The 2004 Presidential debates are starting tommorrow. I am very interested in what will be covered. Does anyone know if this will be scripted and if so what exactly does that mean, are there answers scripted or the questions or both? Hope to see some good analysis here in Kirupia.
Media Advisory - Commission Statement
http://www.debates.org/pages/news_040927.html
On September 20, 2004, the Bush and Kerry campaigns announced their commitment to participate in a series of three presidential and one vice presidential debates, as proposed by the Commission. The September 20 announcement adopted the Commission’s proposals regarding the debates’ locations, dates, times, moderators and 90-minute lengths, and was accompanied by a detailed Memorandum of Understanding specifying format rules for the debates. On September 24, 2004, the Commission announced that President Bush and Senator Kerry, as well as Vice President Cheney and Senator Edwards, have met the requirements for participation under the Commission’s Non-Partisan Candidate Selection Criteria. According to press accounts, the debate participants have begun preparations for the debates, and the Commission has confirmed to the Bush and Kerry campaigns that the topic for the first presidential debate will be foreign affairs and homeland security and the topic for the third presidential debate will be domestic and economic policy. The Commission has reconfirmed that the debate format rules will be enforced as stated in the September 20 Memorandum, including the provisions with respect to no direct exchange between the candidates, the time allowed for candidate responses, and a system of moderator enforced light and audible timing cues. The Commission also has reiterated that there will be no departure from the terms of the Memorandum without prior consultation with and approval by the appropriate campaign representatives.
So to sum it up, the candidates have both agreed to refrain from direct exchanges with one another, and are not allowed to break the pre-set rules, unless both sides have given their pre-approved consent. :sigh:
EDIT: UFA ยูโรป้าลีกคืนนี้ บอลเมือคืน ราคาบอลน่าเล่น - See Hip-Hop Emcee ‘Wordsworth’ give the President Select a verbal tongue-lashing…
What’s the point of debating if it’s scripted (ie: written in advance) ? The moderator (Jim Lehrer, at least for the first debate…) has written questions I think, but not the candidates…
And yeah, I hope to see good analysis too…
Great link to the memo Pom! There is some hilarious stuff in there, like the section on the type of chairs to be used and that they Must stay seated suring the debate. Good stuff, I agree that this form of debate is pretty lame but we all know we are watching it for the answers to the questions and hopefully there will be some new stuff to hear and not the same old retoric.
It should be interesting. I was watching a special on how kerry and bush debate and what their strengths and weaknesses are. Kerry is going to be at a disadvantage due to the rule against talking directly to Bush. They say one of his greatest strengths is ripping on people directly.
Is it me or was Kerry regergetating standard retoric. Hmmm… then again so did Bush…
I thought Bush as himself and articulated his policies very clearly, and defended himself well. That is the best I have ever heard Bush speak, and I believe that this will spread the gap between the two. In my opinion, Bush definitely won this debate.
Kerry seemed like he was just saying anything that he thought would give him the vote. He was too offensive; he spent too much time bashing Bush rather than stating what his plans for the country were.
I would disagree, bush looked too emotional, I’ve seen Bush’s good speaches, during his governor’s race, this wasnt to great at all.
He, as the incumbent, did not respond to well to accusations, which might hurt him, and he’s overusing some of his attack speeches, which I think he should save as he is wearing them out. Plus the stutoring, some pauses where too long, and not enough content.
Kerry’s one major problem was the lack of change in tone, and he didnt give enough time for some of his points to sink in.
The biggest place where Bush I think did very poorly was when he said the reason we are having so much problem its because “Our invasion plan was too successful” it was just horrible, and the because “the terroirst layed down their weapons and retreated in to the cities” if they layed down their weapons, what are they now using water-guns? He stutered through it, I mean paraphrasing he said “the reason we are having problems with post invasion, is because we did well in the ivnasion” … that Might hurt him, but again, might be forgotten…
I didn’t see anything new from either candidate. Bush came off, in my opinion, as likeable, and Kerry came off more solemn. When Pres. Bush was complimenting Sen. Kerry and the sacrifices his family made, he seemed more natural. The joking remark about Yale by GW was good.
Regarding their campaign stuff, they pretty much said the same things that they had said over the period of their campaign. In my view, that isn’t good for Kerry, because he is trailing in most polls and losing ground in various battleground states. Like RB said, Kerry had some ideas that he really needed to hammer in, but couldn’t because of questions by the President.
Overall, I think it was just a normal, nothing-too-exciting debate. The debating rules probably made it that way :beard:
Kerry is a very good speaker compared to Bush!
Bush had many in-between-silence-moments!
I think Sen. Kerry made a good point regarding Nuclear Proliferation, it’s a big deal!
Does anyone know where i can see this online again, i didn’t watch the begining
President Bush had many silence breaks in the debate with Gore too, and kicked his buttt. Just ask yourself what the average working class American wants, a guy that thinks about what he wants to say and talks like he is talking directly to you, or a guy that makes great speeches on the fly without thinking like he memorized everything in some college debate competition? Gore was that guy and lost, and the first President Bush was that guy and lost to the straight talking likeable Bill Clinton.
Good point BL!
I’ll stick to my opinion
i understand what your trying to say BL, regarding taking your time and thinking about what you say before you say it, it was on my mind when i was watching the debates!
But in my opinion(even network tv channels agree on this) is that Kerry is more productive when it comes to speech, he knows what’s his saying before he says, and he does think(just because he talks a bit faster than Bush doesn’t mean he doesn’t think), speech is something that you develop with experience overtime!
though you claim Bush was thinking(i have no doubt). Pres. Bush kept cutting off words, rephrasing what he said and stopping for several seconds between sentences(notice what BR posted above, thats one example).
during a speech, continuing silence between words(especialy when it’s unexpected), rephrasing what you already thought about, cutting off words! It’s pretty overt that you lack the essentials for being a powerful speaker!
I’ll agree with you, Bush is not a great speaker. But I do think that this was a good speech for him. I don’t think the stuttering and pauses will hurt him as much as if he had tried to continually talk and not have those verbal pauses and whatnot and ended up making up words, or “Bushisms.”
Yeah, I agree that it was not great Bush moment, but John Kerry… geez He mentioned his vietnam “experience” like 4 times, it’s the same old stuff from him.
Did you hear in the beginning him talk about GW not sending the troops in with enough gear and “armor”, Kerry voted against the money to “arm” the troops. Same old stuff from Kerry…
blindlizard, bush did not “kick gore’s butt” . . . infact Gore won by popular vote, but this country decides that that its based upon electoral college (states) rather than the people… Bush is a horrible debator, he is approachable and can associate with the common citizen, beyond that he is a sock pupet, however I am not doubting his intellegence, he is a bright man, he just uses it in the wrong way.
I also think that Kerry could use some work, he is intellegent, and probably could make a good president, however, he is not approachable, and has a tough time associating with the common citizen… if we look at the past, we can take note to all the past 6 or 7 presidents and their ability to be approachable and likeable right off the bat, with the exception of Nixon.
I think instead of focusing on how they act, I think we should focus on what they can do, and what they have done. We should also look at the straight facts, both current and historical.
I could go on for hours, but Im sleepy and I need to finish this application im building.
g’night
I like how Kerry said that the greatest threat was nuclear proliferation, and then added WMD after Bush said something about it. Bush was the only one that related nuclear proliferation as a threat in the realm of terrorism. What war are we currently fighting, the war on terrorism or the cold war arms race? Countries having nukes is not the greates threat to America. Countries giving WMD (nukes) to terrorists to use on us is. I guess since Kerry was wrong in the 80s during the cold war, he wants to bring it back up and try again. That man is out of touch…in my humble opinion
The Kerry campain was saying all day that Bush won every debate he was ever in. The conceded that he won against Gore in the debates. I am going off that. God enough with the popular vote. Not all the states counted all the votes, there were absentee votes. In states that went for Bush in 2000 some were never counted because it wouldn’t have made a difference in that states outcome. Most of those absentee votes were military people and most of them go for the Republican. So lets not go the Gore won the popular vote thing. Didn’t Saturday Night Live make enough fun of that for this decade? :mu:
personally I dont like either candidate, I would vote for senocular, but he isnt running for president. But since my choice is either Bush or Kerry, Id rather see a fresh face in the office, maybe other countries will begin to like us, and maybe, just maybe, the economy will improve, rather than the rich . . . . And as I stated earlier, instead of refering to peoples acts, and refering to the media, lets base our ideas on fact, the facts are, since Bush has been in office, the economy has become worse, we are diving ourselves into an economic depression with the largest debt ever, in history. Not to mention, this war, though I defend it as I was in the military myself, and I strongly support our troops, I fear we went into Iraq for the wrong reasons.
Im sorry you feel the way you do, it is sad to see people base their opinion on feeling rather than fact, and as you put it, we are fighting the war on terrorism, Im curious, how many troops are in the non-oil filled Afghanistan as compared to the number of troops in the oil-rich Iraq?? And as we have seen by the facts Iraq had nothing to do with the terrorist attacks of 9/11, nor did they have WMD’s. As a result of the US invading, there is now a threat of terrorism in Iraq.
So based on those facts, I feel that Bush has not done as good a job as he should have, and I feel that Kerry is a better candidate for the job. And I strongly feel that Kerry would not, and will not pull our troops out until the job is done, I also feel that Kerry will be a better candidate to pull other countries in this war, thus, saving the US billions of wasted dollars, which could be better spent here on our soil.
Now its sleepy time for me.
and I hope you understand, Im not attacking you, Im just stating my opinions as you did yours.
Lets keep the facts going. Kerry supported a nuclear freeze when Reagan was winning the cold war. That war was won by out spending the USSR to build nukes. But Kerry wanted to stop making nukes. Kerry supported getting rid of every major weapon system we use today. Kerry voted to take power away from our intelligence agencies. After the first trade center bombing, Kerry missed 75% of the Intelegence committe meeting in the Senate. There is not one major bill that was passed into law that Kerry sponsored. The fact is Kerry has been weak on defense for 20+ years in the Senate and Kerry has not gotten any kind of domestic pollicy passed.
Now lets go into you “facts” Since Bush has been in office we have had the largest economic grow in 20 years. We do not have the largets deficit (which is what I assue you ment) as comparied to GDP. Iraq did have connections to Al-Qieada because Saddams people have been found to have been comunicating with Al-Qieada. No one ever said Iraq was responsible for 9/11, ever. Saddam had ties to Hammas and gave $25,000 to families of suicide bombers in Israel. Saddam had weapons in the past he gassed 300,000 of his own people. The CIA, MI6, Russian intelligence and Egypt said he had WMD.
