[Mb-civic] NYTimes.com Article: Standing Firm for 90 Minutes

[swiggard at comcast.net]

The article below from NYTimes.com 
has been sent to you by swiggard at comcast.net.


Personally, I thought Kerry made Bush look dimwitted, dishonest, and physically small.
But I am hardly unbiased. What does the group think?
Peace,
Bill

swiggard at comcast.net


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Standing Firm for 90 Minutes

October 1, 2004
 By TODD S. PURDUM 



 

In the end, it was a real debate: sharp, scrappy and
defining, just what the nation seemed to be yearning for
during a wartime election campaign. Again and again,
President Bush defended his conduct of the war in Iraq,
insisting, "there must be certainty from the U.S.
president." Over and over, Senator John Kerry asserted that
Mr. Bush had led the country into a debacle in Iraq and it
was time for a "fresh start, new credibility" in foreign
affairs. 

>From the very first question last night, Mr. Kerry was
determined to show, as he put it, that "I can make America
safer than President Bush has made us." He was cool,
respectful, rational in offering a detailed brief that Mr.
Bush had embarked on a diversion from the war on Al Qaeda
and global terror by invading Iraq, and his answers never
exceeded the time limits. 

By the time the debate ended, Mr. Kerry appeared to have
accomplished his primary goal for the evening: establishing
himself as a plausible commander in chief. 

Mr. Bush, who seemed defensive and less sure of himself at
the outset, quickly gained his footing, counterpunching
effectively by repeatedly charging that Mr. Kerry was
inconsistent and lacked the resolve to defend the nation
against terrorism. 

He was just as relentless as Mr. Kerry, and perhaps more
emotional, never ceding ground in his insistence that he
had used every available means to defend the nation after
Sept. 11. At times, he seemed to lean into the camera,
pursing his lips, at some pains to disguise his apparent
exasperation at Mr. Kerry's attacks, insisting, as he did
at the outset, "People know where I stand." 

At one point, Mr. Bush burst out a spontaneous answer to a
question that Mr. Kerry had posed only rhetorically,
declaring before the moderator, Jim Lehrer, had recognized
him, "Of course we're doing everything we can to protect
America." At another point, after Mr. Bush justified his
use of pre-emptive military action by saying "the enemy
attacked us,'' Mr. Kerry pointed out that that enemy had
not been Saddam Hussein, leading Mr. Bush to jump in to
say, "Of course I know Osama bin Laden attacked us." 

The two agreed that the threat of unconventional weapons in
the hands of rogue actors would be the biggest challenge
facing either of them as president, and that Mr. Hussein
had seemed to pose such a threat. They agreed that the
United States could not pull out of Iraq precipitately. But
they disagreed on virtually all else, from how to handle
what both called genocide in Sudan to nuclear proliferation
in North Korea and Iran. 

Perhaps their sharpest disagreement on future actions came
over North Korea, with Mr. Kerry favoring direct talks with
Pyongyang intended to halt its development of nuclear
weapons and Mr. Bush contending that two-party talks would
be unwise and wreck the regional six-party talks in which
the United States is counting on China's leverage to
pressure the north. 

Facing by far the largest national audience of the campaign
to date, with polls suggesting that something between
one-fifth and one-third of voters might be influenced by
last night's encounter, Mr. Kerry was at pains to rebut the
Bush campaign's portrayal of him as a fickle flip-flopper
who has repeatedly changed his position on the war in Iraq
and would cede too much control of the nation's defenses to
foreign allies. 

When Mr. Bush noted that Mr. Kerry had voted against an $87
billion appropriation for military and reconstruction
operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, then said he had
initially voted for another version, Mr. Kerry's rebuttal
could hardly have been crisper. 

"Well, you know, when I talked about the $87 billion, I
made a mistake in how I talk about the war," Mr. Kerry
said. "But the president made a mistake in invading Iraq.
Which is worse? I believe that when you know something's
going wrong, you make it right. That's what I learned in
Vietnam. When I came back from that war, I saw that it was
wrong. Some people don't like the fact that I stood up to
say so. But I did. And that's what I did with that vote.
And I'm going to lead those troops to victory." 

Mr. Bush was just as blunt in his insistence that Mr.
Kerry's criticism of the conduct of the war had demoralized
the troops and the interim Iraqi leaders struggling to
impose some stability on that country. 

"What kind of message does it say to our troops in harm's
way 'wrong war, wrong place, wrong time,' '' Mr. Bush said,
echoing Mr. Kerry's recent formulation. "That's not what a
commander in chief says when you're trying to lead troops."


After the debate, each man's backers claimed victory, with
Mr. Kerry's adviser Tad Devine declaring that viewers "saw
somebody who could be president, and who could step into
that role," and Ken Mehlman, Mr. Bush's campaign manager,
declaring, "George Bush spoke plainly," and insisting that
Mr. Kerry's "credibility gap became a chasm." 

Indeed, each man was true to type, and gave his committed
supporters comforting lines of argument to cling to, with
Mr. Bush using tested lines from his stump speeches to
argue that his course was simple and direct and Mr. Kerry
doing the same to argue that only a greater awareness of
complexities and more support from allies could keep the
nation safe. 

As the challenger, Mr. Kerry had the greater burden, and
his performance was more disciplined and controlled than
usual. He may well have struck undecided voters as not much
like the Republicans' worst caricatures. He spoke plainly,
politely, but did not shrink from direct and pointed
criticism of Mr. Bush's policies. 

"You know, the president's father did not go into Iraq,
into Baghdad, beyond Basra, and the reason he didn't is he
said - he wrote in his book - because there was no viable
exit strategy," Mr. Kerry said. "And he said our troops
would be occupiers in a bitterly hostile land. That's
exactly where we find ourselves today." He added: "Almost
every step of the way, our troops have been left on these
extraordinarily difficult missions. I know what it's like
to go out on one of those missions where you don't know
what's around the corner, and I believe our troops need
other allies helping." 

Mr. Kerry did not explain how he would secure international
help, beyond calling an international conference, and by
not being Mr. Bush. Mr. Bush's response was skeptical. 

"What's the message going to be?" he asked. "Please join us
in Iraq for a grand diversion? Join us for a war that is
the wrong war at the wrong place at the wrong time? I know
how these people think. I deal with them all the time. I
sit down with world leaders frequently, and talk to them on
the phone frequently. They're not going to follow somebody
who says this is the wrong war in the wrong place at the
wrong time." 

The more immediate question is whether voters will continue
to follow a president who insists the war was right, in the
face of polls suggesting widespread doubt about whether it
was worth the cost. Mr. Bush is banking almost everything
on his belief that they will, as long as they believe he is
clear and resolute. 

It is too soon to know whether Mr. Kerry, trailing in
pre-debate polls, accomplished what Mr. Bush did four years
ago when he came out of his first debate against Al Gore
stronger than when he went in (or what Ronald Reagan did
when he leapfrogged ahead of Jimmy Carter). But he is
hoping that voters will agree with his own succinct
assessment of Mr. Bush last night: "It's one thing to be
certain, but you can be certain and be wrong." 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/01/politics/campaign/01assess.html?ex=1097630719&ei=1&en=acd5bd617506f7d6


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