I thought this one was a clear victory for Bush, which seems to defy all manner of Conventional Wisdom in its implications. Bush was supposed to be strongest on national defense, weakest on domestic policy, while John Kerry was supposed to be the Yin to that Yang. In my opinion, the debates played out quite differently, at least on style.
Bush lost the nat. def.-focused debate on style points, although I thought his substance was on target and Kerry was way off. Most pundits called the second debate a draw, although I thought that Bush edged Kerry in the town hall format. I really think Bush won last night on style and substance. Kerry looked tired and seemed to be on autopilot. That may have allowed Kerry to come across as a good debater, but it almost de-humanized him. He looked wooden, stiff, tired, and he fumbled with his answers far more often than in the previous two.
People seem to forget that Bush ran on a largely domestic agenda in 2000. He had met with some measures of success while governor of Texas and was looking to expand some of those successes on a national level. Had it not been for 9/11, this President wouldn’t be a “wartime” president. I imagine that, barring 9/11 and our response to it, we would be seeing a very different race at this point, with perhaps a Lieberman or a Gephardt running to the right of a sitting GOP President and enjoying a comfortable lead.
However, I think the biggest issue to come out of the night will end up being Kerry’s ill-conceived, crassly-delivered moment of gay-baiting. Not only has he managed to tick off both Cheneys, but he has drawn the ire of numerous bloggers (and even a lot of non-bloggers, it would seem), with the odd exception of Andrew Sullivan, of course, to whom issues of gay rights are of utter importance when it comes to not supporting George Bush. One would think that he, above most, would find the notion that a presidential candidate even attempted to use the fact that a couple’s daughter is gay as “damaging” evidence against a ticket to be insulting and horrifically demeaning in the extreme.
The Kerry campaign’s hamfisted response actually doesn’t surprise me much, nor does the mainstream media’s swallowing of their story hook, line and sinker. If you think the media isn’t pulling for Kerry this time around, just imagine of Bush had made some crack involving Kerry’s divorce and how it must have wreaked havoc upon his girls. Oh, the caterwauling that would have commenced!
The media does seem to be solidly spinning the debate as “another” Kerry “victory” at this point, though.
I guess we’ll see if Kerry’s crack ends up being a bigger deal than the debate itself over the next few days.
