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October 1, 2004
The First Debate
Perhaps the most insightful comment was one that I read on National Review's blog The Corner:
ON THEIR KNEES [Tim Graham]Surely accurate. However, as a confirmed conservative egghead and blogger, I'll go ahead and provide some analysis.
An old friend nailed it for me:Plain and simple. The conservative eggheads are overanalyzing and the liberals are praying.
The president knows what he is doing and believes in it. Kerry will say anything he thinks is different than Bush.
Bottom line is that Kerry says: I would have done what the president did but better.
My bottom line analysis is that Bush won on substance, Kerry on style. Kerry's positions are so contradictory and full of holes that they cannot stand up to any serious scrutiny. Bush could have done without the occasional sighing and looking annoyed or distracted.
The Bad News
Let's also just get the negatives for Bush out of the way right away. Bush takes time to warm to his subject. When asked a question, he at first hesitates and stumbles. It takes a noticable few seconds for his thoughts to form as to what he wants to say. Once he get's going, however, he's fine. His um's and ah's do not help. The worst part were the loud sighs before he spoke. At times he even sounded too defensive, never a good thing.
Further, Kerry sounded decisive. He knew what he wanted to say and said it well. He is a good speaker and avoided Al Gore's mistakes. The good news for Democrats is that their candidate did better than they feared, and on a subject that is supposed to be home turf for Republicans. If the Democrats are looking for a reason to cheer, last night gave it to them.
The Good News
The first bit of good news is what we knew it would be; Kerry's positions will not stand up to serious scrutiny.
The second bit is that even thought the elite media will "score" the debates as if they were judging a college event, the reality is that the average person at home doesn't see it that way. Some will be taken by Kerry's smoothness, but most others I believe look for honesty and "genuiness" (I know, an overused term. It even sounds like psychobabble but it is still useful sometimes). I'm therefore going to ignore what the elite media say and leave that job to others who will do it much better than I.
Further, we need to remember that it is easier to attack than to defend. By my take the moderator, Jim Lehrer, did not ask Kerry any questions about his record relating to national security. He got a free pass. And almost by definition, there are some things that will not have gone right over the course of four years. Bush had a record to defend, Kerry had only to attack. Criticism is cheap.
Lastly, in order to believe that Kerry "won", you have to ignore the substance of what he actually said.
But before I delve into substance, however, Bush did do well in some aspects of the "style" department, and these should not be ignored. He was quick to respond to Kerry's attacks, and asked the moderator for a response many times. He called Kerry on a number of his mistakes and poorly thought out positions and responded clearly. As I said earlier, once he gets going he is good. Although he somewhat fumbled the first question, his response to Kerry on the second one was strong.
It is clear that Kerry, like Gore and Clinton before him, will say whatever it takes to get elected. He'll read the polls and study the focus groups and change his position day by day, if necessary. He was tough-talking before the war, but careful not to commit himself too deeply. Once the insurgency started he tries to tell us that oh no, it was all a mistake.
Kerry tried to tell us that he has had "one consistent position", but that is laughable. As Glenn Reynolds pointed out during the debate on his website;
KERRY PUTS HIS FOOT IN IT: The President says that even knowing there were no weapons of mass destruction he would have gone in the same way. I would not.He'll hold a summit. Don't you know that "summit's" are the answer to all our problems?Er, but Kerry said he would have gone to war even knowing there were no weapons of mass destruction.
And how's Kerry going to "change" the fact that North Korea has nuclear weapons?
All those "Allies"
And as I've said before, for a guy who talks incessantly about how he's going to reach out to all of these supposed allies, and hold all these summits, he sure insults other countries a lot. Well, ok, he hasn't insulted France or Germany. He only insults those countries who are actually helping us. The ones who actively work against us he compliments.
Also, for all Kerry's talk about lining up allies, his record speaks just the opposite in this regard. John Kerry voted against the resolution authorizing George H W Bush to use force to eject Saddam Hussein from Kuwait in what became the Gulf War. And this vote took place after we had lined up all of the nations that Kerry today thinks are so important. Bush Sr also had the UN firmly behind him, something that Kerry also ignored then.
So much for Kerry's talk last night about a "Global Test."
Rushing to War
Perhaps Kerry's most absurd charge, and one we hear from the left in general, is that we "rushed to war" with Iraq.
In response to Lehrer's question reagarding what he thought were Bush's "collossal misjudgements", Kerry said that we should have gone to war only as a " last resort". He said that we should have continued the inspections, that we had Saddam trapped. I went to war, he said. I know what it is about We could have used that money on healthcare. And Iraq is not the center of terrorism.
Wrong on all counts, senator. As a theoretical one can always say that there are more options, that we can give diplomacy or sanctions one more chance. Talk like this is cheap and easy to make for those who do not have to make actual decisions. History is littered with examples; Lincoln could have tried diplomacy and a simple blockade of the South, McKinley could have tried the same with regards to Spain, and Churchhill could have given in to Halifax and sought accomodation with Hitler.
And of course the notation that we had Saddam "trapped" is absurd. As John McCain pointed out during the Republican convention, the sanctions were falling apart. France and Russia had proposed that we weaken the sanctions. Iraq was gaining sympathy throughout much of the Arab/Muslim world on the charge that the sanctions were "killing babies", which in a way, they were, given how Saddam stole billions for his secret military programs. The idea that there was a stable status quo is laughable. Let's also not forget the "Oil for Food" scandal, which gives us reason to believe that influential people within countries such as France and Russia were bought off with millions of dollars.
On World Respect
Back to the classics. John Kerry would do well to consider these words:
Here the question arises; whether it is better to be loved than feared or feared than loved. the answer is that it would be desireable to be both, but, since that is difficult, it is much safer to be feared than loved, if one much choose.Yes it would be nice if we could have a great big coalition, with others kicking in billions of dollars. But let's remember that the price of those coalitions is a "lowest common denominator", whereby the whole must acquiese to the weakest member. And the price in 1991 was a decision to stop at ejecting Saddam Hussein from Kuwait and not to finish the job.Machiavelli, "The Prince"
Iran and North Korea
Kerry will apparently give nuclear material to the mullahs. An alert blogger (not me!) caught this last night during the debate.
I think the United States should have offered the opportunity to provide the nuclear fuel, test them, see whether or not they were actually looking for it for peaceful purposes. If they weren't willing to work a deal, then we could have put sanctions together.
It is statements like these that truely reveal how clueless Kerry really is.
Regarding North Korea, he is going to give Kim Il Sung exactly what he wants; face-to-face talks with the United States. What does he think will be gained by this? They broke every promise they made to Bill Clinton when he tried a 'carrot and stick' approach. Kerry buys into the "broken telephone" theory of international relations, which says that if only we can all sit down together we can talk it out and resolve our differences.... grrr.
Attacking Mexico
During the debate Kerry said that attacking Iraq as a response to 9/11 was like FDR attacking Mexico as a response to Pearl Harbor.
Uh, senator, after Pearl Harbor we also fought Germany and Italy. What did they have to do with Pearl Harbor? As I've pointed out earlier, the Axis treaty that they had with Japan was defensive, with one party only obliged to come to the aid of the others if they were attacked. Japan abrogated this treaty with its attack on Pearl Harbor. And of course there is ample evidence that Saddam was in fact supporting terrorism well before the 9/11 attacks.
That's all for now, got to run. More later. Also, I can't get spell check to work in blogger, so please excuse the errors!
One place you can find a transcript of the entire debate is here.
Posted by Tom at October 1, 2004 10:30 AM
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