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And a lot of pundits are stating that Kerry may get as much as a six point bounce out of the first debate, as the first debate is simply the most important and the most watched. It is the reason that the Republicans are downplaying the importance of the debates, and wht they all look like they just went bankrupt. All Kerry really needs is to cut any lead that Bush has to below three points and the historical trends in voting will give the election to him as the undecided voters who are still undecided are only still undecided now ecasue they have no confidence in the current administration, This is the main reason that in the last weeks of every election, 75-85 percent of the undecided swing away from the incumbent.
The next set of debates are the ones that Bush is supposed to be absolutely the weakest in, and unless the Bushistas find some way to improve his performance in the presence of the opposition and in the presence of a room that is half filled with people who oppose him, he is going to tank again. BushCo has done their own candidate the greatedt harm by assuring that in the past, every crowd at every public appearance that BUsh gave wass filled only with loving BUsh supporters. Bush only performs well before an adoring crowd and has no ability to deal with a crowd that is critical of him. His performance with the press is an indicator of this, becasue the press itself is another controlled crowd. If a member of the press questions BUsh too probingly, Bush just arrogantly stes, "I answerws that< or that will be the topic of another speech, and blows them off by saying "next question" The reporter who dared to question Bush is never seen again, unless they are someone who cant be ignored, like Helen Thomas.
Like any so called ex alcoholic, Bush just lacks an internal editor.
It was great that at least some memebers ofthe media decided that they were not obligates to NOT do the split screen views of both candidates to see the response of both candidates to questions and answers. Bush even outdid gore with the face making and grimacing. Most counts give 25 separate grimaces and faces made by Bush during the 90 minutes. On CNN's Crossfire, the liberal co-host of the show just did a film clip of one grimace after another to show how ingfantile Bush was acting during the evening.
I do not think BUsh is going to fare any better when average Democrats start questioning him about things like lying about the Niger Uranium and so on. And it will look far worse if he stars getting even a little nasty or makes faces about the questions that Kerry answers, or the ones he is presented with.
He is simply not used to being attacked to his face, asn his machine has protected him from that.
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