I have, in a fit of oddity, opted to do all my drunk blogging after the debate.
Sadly, that hasn't worked out too well, in the great scheme of things, but I will be satitsfied by making one final prediction:
Members of the base will be vastly satisified. That being said, the bounce will amount to no more than 3%. Right now, I will give 70/30 odds of the bounce being in Kerry's favor.
In upcoming elections, both candidates will be told to be more aggressive, and that is, roughly, when we can start expecting gaffes.
A wee bit more (and I'm not just talking drinks here, kids...)
Both candidates are going to be under pressure to attack more. Although right now, I am astonished that CNN is cutting for Bush, on average. All things being said and done, how these (and yours truly) these beltway assholes view the debate doesn't really matter. It'll take a few days for middle America to respond fully.
Kerry is not bad on Shinseki, but he's weak on the Clarke Mexico-Pearl Harbor angle. It leaves him open to the accusation of lacking nuance (see also Morocco as a response to Pearl Harbor).
Oh, and by the way, the denial of contracts to Europeans, that stems from the fact that following Bosnia, etc. the European Union denied contracts to Americans on rebuilding. I have this on the word of Jim Baker.
I am still left with this conclusion -- several drinks down the gullet -- Bush could have stomped all over Kerry (and he really did leave himself open) but failed do really hoist that guy by his own petard.
For starters, the only ally that really matters in Iraq is Iraq. Lean on that. Note the fact that France and Germany won't give squat, but Iraq is poised to give 140,000 troops. Those are the allies that really count - despite what Joe Lockhart says about the people who live and die right by the side of American soldiers.
One thing that I am ferociously irate about is the notion that the rest of the world can deliver all this military support. Kerry (deservedly) points out the notion that in Tora Bora, the US didn't spearhead the effort to capture all those Al Qaeda guys. The problem being is thtat we have all the goddamn guns. Full stop. Threre are no other worthwhile peacekeeping forces.
Bush/and/or/Kerry could have made the other son-of-a-bitch hang with his words tonight. One thing Bush hasn't hit home with is the fact that Kerry was on the Senate Intelligence Committee.
I do seriously wonder about the notion that Bush is pressing consistency. You and I know both that failure on this count really is painfull. Once Kerry can match Bush on this point, I do worry.
I thought that he could have used Kerry's 1971 statement about how you ask a man to "die for a mistake" by observing that Kerry calls Iraq a mistake... which if interpreted consistently means that he's taking a position without answering his own question: How do you ask men to die for something you, yourself, have called a mistake... just because you don't think it's your mistake? What sort of leadership position is that?
The point is that Kerry has a great argument for being a dissenter, but it doesn't work very well as a case for becoming the Commander in Chief.
That's Bush's most convincing point, and goes right to the heart of things. It's chiefly why I think he won the debate. We'll see, but I think it's a commonsense level that the pundits don't appreciate, and the voters do.
Posted by: Demosophist at October 1, 2004 08:02 AM