A long article. Here's a chunk out of the middle:
By March 19, the survey showed Bush with a 47-43 lead. On March 22, Bush topped out at 48 percent.
"The ad campaign was effective," said Bill Schneider, veteran political analyst at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. "They convinced voters that Kerry was a flip-flopper and a tax raiser who would raise their taxes on gas by 50 cents a gallon."
But it was right about then that events - growing unrest in Iraq, rising gas prices, concern about the jobs picture - caught up with Bush and his edge began to dissipate. Kerry built a substantial lead at one juncture, Rasmussen had the challenger ahead 48-42 on April 2, and the two have traded the top spot since. Five of the seven polls released publicly in April show Kerry ahead.
Having reportedly gone through more than $40 million of the $90 million budgeted for its spring and summer media effort, the Bush campaign finds itself in no better position than when it started. And its once vaunted financial advantage, which had Democrats muttering nervously, is no longer quite so substantial.
Kerry set a new presidential campaign record by raising more than $50 million in the first quarter of 2004, including $38 million in March alone. He also is finding success in April, pulling in $6.5 million in one night in New York City. That means Kerry, who risked being buried in the Bush bombardment, expects to compete and respond to any attack.
Now the Bush campaign is scaling back its television attack. The number of Bush ads running in the 18 tossup states is being cut by 30 percent, a move the campaign said had been planned all along. Pro-Kerry forces offer a different rationale - they reduced the ad buy because they had to.
"Not even George Bush's special-interest-lined-pockets are deep enough for $8.5 million per week ad spending for almost 25 weeks," said Jim Jordan, with America Coming Together, an anti-Bush organization. "Not given their stunning burn rate and historically high overhead."
Without the money edge, Schneider and others maintain, the Bush re-election effort is looking a little wobbly given recent events. The president had hoped that his reputation for fighting terrorism would generate the sort of support necessary to assure a second term. But the hearings of the commission investigating the 9/11 tragedy, including the revelation that Bush was told that Osama bin Laden was looking to attack the United States, has affected those numbers.
"He always intended to run as a warrior president," Schneider said
