Nothing But Words

I’m positing Kerry as the Irresistable Force, and Bush as the Immovable Object. Kerry did three or four mock debates in preparation for last night. Bush did one, on Tuesday. Why just one? Because he didn’t come to debate, he came to recite his stump speech (he spent the past few days campaigning rather than practicing for the debate). And that’s exactly what he did: regardless of the question, he stuck to his talking points. This is obvious from reviewing the debate transcript. Bush was ready to talk about health care, taxes, security, education, and not much else:

• Lost your job? Youth education.
• Job losses in general? Tax relief (so you can keep more of the money you’re not making, apparently).
• Paying for Bush’s idea to privatize Social Security? Four years after I suggested it, we’re looking into it, in a very non-specific kind of way.
• Raising the minimum wage? The No Child Left Behind Act.
• Overturning Roe v. Wade? Next question please (he only used about 15 seconds of his 2 minutes).
• Banning assault weapons? Lock up people who commit crimes with guns (I think he only used about half of his 2 minutes).
• Affirmative action? Pell grants, small business loans.

Bush was steadfast in not straying from his memorized points, even when he couldn’t think of a good way to link them to the question.

In contrast, Kerry was on his game for most of the night. In reaction to his rapid-fire, fact-filled answer to the lost jobs question, Bush actually said “Whew!” I think he wanted to follow that up with some kind of joke about Kerry being too wordy, but then realized it probably wouldn’t play well. After a bit of a slow start, Kerry’s answers were fast-paced and filled with facts and figures. That may have come across as dry, but I think it plays well into building up his “Presidential” credibility. The guy knows his stuff.

However, I think Kerry missed a couple of opportunities. 1. When Bush was hammering on his supposedly lackluster Senate record, I don’t know why Kerry didn’t respond by talking about some of his key accomplishments: unravelling the BCCI money-laundering scandal (and taking on some top people in his party to do it), the initial investigations that established the link between Iran and the Contras in the 80s, and his key role in normalizing relations with Vietnam. 2. Bush kept coming back to his heavily spun numbers about Kerry’s votes to raise taxes. Republicans have cited several very different numbers on this – they can’t even keep their spin consistent. Kerry could have effectively lampooned that.

Overall, those are just minor points. The key accomplishment for Kerry last night was not on policy matters, it was on the personal. He made the most of the opportunities he was given to talk about his faith, about being a hunter, and about his family. In the first two debates he really had to focus on demonstrating his qualifications and capabilities. By last night’s debate he had some breathing room to just talk about himself, and he did it well.