Well, the WaPo's Jim VandeHei and Howard Kurtz have the scoop on Kerry's strategy of fearmongering:

With voters expressing anxiety about Iraq, nuclear attacks and the threat of terrorism in the first presidential election since Sept. 11, 2001, John F. Kerry and his supporters are adopting President Bush's strategy of playing on the public's security fears and sometimes using incendiary charges to stoke them.

Kerry, the Democratic National Committee and party officials have warned voters in recent weeks, sometimes without evidence, that a second Bush term could lead to greater casualties and another Vietnam in Iraq, a military draft, a secret call-up of reservists and even a nuclear attack on U.S. soil. They are also suggesting Osama bin Laden could remain a haunting and elusive threat unless the Democratic presidential nominee takes charge.

How dare the Democratic candidate attempt to front on Bush's mad "fear" tip? Doesn't Kerry understand that all terror--such as beheadings and dirty bombs, but particularly mushroom clouds, dudes who use WMDs against "their own people," and guys who dip babies in vats of boiling oil--are the exclusive property of president Bush? Hasn't Grover Norquist successfully petitioned for the patenting of the mushroom cloud as a GOP logo? What are these Kerry people thinking? Why are they trying to get all up in president Bush's fear junk? Why are they riding his terror-bling?

Well, the "strategy" won't work. Not only because the warnings are given "sometimes without evidence" (the irony, after three years of outright lies from Bush about the dangers posed to Americans by terrorists, Saddam, and every goddamn other thing, is too obvious to note). The main problem is that Kerry just doesn't understand the strategy's principle, which is that mushroom clouds and beheadings are a good thing.

Get it? Yeah, Bush goes around frightening his cowardly sheep in the heartland with stories of death and mayhem--but the reason the sheep accept the fear is that it's not only fun, it's good! It represents that we still have something left to live for, that even you, Mrs. Crabtree, in Dubuque, might just yet be important and significant enough to die a violent death at the hands of evildoers! (Or at least watch it happen on TV.) The mushroom cloud is scary as shit, yeah, and you better get in line because of that--but gosh no it's not bad. The mushroom cloud--like the shock and awe, and the torture at Abu Ghraib--represents the highest aspirations of America. That we can be such bad, righteous motherfuckers that the whole world wants a piece! And well, the entire Arab world just bought itself a can of Holy Whoopass, courtesy of Jesus Christ, who has personally instructed us to defeat the Mohammedan and die in a fiery bloodbath doing it.

Whereas Kerry: Mushroom cloud bad; must fix problem. Get your priorities straight, Senator. Fearmongering isn't meant to be a form of castigating (the present system) or proposing reform (boring) or educating the public about the facts of this crazy national security situation. It's about cheerleading. Cheerleading for America, for the mushroom cloud, for the beheading, for all the holy grandeur of mass death, over which the eagle soars, free. It's about fun. That's why Bush, that little cheerleading party-boy puss, is so good at it!