Just watched the replay of the debate... the president won it hands down. Lurch had no answers except to keep saying "I have a plan" to every question. And I was overjoyed to hear W tying Lurch to the rats in Europe and he even managed to needle Lurch as a liberal. (Which must have been effective since Lurch kept stammering about "labels").
Well put. I don't know what some folks around here have been smoking--W clobbered him. These debates cannot be micro-reviewed. Bush came off as in command, and in command of the issues. Forget all the little details, the man was ALIVE, while Lurch kept crying that the sky was falling.
The IMPRESSION left was that Lurch is scary and dour and hopeless, Bush had been through the fire and cared about protecting us and wasn't gonna have any of Kerry's bull.