I didn't get involved in any of the "what Kerry should do during the debate" discussions. That's not to say they were uninteresting; many of them were filled with good ideas. But of more interest to me is what happened
at the debate, now that it has passed, what holes in the opposition's defenses have been opened by it, and what momentum can be gained from it. "Momentum" in campaigns is a result of seeing a small opening and driving through it, full-force, until it is a gash.
This isn't a "we're gonna win" essay. Far from it. An opening in the defenses has appeared, and it is up to us to drive through it. If this election is close, we're going to lose it. So it can't be close.
First, let's look at what we all can agree happened during this debate.
Kerry's performance. Kerry was golden, here. Not a dream debater, by any means, but very solid, with an excellent, smiling poker face, and shrewd, measured attacks. If it were up to me, yes, I would have gone for the jugular a couple of times. Kerry had several opportunities to launch blistering faux-angry attacks on Bush, and let them go past. But he's not that sort of debater, honestly, and any attempts to coax him into it now ("alpha male" talking points, anyone?) are recipes for disaster. You cannot change your candidate's debate style without throwing them off their game, and Kerry has been winning these things just fine for decades doing it his way.
There is one very, very important thing that Kerry accomplished, and it was, for the first debate, the only thing he needed to accomplish. He looked presidential. People who were unsure about that before got to see how he would look and act if he were President. During Bush's attacks on him, he was unflustered, even smiling. You could barely tell, just barely, that whenever Bush made a particularly infuriating remark, he would pick up his pencil and (probably pretend to) write something, as if in preparation for rebutting, whether he had rebuttal time or not. A very effective debate move, as it both made him look even-keeled and silently impressed upon the viewer that he had a strong disagreement with what was being said, without having to look pissy. He looked like a leader.
No question about it. Kerry may not be my cup of debate tea, but he's a master at the fundamentals. Excellent poker face. Seemingly unshakable. Soon after the debate, Bob Novak broke his hip, and a senior Fox reporter was reduced to filing a fake report full of drunken taunts (what the hell was that about?) but Hughes and Rove are probably going to be on continuous IV connections of scotch from now to the next debate. Kerry was that solid, seriously. Kerry was, to use a new measurement of solidity that only recently has presented itself, almost-killing-Robert-Novak solid.
Bush's performance. This is where an opening has appeared, because two things happened. First, Bush was his normal self, which is to say, a terrible communicator. He would give his standard stump answer, consisting of whatever sentence or two he's been saying for the last two years, and then look down at the timing lights with the same expression that a child contemplates a plate of broccoli. Continually, he looked as if he had to struggle to fill time about a topic that had been touted, days before, as his strongest. Continually, he was responding to Kerry's attacks with weak repetition, with awkward pauses, with facial grimaces, and with truly ghastly-sounding comebacks like "he forgot Poland!" Bad, bad news for anyone, much less a sitting president.
The second and more surprising thing that happened with Bush's performance, however, is that the media noticed it. That, quite frankly, is remarkable. And there, finally, is the hole that will allow Kerry to gain some serious steam. Rather than forging his own trails through the media wilderness, Kerry (and we) can now exploit and strengthen the themes that the media themselves have decided will be the important storyline of the coming weeks. Bush is weakening. Kerry has a commanding knowledge of foreign policy, and has beaten Bush decisively on Bush's strongest topic. John Kerry is presidential material.
Talking about the economy isn't getting peoples attention. Talking about Supreme Court nominations or other domestic issues isn't getting attention. Terrorism and the war is what's getting attention. Trying to launch an argument over the intricacies of particular social issues just doesn't fly when the other side is screaming "AND YOU'RE ALL GONNA DIE!"
So in the next several weeks, expect a full-scale attack on George Bush's self-proclaimed wheelhouse, foreign policy and terrorism, that wasn't possible before Kerry's masterful debate performance finally broke through to the media with looks Presidential. When it comes to foreign policy, George Bush isn't keeping us safe. Come election day, mark my words -- that's what you are going to be hearing.
- Three years after 9/11, we are still under danger of terrorist attack, and Bush has done almost nothing to prevent it. The same terrorist group that was responsible for 9/11 is still out there, damaged but perfectly capable of launching operations similar in scope to 9/11. Three years later, our ports are still not secure, emergency services in large cities are struggling under government cutbacks, and the Bush administration has yet to successfully prosecute a single "terrorist" being held.
- The terrorists in Afghanistan responsible for 9/11 were being surrounded, but Bush let them go. When we were face-to-face with al Qaeda and Taliban members in Afghanistan, George Bush refused to send in military troops to finish them off, and instead we asked a group of Afghani warlords and drug lords to battle them for us. Large numbers of al Qaeda and the Taliban escaped, because George Bush wouldn't commit American troops to do the job.
- George W. Bush is losing the Iraq War. More of our American troops die each month, and now large parts of the country are under the control of Iraqi "insurgent" forces, but Bush refuses to listen. Kidnappings and murders are common. The "government" we have placed in control in Iraq is looked upon as traitorous by much of the Iraqi population, and many members cannot leave the Green Zone. Iraqi forces trained by Americans are being subjected to daily, deadly attacks by Iraqi rebels, with members continuing to abandon their posts due to the extreme danger. American troops who report back what is really happening in Iraq are punished by the administration. Efforts to get our allies to help us have failed, due to the continual insults from Bush's administration about things like "Freedom Fries", "Old Europe", and the "irrelevance" of the very U.N. that he now wants the help of.
- George Bush has given so many tax breaks to the rich, he says we can no longer afford to do basic terrorism prevention and homeland security. When Senator Kerry listed basic security measures we still needed to take to prevent another 9/11, or worse, from happening to us, George Bush said "I don't think we want to get to how he's going to pay for all these promises." For three and a half years, George Bush has been cutting taxes on corporations and the wealthy, and cutting basic services in cities across America. George Bush is spending $200 billion dollars on the war in Iraq, but when it comes to keeping America safe, he doesn't want to get his government involved.
- North Korea now has nuclear weapons, and Iran is getting them, and the Bush administration has done nothing to stop it. While American troops are fighting to keep the peace in Iraq, emergency situations throughout the rest of the world have had to be ignored. While George Bush allows Iraq to dominate his term in office, his administration has ignored every other threat that has come along.
- George Bush's own advisors say the war is getting worse and the terrorists are on the move, and Bush ignores them and lies to the American people about it. He says he's being steadfast, but we all recognize it for what it is: he's being muleheaded. He doesn't listen to his own advisors. He doesn't listen to advice he doesn't want to hear. He never changes his mind, even when people are dying because of it.
Want to write letters to the editor this week? That's what you write about. Want to convince swing voters who will keep them safe? That's what you say. In these next few weeks, we need more James Carville, less Alan Colmes. Ignore the attempts of the other side to engage in meaningless, distracting debates over "the $87 billion" or "global test". They're trying to nitpick Kerry's words, to distract from Bush's record of failure upon failure. Kerry is on the offense now, and we need to help him keep it that way.
America wants to be safe, so America is choosing John Kerry.
Here's a bonus one that needs to be hit hard:
Bush talks about "flip-flops" because he has nothing else to say. Bush is only attacking his opponent's words because Bush's record is so very, very bad. He can't run on the economy, he botched our fight against terrorism, and he's stuck America into a Vietnam-like war in which more people are dying every month, with no end in sight. Bush has been reduced to a combination of Richard Nixon and Eric Cartman, blustering "what about Poland" and whining "this is hard" instead of leveling with the American people about what he's done and what his policies have resulted in.
No defense. No nitpicking or counter-nitpicking. Offense only. Take it to the soccer moms, the security moms, the nascar dads, whatever vaguely derogatory phrase "normal" America is being called this month. The Iraq war is keeping us from battling the real terrorists, and George Bush isn't listening.
Letters to the editor. Talking to swing voters. Pointing out Bush's war lies. Kerry will protect us from terrorism where Bush hasn't been. It's not enough to talk tough to the terrorists, you have to find them, and stop them, and John Kerry will do that where Bush has failed.
America wants to be safe, so America is choosing John Kerry.
Go.
Now.
Update [2004-10-3 14:34:7 by Hunter]:
From Chris Andersen's diary, we can see that the Kerry camp knows exactly how to counter the "global test" talking point that has everyone so worried. Notice two things:
- They don't even mention the words "global test", but instead simply say Bush is lying.
- They frame the defense itself as offense, by pointing out some of Kerry's best speech lines -- which makes Bush indeed look like a liar -- and then by adding their own attack as well.
See how masterful that is? They defend against the talking point, but it doesn't look like they even thought defending against it
was worth a whole ad! Their idea of "defense" against the talking point is to give their opponent two black eyes in the process!
That's what I'm talking about. That's Carville, not Colmes.
Let's be clear here. When Bush says "global test", he's saying that John Kerry is a potential traitor. This is part and parcel of the shitheaded "Republicans are true Americans, Democrats are traitors" theme that the Republicans have been blovating at every opportunity during this election. It's offensive, it's repulsive, it's a lie, and they know it -- which is why they only pussyfoot around it, and never say it outright.
If you want to respond to it, do it as offense. Say how offended you are that Bush would stoop to calling his presidential opponent a traitor, and how that proves that Bush has nothing in his own failed record to run on. Follow it up by saying that you are voting for John Kerry because Kerry will be able to keep America more safe than Bush has been able to do. And then give a reason or two why you think that (feel free to steal from above.)
The media loves reporting offense. Defense isn't newsworthy. Bush and company are reduced to calling Kerry a potential traitor because they suck at playing defense. It's our job to keep them there from now to the election by hammering them in LTTEs and other venues every single day.