kick off “Campaign for President: The Manager’s Look at 2004,” a two-day event at the Institute of Politics (IOP).

Journalists Glen Johnson of the Boston Globe and Ramesh Ponnuru of the National Review joined the two strategists as they shared the insights from the campaign season.

Panelists described the lighter moments of the campaigns as well as the difficult decisions before answering questions from the audience.  The discussion, moderated by IOP Director Phil R. Sharp, covered topics as diverse as stem cell research and the emergence of disagreements between candidates and campaign managers.

Sharp said the panel aimed “to share with our student audience… the exhilaration, the agony of this process.”

Over the course of the evening, the panelists revealed many of the hidden details of life on the campaign trail.  Cahill noted the intensity of Kerry’s preparation for the three televised presidential debates. The senator took three days off the campaign before each debate to read and engage in mock debates.

Mehlman painted a similar picture of President Bush’s debate preparation. His statement that Bush “likes to read a lot” drew snickers from the crowd.

The panel also focused on the advertisements run by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a political action group that sought to challenge Kerry’s military record.

Responding to claims that the Kerry campaign reacted too slowly, Cahill explained Democrats’ hesitance to draw attention to such claims. Though upset with the press for overemphasizing accusations that had been disproved, Cahill said the ads were “the best $40,000 investment ever made by any political group.”

Cahill said the one campaign decision she wished she could have changed was the timing of the Democratic National Convention (DNC).

She said the time between the DNC in late July and the presentation of the Republican platform in early September allowed a sizeable window in which Republicans could criticize the Democrats, while remaining invulnerable themselves.

In an interview after the panel, Cahill defended the decision to put North Carolina Senator John Edwards on the ticket as Kerry’s running mate, despite the fact the Democratic duo was unable to carry a single southern state.

“[Edwards] fit very much with Kerry ideologically,” she said.

While Mehlman cited Republican inability to assuage young voters’ fears about a military draft as a major weakness, Cahill touted the strength of Kerry’s support amongst the youth. “Among voters 18-30, Gore was plus two [percentage points],” Cahill said. “Kerry was plus nine.”

Panelists also talked about the relationship between political decision-makers and the press. Glen Johnson described a conflict between John Kerry and himself, regarding Kerry’s prostate cancer.

When Johnson, a close observer of Kerry, had asked the Senator whether he was ill in 2003, he received an emphatic denial, only to learn the next week that Kerry had been recently diagnosed with prostate cancer.

Johnson said honesty between members of the press and politicians was essential, but that he understood Kerry’s desire to talk to his family before releasing information to the press. He said he and Kerry “declared a truce” over the issue.

Among those in the audience were CNN anchorwoman Judy Woodruff and Time senior writer Joe Klein.

After the event, Woodruff said Mehlman and Cahill had been “forthright.”

“I thought we got some moments of candor, especially on the Swiftboat issue,” Woodruff said.