Looks like a bluff. Because they figure Bush won’t accept his proposal. Too much exposure of this type may be counter-productive for both candidates. I suspect Bush would suffer more than Kerry. I think Kerry would do better with less debates. Three sounds about right.

Posted by: Anthony at March 14, 2004 11:32 AM

Or maybe not. Maybe it’s about money and exposure. Kerry is at a disadvantage; a debate would create more exposure for both candidates, but Kerry might benefit more. I still think that too much exposure of this type might be counter-productive.

Posted by: Anthony at March 14, 2004 11:40 AM

How would kerry benefit more? he has nothing to offer except ungrounded criticism, Flip flops. Frequent debates would definitely be to Bush’s advantage. kerry would be able to stay on one side of the fence for very long.
Bush on the other-hand, means what he says and does it.

over the past 6 months, kerry has flip flopped on every issue he’s ever mentioned.

Posted by: Fat Guy at March 14, 2004 02:21 PM

• wouldn’t be able to stay on one side of the fence

Posted by: Fat Guy at March 14, 2004 02:24 PM

It’s generally perceived to be in the challenger’s interest to have more debates. That’s why John Edwards asked for a series of debates before Super Tuesday, and John Kerry denied him:

Senator John Edwards … stepping up his push for a fresh series of debates before the Super Tuesday primaries, on March 2. [M]r. Kerry’s campaign issued a statement saying he preferred to spend the time before Super Tuesday “crisscrossing the country talking to as many voters as possible. ‘We don’t know where John Edwards has been, but we’ve had a real debate on the real issues facing Americans each and every day of this campaign,’ the Kerry statement said.” (NYT, 2/21/04)

I’m sure Kerry sees nothing hypocritical in this, just as he and his surrogates see nothing wrong with being Shocked, Shocked! that the President has aired a negative ad against him, even though Kerry fired first - all the way back in Septmeber:

What about September 3, 2003? Aside from being the Grind’s birthday, that’s when Kerry first ran a TV ad calling Bush’s jobs record an “astonishing failure.” Kerry promised in that ad to roll back Bush’s tax cuts and to be a president, presumably unlike Bush, who’s “on the side of America’s middle class.”

Or howzabout October 31? Aside from being Halloween, it’s the day Kerry first aired a spot in Iowa saying Bush’s administration “works for those at the top, not you,” and has passed “the biggest tax cuts in history to the wealthy.”

“George Bush and Dick Cheney let polluters and oil companies rewrite our environmental laws. They defend the loopholes that let corporations avoid taxes by moving jobs overseas,” an announcer says in that Kerry spot, titled “Courage.”

We could go on, really.

Apparently the Democrats’ argument goes something like this: Sure, Kerry ran those ads. But that was waaaay back in the Democratic primary, so those ads were only intended to appeal to Democratic primary voters. If Republicans or independents happened to view the ads and take away a negative impression of Bush, well, we can’t control that. Now, we’re in the general-election campaign. It’s a whole new ball game. The clock starts over.

Please. No clocks, no ball games. Kerry ran the first negative ads of the ‘04 presidential campaign. Period. (CNN’s Morning Grind, 3/12)

Posted by: Hide and Seek Blog at March 14, 2004 04:42 PM

Why doesn’t Kerry just debate himself? He could probably moderate his own debate, as well.

Posted by: axing at March 14, 2004 07:17 PM

How would kerry benefit more? Flip flops. Bush on the other-hand, means what he says and does it.

Hew would benefit from exposure (free TV), and from challenging a president that is suffering from a credibility problem.

Where have you been? Haven’t you been keeping up with curent events? The Flip Flop stuff is mostly smoke and mirrors. If the press shows up they’ll diffuse it. Bush, the uniter (partisan politician extrordinaire), means what he says? LOL.

That’s why John Edwards asked for a series of debates before Super Tuesday, and John Kerry denied him:

He denied him because it wasn’t in his interest. Just as Bush will now.

I’m sure Kerry sees nothing hypocritical in this

I don’t see anything hypocritical about it. Kerry has the right to ask, Bush has the right to refuse, and the public will make of it whatever they want.

Posted by: Anthony at March 14, 2004 08:51 PM

Or howzabout October 31? … Kerry first aired a spot in Iowa saying Bush’s administration “works for those at the top, not you,” and has passed “the biggest tax cuts in history to the wealthy.”

Who cares? This is how politics works. It how it’s been from the inception of this country. All I care about is getting a fair hearing of the issues. I hope the press will do it’s job and help vet both Bush and Kerry, so I can make by informed decision.

Posted by: Anthony at March 14, 2004 08:54 PM

Yeah, lets make an informed decision like the Spaniards!! ha ha Fighting the terrorists is wrong because it will make them mad and they will come to hurt us….blowing up our trains like that!!! How awful our leaders tried to fight them….lets vote them out!! There, now we should be ok…KABOOM!! waaaa waaaa, why do they hate us like this……waaaa waaaa I’m a socialist crybaby!!! No, wait I’m a liberal Democrat named Kerry; what the fuck am I doing here in Spain???

Posted by: DickD at March 14, 2004 10:27 PM

DickD:

The spainards voted their sitting government out, because they disagree with the Iraq regime change, not the ‘war on terror.’

Posted by: Anthony at March 14, 2004 11:31 PM

Anthony……where have you been? If you’re looking to the press to give you a fair hearing of the issues being fair so you can make an informed decision………uhhhhhh…….I don’t know what to say to you…….you’ll be informed in a way that suits the interests of the liberal socialist, Bush hating, troop undermining, anti-American, Kerry coddling, mongoloids that are in charge of CNN and the other liberal news medias.

You really ought to get out more.

Posted by: Jeff B at March 15, 2004 01:42 AM

BTW, Bush doesn’t have to jump through any of the hoops that Kerry throws up. Kerry is nothing but a wind bag and he’ll try to present hundreds of hoops for Bush to jump through.

Bush debating Kerry if laughable. Kerry can’t debate issues because he never lands firm on any issue except negative George Bush rants. I think he has split personalities. The two of them always vote opposite of each other.

It would be like Bush going to the zoo and debating a fu-king monkey……. or Ted Kennedy.

Posted by: Jeff B at March 15, 2004 01:51 AM

Does kerry even have a platform? All I have seen is constant Bush bashing for about a year, with the help of every other candidate.
Then when Bush says one thing about him, he turns around and cries, “he’s picking on me!!”

Kerry would be in tears in a debate.
I don’t think he could handle it alone. He is after all, a coward that ran from duty.

Posted by: Fat Guy at March 15, 2004 09:14 AM

Oh yea, and while Arafat is a statesman, kerry sure isn’t.

When 200 Spanish were murdered, all he could do was bash Bush about something, He didn’t even take the time to offer condolances, unlike Bush who was.

Kerry prommised this would be a campaign like no other… Is this it? Bash Bush about something or other, and offer absolutely NOTHING?

Whats his platform? Aparently, he’s still working out the details of some kind of health thing….
What else? thats it?
Free hydrogen balloons for Anthony at his campaign stops?

Posted by: Fat Guy at March 15, 2004 09:20 AM

> “Surely, if the attack ads can start now…”

The guy is unbelievable. Kerry’s entire campaign is attack. His platform is attack. It’s all he’s got.

Posted by: Bostonian at March 15, 2004 10:36 AM

Kerry will announce that his tax increase will not be $900 billion, but only $800 billion….and only on the “richest” among us. That way Bush will be a “liar”.

Remember Gore’s definition of a millionaire?$250K/year for 4 years? Kerry will also go on TV and, like Slick Willy, claim that the whole “mess” is worse than he ever knew, so darn it, “I just can’t give you ol’ middle Americans a tax cut….breaks my heart (bite side of lip now)”

Posted by: Jeff at March 15, 2004 09:33 PM

My question: “Senator Kerry: Let’s say I’m a terrorist. Why in the world should I fear you more than George Bush?”

Posted by: xray at March 15, 2004 11:02 PM

X-Ray said, “My question: “Senator Kerry: Let’s say I’m a terrorist. Why in the world should I fear you more than George Bush?”

Let me work in this alittle…..

1. Being a terrorist will no longer be a dangerous job, and since the rewards are better than winning the lottey, everyone will want to be one, and you’ll just become another insignificant cell. ho hum….

2. Since the socialists will have their man in office, the liberal socialist press will no longer give you the mountains of free publicity necessary for your survival. They don’t like sharing the limelight with anyone.

3. You will have to adapt to going from being a ‘blood thirsty terrorist’………..to being referred to as ‘a great statesman’. Way boring.

4. You will become bogged down in a quagmire of negotiations and UN meetings……longing for the good old days when you could be out recruiting young people to blow themselves up.

5. You may have to actually become a politician and protest the war against terror, to assure that future generations can terrorize at will.

Posted by: Jeff B at March 16, 2004 12:03 AM

3. You will have to adapt to going from being a ‘blood thirsty terrorist’………..to being referred to as ‘a great statesman’. Way boring.

LMAO

Posted by: Fat Guy at March 16, 2004 02:44 AM

Why in the world should a terrorist fear Bush? He’s opened up Iraq to terrorists. He’s made it a lot easier and more convenient to attack americans there. Nearly every ally is lead by a government that is an ally despite popular opinion. He’s made the world safe for nuclear weapons proliferation. And instead of protecting US ports from terrorists bringing in a nuclear bomb, he’s spent a ton of money on missile defense which doesnt work.

Compare that to Kerry whos repeatedly said that we need to add 40,000 troops to our dangerously understaffed military.

And think of all the great stuff we can look forward to in the debate: Bush can explain why his allegedly job creating tax cuts didnt,
Mr. Bush’s broken promise to retire $2 trillion of the national debt;

Mr. Bush’s broken promise not to spend the Social Security surplus;

Mr. Bush’s violation of his alleged free trade principles by imposing tariffs on imported steel and then his lifting of those same tariffs;

Mr. Bush’s inconsistent position on stem cells and the destruction of human embryos;

Mr. Bush’s opposition to and then support of a cabinet level Homeland Security Department;

Mr. Bush’s broken promise on control of carbon dioxide emissions;

Mr. Bush’s ever changing position of negotiations with North Korea; and

Mr. Bush’s waffling between a policy of disarmament and a policy of regime change in Iraq.

Mr. Bush’s reneging on a promise to fully fund the Low Income Home Energy Assistance program (LIHEAP);

Mr. Bush’s flip flop on apologizing to China when China forced a US spy plane to land without permission; and

Mr. Bush’s flip flop on the abortion issue. Mr. Bush once said that the abortion issue should be left up to the woman and her doctor. Now, of course, Mr. Bush claims to be pro-life.

I could go on, but Wampum has been running a Bush flip-flop watch. He’s up to part 6 here
http://wampum.wabanaki.net/archives/000826.html

oh and The american prospect had a nice article on Bush’s incompetence in fighting terrorism

http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2004/03/yglesias-m-03-16.html

Rational Security
The problem isn’t that George W. Bush hasn’t done enough in the war on terrorism — it’s that he’s hardly fought it at all.

By Matthew Yglesias
Web Exclusive: 3.16.04
Print Friendly | Email Article

Eager as ever to Leave No Corpse Unexploited, the right has wasted little time in promoting the idea that last week’s horrifying terrorist attacks in Madrid are a vindication of the Bush administration’s policies. On March 12, Andrew Sullivan declared his hope that, if al-Qaeda or an affiliate is found to be responsible, “the democratic nations of Europe will begin to realize what Tony Blair and George Bush have been warning about for so long.” Arnold Beichman, writing in The National Review Online, proclaimed that the attack “reminds the world that there’s a war out there,” a phrase echoed in Secretary of State Colin Powell’s remark on Fox News Sunday that the bombings “show that there is a war on terror that must be fought.” Condoleezza Rice expressly linked this point to electoral politics on Meet The Press, predicting that “we are going to have a debate about whether we are at war.”

Too many Democrats seem to want to dodge this debate, either agreeing with Howard Dean’s remarks later on Meet the Press that “jobs, jobs, jobs” and “economic security” will be the biggest issues in the campaign, or at least hoping that he’s proven right. A strategy of changing the subject might work for the Democrats, but as we learned last week it places a dangerous amount of power in the hands of America’s enemies, who might strike at any time and rapidly alter the political discourse. The possibility of new attacks aside, it must also be recognized that the incumbent president has an intrinsic ability to shift attention to national security. The traditional power of the bully-pulpit has been amplified by the White House’s ability to manipulate the terror alert system, selectively leak intelligence about chatter, or announce new initiatives without warning.

Meanwhile, when Democrats do talk about national security, the tendency has been to focus on domestic topics like homeland security and energy independence — areas where the national security agenda conveniently overlaps with that of left-leaning constituencies like public sector unions and environmentalists.

There are good points to be made on these topics, and they should be made. Nevertheless, the central debate here is not one Democrats should be running away from. The contention that the continued reality of the terrorist threat somehow vindicates the Bush approach is absurd — if anything, it does the reverse — and liberals need to start saying so.

The administration’s first action on the national security front upon taking office was to downgrade the fight against al-Qaeda from the status it held under Bill Clinton, prioritizing instead the danger of “rogue states” by seeking to construct an unworkable missile defense shield. It’s impolite to say so, but if Condoleezza Rice had focused less on abrogating the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and more on Clinton National Security Advisor Sandy Berger’s advice during the transition to “spend more time during your four years on terrorism generally and al-Qaeda specifically than any other issue,” there’s at least a chance that September 11 might have been averted altogether.

Once the attacks occurred, Bush began to exercise what the media has universally proclaimed to be “strong leadership” on terrorism. In fact, he did nothing of the sort. Instead, after spending the day flying around the country in an apparent state of confusion, he delivered a widely panned address to the nation in which he falsely claimed that, “Immediately following the first attack, I implemented the government’s emergency response plans.”

There were no such plans, and Bush’s immediate reaction to the first attack was to continue reading a children’s book to a group of young students.

It wasn’t until over a week later that the president demonstrated the closest thing to strong leadership that his administration has ever had to offer: an excellent speech before a joint session of Congress, one of a number of rhetorically brilliant foreign policy addresses he’s delivered since 9-11.

The country, however, is in need of a president who can assemble a competent national security team, not a crack staff of speechwriters. The substantive response to the attacks was the war against the Taliban. I, like the vast majority of Americans, supported this effort. Media mythology has it that the military campaign was a stunning success, due to its short duration and low casualty count. This theory conveniently ignores the fact that the president and his team failed to accomplish the actual goals of the war: Osama bin Laden, Mullah Omar, and other top leadership elements got away, and no stable government was introduced in their stead. To this day, the Taliban is conducting military operations in the southern portion of the country.

Our main objectives stymied in Afghanistan, the president did not do the sensible thing and redouble our efforts; instead, he chose to take the country on a two-year detour from al-Qaeda to invade Iraq. At the time, we were repeatedly assured that preparations for war were not detracting from efforts in the war on terror, an assertion that’s hard to square with the March 13 announcement that we are only now stepping up efforts to capture bin Laden and his top deputy. It appears, moreover, that in exchange for permission to deploy troops into Pakistan, Bush has agreed to let that government continue to turn a blind eye to the global arms bazaar run by its top nuclear scientist.

The focus on Iraq also led the administration through a mind-boggling series of flip-flops regarding North Korea, Pakistan’s main rival as the world champion of weapons proliferation. Bush’s efforts to keep the public focused on the Iraqi “threat” have placed the United States in the position of accepting the reality of the DPRK as a nuclear power.

Meanwhile, the one thing we can be quite sure terrorists won’t do with any nuclear weapons they manage to buy is load them on top of intercontinental ballistic missiles. Nevertheless, the 2005 budget request for missile defense stands at a staggering $10.2 billion. This might be at least vaguely defensible were it not for the fact that the system in question doesn’t work.

Under the circumstances, it’s hard to deny that the money would be better spent trying to do something about America’s dangerously understaffed Army. Instead of addressing the problem, however, the administration is trying to paper it over with unprecedented mobilizations of National Guard and Reserve units, while using “stop-loss” orders to prevent soldiers from leaving the service. This will work through the fall election, but it threatens to destroy America’s all-volunteer force in the long run.

For all the big talk, then, 9-11 appears to have changed nothing for the Bush administration. Their priorities remain the same as before the attacks: missile defense and Iraq, symptoms of a state-centric worldview incapable of really grasping global terrorism. The only difference was that they started saying their policies were directed at counter-terrorism. John Kerry was on the right track in his Feb. 27 national security speech: “I do not fault George Bush for doing too much in the War on Terror; I believe he’s done too little.” The sentiment is exactly correct, and needs to be repeated. Often. And with specifics.

The Madrid attacks seem to have hurt Spain’s conservative governing party badly at the polls, and rightly so. When bad things happen under a government’s watch, the officials responsible ought to be held accountable. The American right is quite correct to say that the terrorist threat remains serious; this is, however, less a reflection of our enemies’ strength than of the simple fact that the Bush administration hasn’t bothered with doing much of anything about it, preferring to offer tough talk as a rhetorical smokescreen for an unrelated agenda. Don’t they know there’s a war on? Matthew Yglesias is a Prospect writing fellow. His column, which appears every Tuesday, examines and debunks the arguments of the right.

Posted by: typhonus at March 18, 2004 11:44 AM

Typhoonus Here’s a hot little number to add to your collection of LoveLetters. Read it and Weep. I excerpt the pertinent portion - “Kerry will kill our nation while it sleeps because he and the Democrats have the cunning to embellish blasphemy and present it to the Arab and Muslim nation as civilization.”

I love it when the DemoCandidate stresses all these ‘foreign’ kudos. You’d think the guy would be more interested in ‘splainin’ why he wears FlipFlops on EVERY issue, wouldn’t you? No. You wouldn’t. You like hittin’ the hookah and Radical Lefty sites for ‘insightful’ information.

BTW. My boat is watertight. Storms of your magnitude are every four year occurances.

Shorten it up, wouldya? I kept lookin’ for the word ‘pimp’. Good thing I didn’t find it.

Posted by: Cap'n DOC at March 18, 2004 02:38 PM