If Whitman wants to interpret the Bush margin as a sign of weakness, she should be reminded of the following factors: Perceptions of the economy were not good, those right track/wrong track poll numbers were awful, presidential approval ratings were lackluster, the stock market was sluggish, gas prices were high, the Iraq war didn’t win any popularity contests, the media was wildly hostile, and the pro-Kerry forces actually outspent the pro-Bush forces. It’s astonishing that Bush won by any margin at all–to say nothing of the fact that he got a bigger percentage of the popular vote than any Democratic candidate in decades.