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Thoughts On Debate #1

Thoughts On Debate #1

On Friday morning we posted a link for Relevant reader’s to respond to the presidential debates from Thursday night. We received a lot of great feedback from the readers. Unfortunately, we were not able to feature everyone’s comments but here are a few notable ones.

On Kerry…

On matters of both substance and style, it is clear that Kerry won the debate last night. Kerry’s arguments were more clear and more forceful than the President’s and made greater sense … And don’t let Bush off for a weak Christian-sounding reference to the valley of peace at the end of his speech.

Jason Evans

Even though I support a majority of the policies of Bush, I though Senator John Kerry presented his plan in a clear and concise way … I believe Kerry won the debate, but it wasn’t a landslide.

-Tommy Bailey

Senator Kerry was much more prepared for this debate and he blew the doors off Bush. That is not to say that every point was right on, but Kerry seemed like an adult out there and the President seemed like an over-matched kid.

-Alex Caldwell

… Kerry dominated. Completely. He made very strong points about Iraq, about the tax cuts, about national security, about North Korea. He looked much more presidential than he has in months past.

-Jason Boyett

I believe that Kerry held himself well … I couldn’t help but thinking of Will Ferral [sic] doing his George W impersonation. I believe that the thing that makes me more upset than seeing him fumble like that, is that he doesn’t seem to think he has done anything wrong.

-Erik Fisher

On Bush…

I think President Bush did a good job by defending his actions and admitting that he had a very hard decision to make about going to war. He has accomplished a lot in 3 and a half years.

-Hannah Woody

Bush all the way … Kerry is a nice guy … but I don’t want a "nice guy" in office. Kerry has no emotion … his practiced responses of rolling his eyes and scrunching his face are annoying at best!

-“iggy

Bush has never been a talented speaker (kind of like Moses, huh?), but that’s what I like about him. He just seems so real.

Chuck

This is the first time we have seen Sen. Kerry stick to one viewpoint for more than 60 minutes. President Bush 1, Sen. Kerry 0.

-Kevin Peterson

I don’t believe anything that Kerry says. I think it was good of Bush to constantly remind the viewers of Kerry’s inconsistency and his wavering views based upon popularity

-Zoila Walston

Who cares about the debate…

As a Christian, the debate should not matter. A Christian man who will promote anti-abortion legislation and consult his God on decisions or a man who will not defend the rights of the unborn and defy the commands of his stated religious denomination.

-Erik Murphy

I was just angry that my girlfriend didn’t tell me that Apprentice was on Wednesday instead of its usual Thursday slot. Oh well, at least I got to see Joey beforehand.

-Artom Mirskov

On Repetition…

After the first six times, we were well aware that he felt that "A Commander in Chief who says wrong war, wrong place, wrong time, (or whatever) cannot lead" when [Bush] continued answering questions with that same response, it just seemed like he didn’t have actual answers to the moderator’s questions.

-Ashley Horton

I felt that Kerry won last night, hands down. He showed his grasp on all the major issues and I couldn’t help but feel that Bush sounded like a broken record.

-Cheryl Glenn

Bush may have repeated his Texas drawled, “I know where I stand” several times over, but at least he wasn’t as annoying as Kerry’s kindergarten like response, “I can do it better than you.” Come on, you’re a Yale grad and your best comeback is that.

-Cedric Lewis

My Favorite Comments

The reason I have for believing Bush lost … is that whomever was producing the debate, calling the punch commands for specific cameras, was to my media-savvy eye, most definitely a Kerry supporter.

-Kyle Vitasek

Bush went to Yale, so if he wanted to say the word “nuclear” correctly, he would (he currently says it “nuclur”). Bush chooses not to pronounce it perfectly in order to keep the image of the good-ole boy that you would trust to fix your car.

-Jarod Sutphin

Bush’s podium was better lit and on ABC it was zoomed in more than Kerry’s to make up for the height difference. Those two small little details I think made a positive difference for Bush.

-Ryan Stone

I hadn’t planned on watching the debate, but I screwed up my taping of Survivor so I turned it on and got sucked in.

-Jay Cheatham

Bush is not a good public speaker…But my favorite line of the whole night? "Of course I know Osama bin Laden attacked us. I know that."

-“Cat”

The best feedback of all…

It is a tribute to George W. Bush’s verbal ineptitude that he can make such a cold public speaker as Kerry appear to be a veritable Shakespeare of the podium, and it would be difficult to imagine a debate more devoid of progression of ideas, nuance, or other hallmarks of intellegent argumentation.

-Randy Brafford

This isn’t the best piece of feedback because it’s clever (although it is), it’s the best because “intellegent” is misspelled. (It’s spelled intelligent; now that’s funny.)

Thanks for all the e-mails. If you didn’t get included in the feature this time, don’t worry you’ll have your chance next debate. It was great to hear all of your responses. Plus, if you really want to say something feel free to leave comments below. I’m sure the message board will be very interesting as well.

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