Overview of Campaign Events
The campaign events are best viewed in chronological order, broken up into four time periods:
The conventions
The Democrats held their convention in Boston in late July. During that week, considerable emphasis was placed on Kerry's distinguished Vietnam War record. This was part of a strategy to reassure voters that Kerry was highly qualified to serve as president at a time when national security and foreign affairs seemed particularly important. The selection of North Carolina Senator John Edwards as the vice-presidential nominee was well received by most Democrats. Edwards was seen as providing some balance, both ideological and geographic, to the ticket, and he was viewed as a good campaigner. Despite what most observers saw as a well-run convention, the Kerry-Edwards ticket received only a small "convention bounce" in the polls. Going into the convention, Kerry lead Bush in most polls by a few points, and following the convention he was only slightly more ahead (Nagourney 2004).
In early August, an important and perhaps unexpected campaign development occurred. Televised campaign ads sponsored by a group called the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth appeared. These ads accused Kerry of lying about his war record and being undeserving of his medals. The Swift Boat group was formed by individuals with close ties to Bush administration officials, but the group was formally and legally independent of the Bush campaign, which allowed Bush to disavow any connection with the ads. Although the ads were largely discredited by subsequent investigations, they received considerable play in the news media, and most observers felt that they did lasting damage to Kerry's image (Ceaser and Busch 2005, 119-120). The lead that Kerry held following the end of the Democratic convention evaporated by the time of the Republicans convention.
At the end of August, the Republican Party met in New York. The week was devoted both to reinforcing the positive image of Bush and to undercutting the image of Kerry that Democrats had been cultivating. Kerry was criticized as being a flip-flopper, as being too liberal, and as being too weak on national security. The convention seemed very successful, and Bush received a significant boost in the polls. Early September polls showed Bush with a lead of about five points (Pomper 2005, 53).
September
The first month of the official campaign was largely uneventful. The most significant news story had to do with Bush's previous service in the Air National Guard. Charges that he did not fulfill his responsibilities had been made in 2000, but they seemed unsupported at the time. In early September, CBS News reported that they had memos confirming the old charges. However, further investigations cast doubt on the authenticity of the documents, and the story seemed much more of an embarrassment to CBS than to Bush (Ceaser and Busch 2005, 123-124). At the end of September, Bush had a lead over Kerry that was almost unchanged from what it was at the beginning of the month (Pomper 2005, 53).
The debates
Three presidential debates were held, the first on September 30 and the last on October 13. A vice-presidential debate also was held between the first and second presidential debates. This two-week period was the most important of the campaign. Viewership for the debates was high. This clearly was the best opportunity for either candidate to make major gains in the race.
The first debate focused on foreign policy, which presumably was to Bush's advantage. However, Kerry was the candidate who won the debate. He appeared more clear and confident in his responses, and he made pointed criticisms of Bush's policies and performance. Bush appeared ill prepared and unable to effectively counter Kerry's criticisms. The debate gave a boost to Kerry's standing in the polls, making the race close to even (Stevenson and Elder 2004).
The second and third debates were much more even. Instant polls afterwards showed Kerry to be the winner of both, but only by a very slight margin (Bennet and Rutenberg 2004). The vice-presidential debate also was fairly even (Archibald and Hernandez 2004). Although the Republicans were unable to clearly win any of these debates, the fact that they did not clearly lose them prevented further losses. Kerry failed to make further gains. In mid-October, following the final debate, Bush retained a narrow edge in the public opinion polls (Morin and Balz 2004).
The final weeks
From the end of the debates in mid-October until election day, no major developments took place in the campaign. The candidates and their surrogates continued to stress the same themes that they established earlier in the campaign. Attention became even more focused on the small number of battleground states. Considerable organizational effort was put forth by both sides in vigorous efforts to get their supporters to the polls.