I believe that Senator John Edwards, with quiet dignity, clarity, honesty, and truth, won this debate.
Why do I call this Edwards' win?
Edwards convinced me he was telling the truth and he convinced me that Dick Cheney, although he might be masterful, is only masterful at distorting the truth.
I can't tell you how many times I detected lies and deliberate distortions from Cheney, who is a master of deception. Where shall I begin?
He totally evaded Gwen Ifill's first question about Paul Bremer's revelation that Bush/Cheney failed to provide proper troop levels to ensure success in Iraq.
When he said, "What we did in Iraq was exactly the right thing to do. If I had it to recommend all over again, I would recommend exactly the same course of action," he may have sounded more coherent than Bush, but I knew, by his words, he was just as dangerous, wrong, and stubborn as his incurious commander in chief.
"The senator has got his facts wrong. I have not suggested there's a connection between Iraq and 9/11, but there's clearly an established Iraqi track record with terror."
I don't know who Cheney thinks he's fooling. He's spun his web about 9/11 and Saddam's Iraq so many times our heads spin..and then he denies ever saying it. The press should have called Cheney on his lies about these bogus terror connections a long time ago. If they had done their job, perhaps we wouldn't have to look at Dick Cheney still making up more lies today.
When Cheney said, "Gwen, we've never let up on Osama bin Laden from day one," I could envision a multi-color neon sign on Times Square flashing the word "L-I-A-R". It doesn't take a genius to figure that sometime between attacking Afghanistan and Iraq, Dick and George "let up" on making Osama their priority.
When Cheney began to play his distortion harp about John Kerry's lack of conviction, my prayers were answered by Senator Edwards' response. He beautifully pointed Cheney out as the distorter he is. It's all Cheney seems to be good for in this campaign, really. People don't actually like him. He turns them off. He might be a nice fellow in real life, but he turns people off. All he has left is distortion.
For just a moment, when he was pressed by Edwards to justify the war in Iraq, I thought Cheney might actually come out and say "Thank God Zarqawi is out there beheading Americans---because he's all I've got left to try to connect with Saddam Hussein--even though the CIA says it's the weakest possibility!"
Cheney said to Edwards, "The first time I ever met you was when I walked on the stage tonight."
This was a lie from Dick Cheney, disproven quickly at the Kerry/Edwards blog. He didn't fool me. I'm on to his tricks.
Cheney pulled the same trick about "not knowing" Joseph Wilson on Meet the Press last year.
I have absolutely no respect for ABC's Nightline, who used a heavy-laden GOP-participant poll just after the VP debate to enforce their early assertion that Cheney won the debate. In doing so, I was reminded ABC is acting very much like Dick Cheney. Distortion is the name of their game, I guess. I am confident most people believe their own eyes over distortions.
TRANSCRIPT OF DEBATE