October 1, 2004
Brief thoughts on the 1st debate
Some brief thoughts on the first presidential debate, before the talking heads try to destroy my memory of what I heard and replace it with meaningless fluff about who had better nose hair and who made more points with the key Floridian over-65-black-helicopter-mom vote.
First off, I was very impressed with Kerry. He was decisive, plain-spoken, and specific in his plans and priorities. I was especially impressed by his pragmatic position on Iraq — I figure anyone who still claims Kerry has a shifting or incoherent position on Iraq must either be completely shilling for the other side or be especially dense. Our foreign policy is something of a mess right now, and before this debate I was still thinking of Kerry as a "he can't mess it up more than the current guy" candidate. I've changed my tune now, and at least on foreign-policy issues I'm confident he knows what he's doing and can put things to right.
I also left the debate with a better opinion about who Bush as a person. The thing that has always confused me about Bush is his tenacious loyalty to an idea, policy or statement even after it's clear to everyone else in the world that it's wrong. The venomous theory that it all comes out of Rove-induced "Big Lie" manipulation tactics has never seemed right. Certainly there are party-faithful on both sides capable of such evil, but Bush isn't an evil man. He's also not blind or stupid, so the idea that he can't see any of his administration's mistakes due to a thick "What, me worry?" fog seems far-fetched as well.
Now I think I get it. As he said in many ways in this debate, Bush believes the most important thing a president or country must do is present to the world a strong, confident stance and an unwavering message. Unfortunately, he doesn't have the experience or skill to avoid backing himself (and us) into a corner. A noble man sticks to his principles, but a skillful noble man knows not to draw a line in the sand until he's good and ready for whatever may step across.
This may be my own bias, and I listened to the event rather than watch it, but several times during the debate Bush sounded... trapped. Not by Kerry, but by the events of these past three-and-a-half years. I heard in his voice tonight something I heard in the secret audio recordings of Lyndon B. Johnson — the sound of a man who knows he's out of his depth, but also firmly believes that he needs to keep up a strong face for the good of his country. I sympathize with the man. He's absolutely right, being President is a hard job, and I know for a fact that I would not be up to the task. But as much as I'm coming to like George W. Bush as a man, I'm all the more convinced we need someone else as President.
Posted by bug to Politics at October 1, 2004 2:19 AM | TrackBackI agree with what you heard in the debate. The visual underscored it. Bush looked uncertain at times, and frustrated. The fact that he came out the next day with a one hour stump speech using all the zingers he wished he'd said also points to his need to present his case (helped by skillful writers) rather than thoughtfully examine it. I would say that a noble man, while sticking to his principles, spends time analyzing not only his tactics, but his principles to make sure they jibe with reality.
Judy PS, love your blog
Posted by: Judy Rhodes at October 7, 2004 11:50 AMI know that I am not shilling for the other side and am reasonably confident that I am not especially dense, but I think that both Kerry and Edwards have been all over the map on Iraq and the war on terrorists. For months, I have followed links to original statements, etc. and firmly believe that they have contradicted themselves many, many times. They have also made some exceptionally dumb statements such as “the coalition of the coerced and bribed” and “global test” (yes, I have read the whole text of the debate statement) that have shown a triumph of the worst of partisan politics over common sense.
Do we have any good choices? No, but at least the Bush Administration’s foreign policy is constant and ignores the self interest of the French and the corrupt UN administration of Annin (see the latest report on Iraq’s bribery just out today).
Any plans for the hollidays yet? We'd love to get lots of family together.
Posted by: Frank at October 7, 2004 12:54 PMWhen I heard the "global test" comment, it sounded to me like he was about to say "it has to pass the smell test" (or perhaps "the straight-face test," or something like that) and then thought better of it and settled on the rather unfortunate "global test" comment. The overall message was clear to me though — if we're going to preemptively strike a sovereign nation, we have to pass the credibility test. It's not only the moral thing to do, it's not only the practical thing to do in terms of maintaining our reputation. It's the smart thing to do in terms of our national security. Because if we can't even convince our own allies, who share our cultural, moral and even religious values, of the credibility of our reasons for acting, then there's a good chance that our reasons are dead wrong. What we've seen so far with Iraq is the perfect case study for that.
As for Kerry's position on the war, if he's flip-flopped on his position on the war so much why is it only the Right that think his position has changed? I don't just mean people like me, who agree with Kerry that Iraq needed to be dealt with and that the President probably needed his authorization to use force from Congress in order to negotiate, but that he then made a royal mess of the whole situation. I mean I don't know a single person out here in the liberal bay area who hasn't known from day one that Kerry wasn't completely against the war and more importantly that he wasn't going to pull out troops any time soon. If the Dean and Kucinich supporters don't think he's flip-flopped, and if in theory they're the ones he was flip-flopping in order to woo, why on Earth do Bush supporters think he's flip-flopped? (I mean, besides the obvious answer of "because the Bush campaign keeps repeating it.")
Posted by: Bug at October 7, 2004 11:59 PM