The Third Debate
I just watched the debate and took in a little reaction from Andrew Sullivan and Kevin Drum. I agree with Drum that Bush denying he said he wasn't worried about Osama will probably get a lot of play over the next few days. The commercial where he says precisely that has been getting a lot of airtime here and Bush's statement tonight is clearly false to people who have seen that commercial. Right now the commercial includes Bush saying he wants Osama dead or alive followed by him saying, "I don’t know where he is. Nor — you know, I just don’t spend that much time on him really, to be honest with you. I....I truly am not that concerned about him." Tonight Bush said, "Gosh, I just don't think I ever said I'm not worried about Osama bin Laden. It's kind of one of those exaggerations." Unless they want to delve into Clintonian parsing and contend that 'worry' is not 'concern,' this is going to be a little embarassing. Probably not more than embarassing, but also not less.
The narrative that seems to have developed for the Kerry campaign through the debates is that in the first debate Kerry broke through the stereotype as a flip-flopper and established himself as a viable alternative to the incumbent. In the second debate Kerry showed that although he is no Bill Clinton he can interact with people and give more responsive answers to their questions. And tonight, as also in the second debate, Kerry spoke mostly to undecided voters while Bush was forced to speak to his base.
I think tonight Bush made some attempts to speak to the middle and try to find his compassionate conservatism with all the educational policies he talked about, but I think Kerry was able to address a much larger audience. Bush did well tonight for the message he was trying to send, but ultimately it's not as effective because he limited his audience.
Update: Josh Marshall thinks Bush's gaffe will be more than embarassing. He also has the transcript from the press conference where Bush said he wasn't concerned about Osama that shows that it isn't at all taken out of context. It was, as the Kerry criticism claims, a reflection of the removal of the spotlight from Osama and its refocus on Saddam.
Another thing. Does Bush really not know that this ad is running? How could he make the statement he made tonight if he knows that this ad is running? Could he really be that sheltered from the outside world?
Update 2: Kevin Drum has the same thought as I did about the sheltering. The Bush Cocoon. He also has a good roundup of insta-polls from the debate:
The narrative that seems to have developed for the Kerry campaign through the debates is that in the first debate Kerry broke through the stereotype as a flip-flopper and established himself as a viable alternative to the incumbent. In the second debate Kerry showed that although he is no Bill Clinton he can interact with people and give more responsive answers to their questions. And tonight, as also in the second debate, Kerry spoke mostly to undecided voters while Bush was forced to speak to his base.
I think tonight Bush made some attempts to speak to the middle and try to find his compassionate conservatism with all the educational policies he talked about, but I think Kerry was able to address a much larger audience. Bush did well tonight for the message he was trying to send, but ultimately it's not as effective because he limited his audience.
Update: Josh Marshall thinks Bush's gaffe will be more than embarassing. He also has the transcript from the press conference where Bush said he wasn't concerned about Osama that shows that it isn't at all taken out of context. It was, as the Kerry criticism claims, a reflection of the removal of the spotlight from Osama and its refocus on Saddam.
Another thing. Does Bush really not know that this ad is running? How could he make the statement he made tonight if he knows that this ad is running? Could he really be that sheltered from the outside world?
Update 2: Kevin Drum has the same thought as I did about the sheltering. The Bush Cocoon. He also has a good roundup of insta-polls from the debate:
WHO WON?....The post-debate polls are solidly in Kerry's favor:
CNN/USA Today/Gallup: Kerry wins 53%-39%.
CBS News poll of uncommitted voters: Kerry wins 39%-25%
ABC News: Kerry wins 42%-41%, even though their audience leaned heavily Republican.
Democracy Corps: Kerry wins 41%-36%.
That's by far the biggest win for Kerry of the three debates. By next week I'll bet Kerry is 3-4 points ahead of Bush in nearly every poll.
Needless to say, this means that Karl Rove's October Surprise will be unveiled soon. But what will it be?
posted by joe at
8:13 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home