By Carly Hawkins

“Debate” is perhaps a strong word for what took place on Thursday night at the University of Miami between two of the presidential nominees – Senator John Kerry, the Democrat, and President George W. Bush, the Republican. Through a detailed agreement, neither candidate was to pose direct questions or to address each other at all. One CNN talking head aptly described the event as a bi-partisan press conference.

            Nevertheless, the hour and a half debate gave voters a chance to compare Kerry and Bush in a live, unadulterated way, without the media filter. In the end, the presidential debates are not about ideas or what a candidate says. They are now about image and the post-debate spin from each campaign. Bush’s people, who historically are able to dominate media perception, dropped the ball this time and Kerry was able to walk away with an important mental and perceptual victory.

            Bush’s campaign banked on the first debate, as in 2000, having the highest viewership, and pushed for foreign policy to be the sole topic of discussion. This is an area where polls indicate Bush is overshadowing Kerry in the eyes of the American people. He should’ve pounded Kerry, extended his lead, and then no one except for us political junkies would’ve watched the two remaining debates that should favor Kerry’s position. That strategy clearly backfired badly for Bush, as John Kerry rose to the occasion and clearly won the debate.

            Kerry came in to Coral Gables after a hard and disheartening month and a half filled with frustrating polling results and a complete inability to control the message. There was a real feeling among supporters that if Kerry did not manage to blow Bush out of the water on Thursday, the ball game would be essentially over. He didn’t let us down.

            Kerry dominated in both style and substance. He came across as an experienced statesman with a significant handle of the tough issues that currently face the US and an intelligent plan for the future. Meanwhile, our president looked and sounded annoyed at having to condescend to defend his foreign policy record. Kerry’s poise at the podium and the lack of a sympathetic crowd of cheering supporters knocked Bush off his game as well.

            The president had little to offer the American people during the debate except his claim that Kerry sends “mixed messages” and a continual and deliberate effort to blur the line between Iraq and 9-11. He came off as a parrot who knew no other lines, while Kerry answered coherently about his position, past and present, on Iraq, and other subjects.

            While any change in the horserace due to the Kerry victory remains to be seen, it is clear that the Senator came in to the debate ready to be serious and persuasive while Bush’s rhetoric seems like a denial of reality and the significant nationwide dissension his administration faces. Either way, this debate has prompted rather than dampened interest in the next one – coming to you live from nearby Washington University at 8 pm central on Friday, October 8^th. Watch and decide for yourself.

By Andrew Hollingstead

Bush was clearly ahead before the debate. Why the boost for Bush?  Bill Clinton’s chief political advisor throughout most of the 1990’s, James Carville, often framed the political debates of yester-decade by simply arguing, “It’s about the economy, stupid.”  In a post 9/11 world, Bush and his crew have successfully and similarly set the terms of the current election with “It’s about terrorism, stupid.”  With hat in mind, it’s convenient that Bush has portrayed himself, and has been perceived, as a terror warrior.     

On the other hand, Kerry needed a lift from the first debate.  He only received a few points bounce from his convention and has been successfully portrayed as a “flip-flopper” after voting for the Patriot Act and now opposing it and after voting for NAFTA and now opposing the free trade agreement.  On the election’s most pivotal issue, Iraq, Kerry, a long time member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, came out strong, even during the Clinton years, in support of regime change in Iraq, even deploying ground troops to do so.  Kerry voted for the Iraq War authorization, said that he was an anti-war candidate during the primary, and a month ago said on Meet the Press that he would have still voted for the war “given everything that we know now.”  On funding the troops in Iraq, Kerry told MSNBC’s Chris Matthews that no responsible members of the Senate would vote against the $87 billion emergency appropriation the following day.  Kerry voted against the appropriation, and later explained that he “…actually did vote for the $87 billion, before he voted against it.”  What?!

The bottom line is that had John Kerry not straightened out these incoherent positions at the first debate, which focused on foreign policy, he would have been sent back to Massachusetts for some more flag football and “sun tanning” instead of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.  Period. 

I have to give it to Kerry.  He came out with more energy than Bush did and clearly knew that he had to perform.  Bush, on the other hand, reminded me of Ronald Reagan during his first debate with Walter Mondale in 1984.  He seemed tired, and at times frustrated with Kerry’s arguments. It’s quite possible that he was over coached.  He did not come off as the energetic, down to Earth guy who Gore 2000 advisors now concede won over more hearts and minds than their guy did.  Kerry very much looked like a former Yale debater turned prosecutor.  For this, Kerry wins the debate on style.

As a Bush backer, I was frustrated that Bush did not hit Kerry out of the park when Kerry made remarks along the lines that the war in Iraq he voted for was the “wrong war, at the wrong place, at the wrong time” shortly before he’d convince the graft-grubbing Jacques Chirac and Germans to mobilize their highly “robust and competent” militaries to move into Iraq and lay down the law.  Kerry, the staunch multilateralism, then goes on to claim that the U.S. should engage that communist country on the Korean peninsula led by that nut in his pajamas without the assistance of willing participants like China and Japan.  Come on, the Chinese feed the North Koreans.  They would of course help us deal with Pyongyang in order to ensure security in their region and would be strong allies.  Clinton tired to “go it alone” and was conned.  Why would it be different for Kerry?  Bush won on substance not because of anything special that he did, but because Kerry’s stands were nuts.