I was just perusing the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel web page to see if there were any election endorsements yet. There weren't, but what I found looks good for Kerry, as it turns out that W. didn't give their editorial board the courtesy of an in-person meeting.
While John Kerry responded in detail to the board's questions on October 15, W. had his flackies respond to the board in writing.
The board, clearly disappointed, writes:
With his Wisconsin campaign citing scheduling conflicts, President Bush was unable to meet with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Editorial Board.
His campaign staff did, however, respond to questions submitted in advance. The drawback for the board in such a process is that it doesn't allow for follow-up questions and the kind of give-and-take that occurred during the Kerry interview.
But, in the interest of balance, we present excerpts of his campaign's responses.
Ah, yes, I'm sure W. was far too busy to meet with the staff of the most widely-read newspaper in a pivotal swing state. It's not as if he could have taken time out of his hectic, Tetrus-filled schedule to meet with them when he visited the state today, or on
October 20, or on
October 15, or on
October 7, or on
September 24, or any of the many other times he visited Wisconsin. And I'm sure Dick Cheney couldn't have filled in for W. when he was here on
October 21 or on
October 12.
Granted, the Journal-Sentinel editorial page is reliably Democratic, but their news coverage is fairly conservative (they own a local right-wing talk radio station). Had both candidates spoken to the board, I would have expected a lukewarm Kerry endorsement; we'll have to wait until this weekend to see whether it's very enthusiastic, but if it is, I would bet that W.'s diss contributed.
In any event, this seems far worse than the Holbrooke-Plain Dealer incident.