Thursday, September 30, 2004
(11:10 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
Debate Discussion
My initial reaction, listening to it on the radio, was that Kerry did a much better job but that he missed several opportunities to really tear into Bush. The president sounded annoyed much of the time and repeated himself to no end. Bush wasn't a complete failure in terms of thinking on his feet, but it always seemed to be superficial things like his remarks about what he likes about Kerry personally or when he would sometimes exploit an awkward wording of Kerry -- clearly Kerry had a much firmer mastery of the facts. It'll probably take more than just this debate to convince those undecided voters who aren't dead-set on Bush but who aren't yet ready to embrace Kerry, but it seems like a step in the right direction.I browsed a few of the blogs, including Instapundit, who called it a draw. Josh Marshall agress. Ogged details the ways in which the president is a skilled debater. Matt Yglesias seems to have taken the same position as me -- a win, but not as big a win as it could have been. Andrew Sullivan, whom I will not link, thinks that if this was the first direct introduction most people will have had to Kerry (and I suspect it is), then he succeeded admirably in proving the Bush campaign's parody of him incorrect. But again, Kerry didn't go in for the kill when he should have.
Overall: Kerry did well and has room to improve, whereas it seems like what we saw from Bush is basically what we've always seen from Bush and what we're always going to see. This might sound overoptimistic, but tonight I felt like it was Kerry's election to lose. If we could somehow have an electoral process with several debates like this and without political smear ads and "media analysis," not only would Kerry win in this particular instance, but our democratic process would be in much better shape. Tonight momentarily gave me confidence that maybe politics can be about ideas in addition to personality.
Still, Dean would have been the better choice.
