Well if you watched the debate to night you saw a President Bush rather handily defeat Senator Kerry on both substance and style.
From the opening question Senator Kerry launched in to an angry accusatory attack on the President. The President showing what truly great leaders are made of landed a huge blow on substance laying out the many changing positions of the Senator on almost every issue and calling him to task on how the tax cuts have enormously benefited EVERYONE in the current economic recovery we are in.
It was like watching a heavyweight championship fight when the champion lands a knockdown blow which the challenger tasks the standing 8 count for and never recovers or clears the fog from his head for the rest of the match.
What was different tonight from the first debate was that for the first time Senator Kerry was forced to deal with his rather dismal 20 plus year Senate record. He was constantly avoiding and running from his legislative record over the last 20 years. Trying to paint a favorable slant on a unfavorable record to most American's. Senator Kerry would skirt and dance around questions at every opportunity.
One especially poignant line of questioning concerned two key issues. Stemcell research and the abortion question late in the debate. Both questions Senator Kerry seemed to ramble on incoherently trying to say on one hand he is a man of faith but then taking very unfaith based stands on both issues. In both cases not really seeming thoroughly committed to his answer. It was especially interesting to her Senator Kerry make the statement about not invoking his personal beliefs on others in light of The Pope's call today for Catholic's to present their faith more strongly in public?
The stemcell debate hits home with me and I am in total agreement with the President. As a diabetic I would greatly benefit by any gains made in the research from stemcell's. But as a Christian and a voter, and in that order (contrary to some popular beliefs going around in the blogsphere), I support the Presidents policy of choosing life over research, ethics over science. It is important to do the research but use the 70 or so existing lines that are available, Senator Kerry's claims of 11 to 20 is totally wrong. I don't not want to benefit from the unethically harvesting of innocent life for my health gain.
basically the whole night comes down to the fact that the President was on his game and the Senator never recovered from the early knockdown by the President. The President was in command of the facts and details will Senator Kerry grasped for words and catchy campaign slogans or his standard "go to my website" for more information on my plans. Kerry skirted and mislead the debate audience and national audience with misleading statements and conflicting accounts of his 20 year voting record that again his was finally called into account on and was found to be quite lacking. The key line to sum it up was the one the President repeatedly hammered him with, "you can run, but you can't hide."
The President was on message and in control of the facts and details all night. Some key points he made was the linkage and connections to Saddam Hussein, France, Germany, Russia and the UN and the corruption link and their direct misleading of the inspectors through the "Oil for Food" program.
His linkage of the rising cost of healthcare and the billions made by John Edwards in driving up those cost to where they are now was another knockdown blow to the Kerry/Edwards record as was Kerry's 20 plus non-record on Tort reform which he know wants to embrace for political gain. With a trail lawyer on the ticket do you really believe that will happen?
Great lines tonight:
"If he won the war in Kosovo, why are we still there?" - President Bush, refer to Senator's Kerry's claim of backing from General Wesley Clark who Kerry said won the war in Kosovo.
"I own a lumber company, that is news to me, wanna buy some wood?" -President Bush on Kerry's claim the President owned a lumber company and received $84 in dividends.
"The war on terror is not just Osama Bin Laden, it is stopping WMD's everywhere." President Bush.
Key to the whole night was the focus on Senator Kerry's 20 + year Liberal voting record and pushing the "he's a liberal" line. Obviously they have tested this line and it works and also the Democrat's have tested it and know it works against them and are trying to distance Senator Kerry from it. Mark this down this will be driven home time and time again until election day.
Final thought, the President score early and often and the Senator never was able to clear his head or get off his heals.
Bush wins tonight on both style and substance.
Bush - 2 Kerry - 1
p.s. Drudge has an internal ABCNEWS memo instructing their news team to "Help Kerry win this election."
No liberal bias there is there.
1 comment:
Your understanding of Bush's policies has to be seriously revised by now. The middle class shrunk in his second term, partially because of his tax cut policies. I am also a Christian.
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