With four days left in the election, John Kerry is reaching into his back pocket to pull out the political trump card that will shore up the youth vote, thus guaranteeing his victory over President Bush.

Enter Leonardo DiCaprio.

That’s right. The blond pretty-boy of middle school fame is now stumping for Kerry on college campuses in our beloved home state. I’m sure that Leo’s deft handling of complex political issues will surely be what it takes to attract the undecided voters to the Kerry camp. Although, if I were Kerry, I would have thought twice before enlisting the “Titanic” star to steer my campaign to victory. The “sinking ship” pun comes to mind just a little too quickly. Was Jonathan Taylor Thomas unavailable?

Of course, Kerry has more than good looks on his side. No political campaign would be complete without a healthy dose of scare tactics. Kerry has been aided and abetted by Deaniac-turned-conspiracy-theorist Tom Harkin’s strategically timed letter to the Iowa State Daily and by a widely circulated e-mail myth, both claiming that the Bush Administration has a secret plan to reinstate the draft.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Bush has stated plainly that “we’re not going to have a draft. Period.” He has repeatedly said that he wants the all-volunteer army to stay all-volunteer, and he has increased military pay in order to keep it that way. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield emphatically shuns the idea of the draft, which should come as no surprise, since it was then-U.S. Rep. Rumsfield who first authored legislation that made the conscripted army an all-volunteer army three decades ago.

Yet Kerry has done nothing to dispel the draft myth. Instead, he told The Des Moines Register that if Bush is re-elected, there is “great potential of a draft.”

What all this suggests is that the Kerry campaign doesn’t see college students as adults capable of making important decisions but as a bunch of kids who can be bought off with ramen noodles, hypnotized with star power and, if all else fails, scared into voting.

By contrast, the Bush campaign has employed persuasion, not manipulation. Young people are attracted to his willingness to tackle important political issues. The president believes that, as society changes, governmental policies must change with it. For this reason, Bush responded to the archaic part of the tax code that assumed that married women didn’t work outside the home by eliminating the marriage penalty tax.

He also saw that in this economy, people move frequently from one job to the next, such that the traditional employer-provided health care system is inadequate. In response, Bush made it possible for many people to own their own tax-free medical savings account.

Also, Bush won’t let young people bear all of the burden for the Social Security system and reap none of the benefit. He has proposed voluntary personal retirement accounts for young workers so that people can have ownership of their retirement savings and control over how it is invested.

Compare Bush’s plan with Kerry’s bold “Three Pillars” plan outlined on his own Web site: “Grow the economy; Restore Fiscal Discipline; Bipartisan Process.” Social Security is going bankrupt, but never fear! John Kerry will save it by reaching across the aisle and giving John McCain a hug.

More important than any of Bush’s domestic policy reforms is his commitment to bring about a safer world, free from the fear of terrorism. Under his leadership, 50 million people who once lived under despotic rule in Afghanistan and Iraq have been liberated. Two countries that were once enemies of the United States are now being rid of their terrorist elements and are on the way toward democratic rule. Bush has made our country safer by fighting the war on terror on the offense.

Kerry still has the old view of fighting terrorism, that it should be a law-enforcement operation instead of a military operation, that we should reduce terrorism to the level of “nuisance,” that if only we inspected enough ship containers and funded the first responders, then nothing bad will ever happen to us.

So, college students, when you vote, make your decision on substance. Vote for the candidate whose vision and leadership will steer this country well, or else you may find yourself on a sinking ship with John Kerry at the helm.

Nicole Asmussen is a senior in political science from Omaha. She is the vice president of the ISU College Republicans.