Free Republic

Before this gets out of hand, a few questions need to be asked. If you've TiVo'd this, please take a look and let us know the answer to some of these. 1. Did Bush remove anything from his pocket at any time? 2.Watch the video. Kerry obviously holds what he removes with both hands. Would anyone hold a pen like this? 3. What happens at the end of the debate? Does Kerry remove what he laid down. Did someone TiVo this? 4. Bush obviously had an unfolded piece of paper. At anytime does Kerry expose what he has? 5.Since the...

If anybody tivo'd or screen captured the first debate it would be helpful in finding a higher resolution version. If not I'm sure freepers will be able to scour the internet to find one.

The Miami debate rules covered 32 pages and were explicitly detailed. However, the Bush team failed to take into account Kerry's personal vanity, or that Kerry's manicure would be uppermost in his mind when debating GWB. Before the debate, Kerry had a manicure in his room.......as most self-absorbed presidential candidates would. However, he was afraid he might have smeared his nails while getting dressed for the debate. So Kerry put a nail buffer in his breast pocket, and placed it on the podium, so that he could tidy up his nails in between answers. For the next debate the Bush...

CNN/USA Today/Gallup (10/1-10/3): Bush 49, Kerry 49 | Bush JA @ 50% Rasmussen (9/30-10/2): Bush 49, Kerry 45 | Bush JA @ 53% GW/Battleground (9/27-9/30): Bush 51, Kerry 44, Nader 2 | Bush JA 53%

I wish I knew how to post photos from video clips, but if you watch a hi-res video of the debate, you will notice how Bush seems like his normal bubbly self until he looks over at Kerry when he is d***ing around with his cheat sheet. You then see his face contort, and he looks angry. Perhaps our President didn't do as "awful" as many of you thought he did. Perhaps the sky really isn't falling...

Bush Retains StrengthsDespite these significant changes in the basic structure of the presidential race, the poll suggests that President Bush continues to have significant advantages over Kerry on several key dimensions that have been central to Bush's campaign strategy in the last several months: Americans still see Bush as better able to handle Iraq than is Kerry, although Bush's margin over Kerry has narrowed on this dimension since the debate. At this point, 51% of Americans say Bush can handle the Iraq situation better than Kerry, while 44% select Kerry. That's down from a 55%-41% Bush margin in the pre-debate...

Popular opinion column writers have had their hasty say on their feelings and the feelings of many who viewed the Presidential Debate. Connoisseurs of entertainment have rendered the final decision on the looks and voices of the candidates in polls. Or have they? They are quick to speak. But distinguishing voters in the USA are concerned about defense. Senator Kerry was widely reported to have held his own and given articulate answers, but his statements from the Debate reveal troubling clues about his position on defense. Kerry, referring to the President, said "And smart means not diverting your attention from...

My sister came up with this scenario. Could Bush have avoided a trap? What if Kerry pulled out a picture of a dead soldier and did it so Bush would see him pulling out a paper hoping to entrap him into accusing him of cheating. He would have then said emotionally (maybe with a tear) "Oh no I'm not cheating. This is a picture of ______ who was killed in Iraq. I just have it to remind me why I am here and how important it is for me to win for this election for him". It would have made...

I'm not really surprised by John Kerry's performance at this season's first presidential debate on September 30. Former governor Bill Weld, who attempted to oust Kerry from his Senate-seat in 1996, has recently been out and about the media advising of his past experience in that hotly contested Senate race. It was Weld's conclusion that it would be very foolish for the Bush campaign to underestimate Kerry's considerable debating skills. Weld was right on target. Once Kerry hit his stride last Thursday evening, he was indeed poised and impressive, presenting his well rehearsed talking points with ease and conviction. Moreover,...

Pollster Frank Luntz is crying foul after MSNBC canceled his long-scheduled focus group two days before the debate. Luntz, who is under contract to MSNBC, had already spent $30,000 on recruits for several focus groups and invited reporters in Florida to watch -- only to be told that the network didn't want to declare a winner in the debate. "I think they buckled to political pressure," says Luntz, who has advised Republicans from Newt Gingrich to Rudy Giuliani but says he's done no GOP work since 2001. "They caved. . . . Why is it that Democrats are allowed to...

"In the first presidential debate, I was hoping to hear a good debate. "I wanted to hear John Kerry lay out his plans for Iraq and for winning the war on terror. I wasn't disappointed. Kerry staked out a strong plan to bring peace to Iraq and to refocus our efforts to fight terrorists around the world. "President Bush avoided the questions and issues presented him. He is a terrible speaker and a worse debater. His snide grin doesn't work on me. He's led us into danger, not toward safety. "This debate made it clear: Kerry is a leader we...

Kerry quote from the debate: And now we see beheadings. And we got weapons of mass destruction crossing the border every single day, and they're blowing people up. And we don't have enough troops there.Which weapons of mass destruction is he talking about? Is he referring to the weapons that were seized coming from Syria that were heading for Jordan heading for Jordan and that were thought by many to have originated in Iraq?  

Why didnt Bush say anything about Kerry's votes in Senate(and lack thereof) as they relate to foreign matters? I havent come across an answer to this in my reading for the past two days.

President Bush left a lot to be desired for the other night. He hit on some excellent points and let Kerry hang himself on others. But if I were working for the Bush campaign and did debate prep with him...I would have demanded that he use one line repeatedly over and over and over and over. A line straight from John Kerry himself. "The threat of terrorism has been exaggerated"-John Kerry

John F. Kerry improved his image with voters who watched his debate with President Bush last week but didn't significantly shift their choice in the presidential race, a Los Angeles Times Poll of debate viewers has found. While the debate generally did not diminish impressions of Bush on most questions, it did restore some of the luster Kerry had lost amid relentless Republican pounding since his party's convention in July, the poll found. [...] The Democratic nominee also made modest but consistent gains with viewers questions relating to national security and strength of leadership. And the percentage of debate viewers...

With voters widely viewing Kerry as the debate’s winner, Bush’s lead in the NEWSWEEK poll has evaporated Oct. 2 - With a solid majority of voters concluding that John Kerry outperformed George W. Bush in the first presidential debate on Thursday, the president’s lead in the race for the White House has vanished, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. In the first national telephone poll using a fresh sample, NEWSWEEK found the race now statistically tied among all registered voters, 47 percent of whom say they would vote for Kerry and 45 percent for George W. Bush in a three-way...

Last Updated: 9:51 pm, Saturday, October 2nd, 2004 Kerry is self-declared debate winner; rips Bush on economy By Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) - John Kerry on Saturday looked to frame the next presidential debate in a speech criticizing President Bush's economic record, but also tried to get in a final word about their last face-off by declaring himself the winner and Bush a liar. "George Bush lost the debate," an announcer says in a television ad Kerry's campaign unveiled Saturday. "Now he's lying about it." The Democratic presidential candidate's accusation comes two days after his first debate with Bush, when...

President George W. Bush and Sen. John Kerry both hammered away at familiar themes in their 90-minute debate Thursday night in Coral Gables, Fla. The dominant themes of the face-to-face encounter, as expected, were the war in Iraq and the war against terrorism. Kerry accused the president of "a colossal error in judgment" in ordering the invasion of Iraq and said the real focus should be the war against terrorism and the hunt for Osama bin Laden. Kerry talked about his four-point plan to end the war in Iraq. "I have a plan to end the war… I want to...

WASHINGTON -- John F. Kerry improved his image with voters who watched his debate with President Bush last week but didn't significantly shift their choice in the presidential race, a Los Angeles Times Poll of debate viewers has found. While the debate generally did not diminish impressions of Bush on most questions, it did restore some of the luster Kerry had lost amid relentless Republican pounding since his party's convention in July, the poll found. The key political question will be whether those gains in Kerry's image will help him peel away voters from Bush in the days ahead. More...