Comments on the Presidential Election


This is a short discourse on the direction of the Presidential election. It is being written after the Vice-Presidential debate.

Before I talk about the debates, I would just like to point out one thing I don't believe anyone is talking about. It's being hinted at but sometimes we need to state the obvious. All the President and Cheney do is attack John Kerry. And every once in a while they mention that they might take on the economy, jobs and health care in the second term. In fact the President has the congress the senate and the supreme court and in 4 years they have done nothing to deal with rising health care costs, they have done nothing to create high wage jobs and they continue to insist that outsourcing is good for the economy. From their commercials you would think they are the challengers always attacking because they had record. In fact as an incumbent he has to attack because his record is so bad there is nothing to defend.

Now a word about the debate tonight. I was struck by the fact that every time the moderator tried to talk about jobs and the economy the Veep tried to get to Iraq or would talk about the No Child Left Behind Act. He must have dodged that question at lest three times. Also when Sen. Edwards accused the Administration of believing outsourcing was good for the country, Cheney never denied it. Congratulations to John Edwards for an outstanding performance.

If there are some lessons for Sen. Kerry as he prepares for the next debate, I think he needs to keep the focus on the economy. Don't let the President turn this into another foreign policy debate and keep challenging them on job creation and outsourcing. Cheney was unable to answer those with any clarity except tired old campaign slogans. He was also pretty weak on health care. All in all he was least comfortable on the domestic issues and I think Pres. Bush will be the same.

Good Luck to Sen. Kerry on Friday.

Posted: Wed - October 6, 2004 at 12:32 AM          


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