President Bush did not destroy John Kerry tonight, but he didn't have to. President Bush just needed to not make a big screwup.
Sen. Kerry came across as a good speaker who was trying to sell a bad product. His biggest problem is that most Americans do not think that continued diplomacy would have had an impact on Saddam. And that is the critical difference between the two men, Bush acted and Kerry would have wanted Round 18. So, Kerry loses this as being an indecisive executive.
President Bush is not a great speaker but he was simple and clear tonight in hammering a number of points. The world needs America to be strong. The American President must be resolute.
The President made the point that this is "Hard Work" many times. This is the core difference between the two people, Sen. Kerry flaps his gums, President Bush has to actually act and some actions can be second guessed. Campaing rhetoric is not easily proven to be wrong.
The "global test" comment by Kerry (along with calls for more diplomacy on Iraq) are the key to just how much Kerry would subordinate the US interests to the UN and France.
One last note, I thought that the questions by their nature favored the challenger because after all they focused 100% on the problem areas and spent no time talking about the successes-- like Afghanistan, and the fact that AQ has been decimated.
President Bush will not lose ground based on this debate IMHO.
Yup! Debate is over.
Percy Dovetonsils "won", sort of. No doubt he can twist words any way but Sunday. But, never would want to have my daughter stuck with a guy like him.
I am gonna vote for the guy who walks the walk, but is linguistically challenged about blowing his own horn. I prefer substance in men, not stream-of-conscious sentiment of the moment.
For those of you who like manicures, tube-tans nicely covered by make-up, and wind-surfers who marry rich widows and like to tell tall tales about how they can do it better than the one who gets stuck doing it, vote for the gigolo.