Kerry: This Is No Time to Channel Al Gore

Nobody cares what we think, right?

We’re not a swing state. We’re California, the state presidential candidates only use as an ATM. But that gives us the right to weigh in, so here goes:

Not long ago a young man knocked on my door at dinnertime, asking for donations to the campaign of Democratic nominee John Kerry.

Why Kerry? I asked.

This kid was passionate, he was focused, and spoke with urgency as he laid out a compelling case for taking out George Bush. In other words, he was nothing at all like Kerry.

With only a month and a half before the election, the question is not whether George Bush showed up for National Guard duty 30 years ago, but whether John Kerry will show up for the rest of the campaign.

Yes, I know. Kerry pops up here and there, makes speeches and moves on. But nothing sticks with me, other than the nagging sense that Kerry can’t quite warm to the task.

He lost precious weeks foolishly defending his Purple Hearts, for crying out loud, even though Bush was one step removed from flying model airplanes during the Vietnam War.

Sure, the latest poll has Kerry gaining on Bush and making the race a dead heat. But if Kerry hadn’t been sleep-walking the last few months, the Bush family would have been shipping furniture home to Texas by now.

How hard can this be?

Count yourself blessed if you can still afford healthcare; you’re out of luck in the new economy unless you work for Halliburton; Bush waged war on the only Middle Eastern country without terrorists; Iraq is a full-blown disaster with no end in sight; and the world is less safe by the minute.

It’s one fat home-run pitch after another. Kerry knocks a two-bagger now and then, but often fails to get the bat off his shoulder. He’s too busy looking for a sign from the third base coach, and to make matters worse, he hires a new one every other day.

Swing for the fences, says one. No, play it safe, says another.

Talk up your own record. No, attack Bush’s.

If this looks like deja vu all over again, there’s a reason.

Kerry has the disease.

It’s akin to multiple personality disorder, it’s a killer, and it afflicts virtually the entire Democratic Party. They can’t quite figure out who they represent, what they stand for, or how to explain themselves.

Republicans, on the other hand, are much more cunning. Bible-toters don’t have anything in common with social moderates in the GOP, but they all come together when they have to and rally around meaningless slogans.

Compassionate conservative? Count them in.

Terrorists hate freedom? Sounds good.

Tax cuts and smaller government? You don’t even have to deliver the goods. Conservatives just love the sound of the words.

The Democrats have no slogan, no idea, as ingeniously simplistic as those of the Republicans. Bill Clinton had a bridge to the 21st century, but Al Gore fell off it chasing soccer moms--or was it NASCAR dads? -- while trying to hold onto the Democratic base, whatever that might be.

I had the unforgettable experience of seeing this up close, because I traveled with Gore four years ago for Time magazine and watched as he managed to blow a lifetime of breeding and experience.

One day Gore was the worldly chap who had grown up in D.C., the next day he was Country Al, boots and all, waxing about his dusty childhood on a Tennessee farm. He even changed his voice when critics said he seemed a bit dispassionate, developing a frighteningly awkward wail.

One night, while stuck somewhere between wonk and wrangler, Gore pulled off the miracle of losing a debate to W, proving to one and all that brains will get you nowhere in politics.

With prodding, as well as blistering critiques, Kerry has seemed a little more sure of himself this week, particularly on domestic issues. Maybe that -- if not the spiraling chaos in Iraq -- has moved him up in the polls.

But he still seems uncomfortable and uncertain out there, as if under all that hair, he’s got a transmitter with Al Gore on the other end. The other day on the radio with Don Imus, Kerry was asked about getting American troops home from Iraq.

“What you ought to be doing -- and what everybody in America ought to be doing -- today is not asking me,” Kerry said. “They ought to be asking the president: What is your plan?”

Even if he’d tried, Kerry could not have come up with a more harebrained answer. All he had to say is that he foolishly bought into the president’s justification for war, and soon as possible, he’ll get us out of that mess and fight a true war against actual terrorists.

“We’re asking you,” Imus persisted, “because you want to be president.”

Kerry’s response?

“I can’t tell you what I’m going to find on the ground on Jan. 20.”

How about his political career?

A few more answers like that, and he can share a lifetime of what-ifs with Al Gore.

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Steve Lopez writes Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. Reach him at steve.lopez@latimes.com