The First Presidential Debate

I watched the debate on Fox just to see if they would superimpose devil horns on John Kerry's head, but I guess thats hard to do with a live broadcast.

Anyway, now that I've heard the president's reasoning for the war, I still think it sucks. And it seems to me that Bush's supporters only like him because he shares their southern accent and tough guy attitude. I was very glad that Kerry brought up the fact that North Korea and Iran have the same weapons that we accused Iraq of having, and we do nothing to those countries. Bush had a good reason for not wanting to attack North Korea, but he didn't say why we didn't go after Iran like we did Iraq. I doubt he mixed up the countries and started war on the wrong one, but anything seems possible these days. Bush said,"The Enemy attacked us," and Kerry ran with it, reminding us that Iraq did not attack us on 9/11, it was Osama bin Laden, whom we still have not found because of our presence in Iraq.

Bush never used the word "flip flopper", which was really cool of him, but of course he threw in the stuff about Kerry's "mixed messages", a phrase repeated throughout the debate from both candidates. Kerry does a good job deffending himself against flip flop accusals, but I don't think he convinced any Bushies. I agree with Michael Moore's proposal that Kerry should just come right out and say,"Of course I voted for the war! Everyone was on Bush's side back then! And most of us have changed our minds now that we know the truth about the WMD's!", but there's no way he would say something like that, it's too cool for him.

Kerry also attacked the tax cut, basically saying that rich people like Bush and himself don't need such a break. I don't really remember what Bush had to say about his tax cut, I didn't take notes and it was in the very beginning of the hour-and-a-half debate.

I really paid attention to they way these guys talk and act during their speeches (I know it was a debate, but they really did give little speeches to answer the moderator's questions). Kerry never stops talking, he's got a whole lot to say. Bush tends to give little thoughtful pauses that allow the listener to think about what he is saying while he is talking. He may just not know exactly what to say, or maybe he just stalls for time, but I kind of like it. He still pronounces "nuclear" wrong, but thats kind of a trademark. I'd be sad if he actually figured out that he sounds like a freakin' moron.

I made a hilarious realization that I haven't heard talked about yet: Each candidate resembles the animal of their party somewhat. Kerry has the long face of a donkey, and Bush has the big ears of an elephant, how cool is that? I think they are the most animal-like presidential candidates we've ever had. Although Kerry is more of a bassit hound and Bush is more of a chimp, they do a really good job of representing their party's animal. Maybe too good.