Bush spin vs. Kerry's win

Kerry was the clear winner of the debate... although the Bush people will tell you that Georgey was clearly the winner. But as Mike McCurry said, no spin is needed to realize that Kerry was the winner, unlike the massive spin that's been put on it by the Republican party, who shot off words like passion, conviction, beliefs, and heart (oh how I hate propoganda). Apparently the long pauses were for effect and this was one of Bush's "best debates", despite all of his lies.

Scenes From Spin Alley
Karl Rove, Mike McCurry, and other surrogates score the debate.
By Chris Suellentrop / MSNBC Slate

MIAMI—Karl Rove must have known things didn't go well when the New York Post asked him whether this was the worst debate of President Bush's life. No, Rove insisted. This was one of the president's best debates, and one of John Kerry's worst. "Really?" asked the reporter, Vince Morris. "You can say that with a straight face?"

As soon as the first presidential debate ended, the reporters and campaign surrogates in attendance hustled into "spin alley," where Karl Rove, Karen Hughes, Dan Bartlett, Tad Devine, Joe Lockhart, Mike McCurry, and other eminences of spin practice their craft. (There were other, lesser luminaries, such as Kerry's Swift boat crewmate Del Sandusky, who seemed to have trouble finding reporters to talk to.) The whole affair is a little bit ridiculous, as the participants are less honest than NFL coaches during halftime interviews, but you do get a sense of two things: The questions asked by reporters indicate who the press thinks won the debate, and the answers are a good gauge of how the two campaigns will try to frame the post-debate debate over how each candidate did.

On the first indicator, Bush was the clear loser. One of the first questions asked of Rove was whether the president's frequent pausing was a problem. Rove disputed that Bush paused because he wasn't sure what to say. "Paused for effect, is what I think," he said. Over and over again, Bush surrogates were asked about the president's demeanor. (Question for Paul Krugman: Are you still angry about the media's focus on style over substance?) Wasn't the president defensive? a reporter asked Matthew Dowd. Didn't he look confused? a reporter asked Ken Mehlman. "I think he spoke with passion," Mehlman said. Another reporter asked Bartlett, didn't the president look irritated? Tired? "I think he showed a range of emotions," Bartlett said.

...

I asked Dan Bartlett if he thought it was bad that President Bush kept having to look down at the podium and read his remarks. No, Bush was "taking notes," Bartlett said, and he had to do that because "Sen. Kerry was throwing the kitchen sink at him." President Bush may not be "articulate," he said, but he won the debate with his "conviction and core beliefs." Using a phrase the Bush surrogates deployed frequently, Bartlett said Bush spoke "from the heart." I asked the same question of Mike McCurry. His answer: "There's some things you just don't have to spin."

You might be wondering what the Kerry campaign did to celebrate the win of the debate.

Well, if you were to ask Kerry, I think he might have said "I'm going to Disney Land!"


In other news, we're losing the "war on terror" in Iraq more and more every day.

Also, be ready for major corruption in the voting this year... from electronic voting machines that can easily be fixed to a Republican lawmaker recently saying "If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election" (note: 80% of Detroiters are black), we're guaranteed a money corrupted, Republican controlled election this year.

Jeb Bush, however, doesn't think electonic voting will be a problem. He dismissed growing concerns about electronic voting as "conspiracy theories."

Just like the "conspiracy theories" (read: hard factual evidence) that Bush bought the election in Florida the last time around?

DELAND, Fla., Nov. 11 - Something very strange happened on election night to Deborah Tannenbaum, a Democratic Party official in Volusia County. At 10 p.m., she called the county elections department and learned that Al Gore was leading George W. Bush 83,000 votes to 62,000. But when she checked the county's Web site for an update half an hour later, she found a startling development: Gore's count had dropped by 16,000 votes, while an obscure Socialist candidate had picked up 10,000--all because of a single precinct with only 600 voters. - Washington Post Sunday , November 12, 2000 ; Page A22

Read More: How George Bush Won the 2004 Presidential Election, Wikipedia: Election 2000

... then watch Grand Theft America, a flash animation about the 2000 election.

Iraq Apologies and proof that Bush was AWOL in 1972 and did not fulfill service to National Guard.

Remember when Tony Blair quasi-apologized to his country about the war in Iraq?

Well, here in the U.S., that's not going to happen.

QUESTION: Tony Blair has apologized for the
evidence that brought the country into war against Iraq, apologizing
since apparently some of it was wrong. Do you think the President will also apologize?

MR. McCLELLAN: The President has already talked about what Prime Minister Blair said.
The President said we all thought we were going to find the stockpiles,
and we're surprised that we did not. But also look at what Prime
Minister Blair said and what the President has said: It was the right
decision to go in and remove Saddam Hussein's regime from power; he was
a threat that we could no longer afford to ignore and let -- and let
him continue to deceive the world.

QUESTION: Was it appropriate to apologize?

MR. McCLELLAN: The President has already spoken to that issue, John. So he's already said that --

QUESTION: Did he apologize?

MR. McCLELLAN: He's already said that, I thought we would have found the stockpiles.

QUESTION: That's not an apology.

QUESTION: Is that an apology?

MR. McCLELLAN: Dick, he's already addressed this issue.
It's the same -- Prime Minister Blair said what he's been saying, too.
We all expected to find the stockpiles, but the decision to remove
Saddam Hussein, as Prime Minister Blair reiterated again yesterday, was
the right decision, because he was a threat and the world is better off
with Saddam Hussein removed from power. And that's --

QUESTION: Can you say that's more an explanation or an apology? I don't think the statements are --

MR. McCLELLAN: The President said this quite some time ago,
he spoke to this very issue quite some time ago. He said the same thing
-- Prime Minister Blair said we all thought we were going to find the
stockpiles. We all thought we were going to find the stockpiles. But it
was the right decision to remove Saddam Hussein --

QUESTION: Where is the word sorry?

MR. McCLELLAN: -- from power, and that we're better off -- and we're better off because of it.

QUESTION: -- into a place where you use words like --

MR. McCLELLAN: I'd be glad to show you where he said that we all expected to.

QUESTION: It's the contrition --

MR. McCLELLAN: I think he's already said --

QUESTION: There's no apology.

MR. McCLELLAN: He's already talked to this very issue, Jodi.

[White House Press Briefing - Air Force One - 09-29-04]

[Christian Grantham]

ALSO: PROOF THAT BUSH WAS AWOL IN 1972 AND DID NOT FULFILL HIS SERVICE TO NATIONAL GUARD