October 1, 2004
Debate Round Up
The first presidential debate is over and now the fun really begins. It's time for all the analysis, fact checking, second guessing, and partisan spin that this town is famous for.
The Posts' Howard Kurtz offers up a national round up in this morning's Media Notes column, saying that "[i]t was, in fact, a relentlessly serious debate -- Iraq, Iran, Sudan, North Korea -- in which both Bush and Kerry, both wearing American flag lapel pins, tried mightily to project an image of strength."
The W.Times wasn't nearly as forgiving as the Post apparently. Their headline this morning reads: "Bush rips Iraq flip-flops"
Of course, the bloggers have weighed in as well.
Talking Points reports: The DNC has up 'Faces of Frustration' -- a compilation of presidential grimaces, moments of pique, agitation, impatience and anger. 'Hey, why do I have to be up? I'm the president! What'd you say about me? I'm the president!'
And just to be fair, Andrew Sullivan has this to say about Bush's performance: When asked to skewer Kerry's character, he was classy and genuine. His anecdote about the war widow was heartfelt and poignant. He had a few good lines - and skewered Kerry easily on the $87 billion. He also kicked Kerry's elegant Brahmin butt on the coalition point, reminding him that Poland exists."
(Missed the debate? Read the transcript.)
So who do you think won? Did Kerry run away with it? Did Bush win your vote? And why were the ladies (Laura and Teresa) wearing matching outfits?
Gothamist on the debates.
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I am so glad I wasn't the only one who noted the matching outfits for the wives.
I thought Kerry took the night pretty handily, finally an opportunity for him to get on the right side of a style vs. substance debate. Everyone says in the media that while Bush might seem like an idiot he's not really an idiot but he seemed rather effusively idiotic last night.
i was really impressed with the quality of the debate really. i thought i'd be really frustrated with both of the candidates, but Kerry did amazingly well and all Bush had to do was not mess up too much. and yeah, how emabarrasing for the wives to be wearing almost exactly the same outfit!
I think Kerry won the debate, but Bush won "the message" --- that he relentlessly pounded home all night.
And that unfortunate "global test" line will surely find its way to a few commercials.
The "global test" line sounded bad, but if you read the transcript, it is a very good statement. He talks about having the country know what they are getting into before going to war, but also about being able to tell the world later that we did the right thing. And if you think about it, Bush fails on both counts - since the war turned out to not be about WMDs, and Powell ended up retracting his statments to the UN.