John Kerry

But I think Kerry's calculation, if he made one, proved right, in this sense: yes he caught flak for that vote, but mainly during the primaries, from those who supported primary rivals or had other reasons for not liking him. In fact they're the ones who still make a big deal about that vote, Dems still looking for a reason to dislike him.

But Kerry won the primaries and if anything his IWR vote had a favorable effect in the general as it buffered the swift-boat charges from the far right. Now those I believe had a real effect, even though all the charges were false, because they hit the national press just as Kerry was trying to define himself for the general election. And while he recovered he didn't build a head of steam in time to make an election theft too obvious to attempt.