IT'S 9/11, STUPID....Kerry's recent poll weakness doesn't bother me that much. These things go up and down, and there's still plenty of time to make up a few points of lost ground.

Ditto for Kerry's weakness in August. With no money to spend, August was always going to be a tough month for him.

But this has me very discouraged indeed:

John Kerry, seeking to shift the presidential campaign focus to the economy, pledges to "stand up for the middle class" and suggests President Bush "sides with the special interests" in new ads that are part of a $50 million post-Labor Day blitz starting in seven key states.

....The ads focus on the economy as the Kerry campaign seeks to move the focus of the campaign from questions about the Massachusetts senator's decorated Vietnam service and subsequent anti-war activities some 30 years ago.

It's fine to hammer away on domestic issues with specific target groups. It's fine for John Edwards to focus on the two Americas. But anyone who thinks the primary message of Kerry's campaign should be anything other than national security is just deluding themselves. To paraphrase James Carville, "It's 9/11, stupid."

In fact, it's a no-brainer: somehow Kerry has to convince people that he can be trusted with national security and Bush can't — and if he doesn't, he's going to lose. But I guess he still doesn't get that.

I'm finally beginning to think Mickey Kaus might be right: Kerry has spent too much time inside the liberal cocoon. It's going to cost him the election if he keeps it up.