Out of his league

Although I don't think I'm particularly qualified to comment on politics (as evidenced by an earlier post), I will have to say this about tonight's presidential debate:

President Bush was thoroughly outclassed tonight.

Bush sounded uninformed on any issues that he hasn't already demonstrated a simple visceral reaction to (e.g. "Ugh, Saddam bad, therefore, invasion good!"). He also repeated himself again tonight and often sounded like he was whining. A very defensive performance. It reminds me of when you just can't justify your position anymore (and you're perhaps slightly inebriated), so you start saying things like, "Well, you're stupid!" and "At least my car ain't all beat up!"

I think one of the most ridiculous moments that Bush had tonight was toward the end when he responded to Kerry's point about the partial birth abortion ban. Kerry had just explained, rather clearly, why he voted against the ban. Kerry said the bill was too uncompromising to the point that it left no provisions for the safety of the mother or victims of incest and rape. Although I haven't read the bill, Bush's response just hit home the fact that he has very limited powers of reasoning.

"A vote is a vote. Simple as that. He voted against a partial birth abortion ban." (Or something like that) is what Bush said.

I think any marginally intelligent person will see right away that Bush was oversimplifying waaay too much on that one.

Another interesting moment was when Bush, in explaining how he would make a bench appointment decision, made the statement that the slavery was never a part of the Constitution. I guess his reasoning was, most people today, even the most right wing of his supporters will probably agree that you can't justify slavery under the Constitution. Unfortunately, Bush is dead wrong.

Slavery was sanctioned in the Constitution (albeit the word "slave" or "slavery" did not appear in the document) and the effects of slavery and discrimination were not dealt with definitively in the law until the mid 1960s with the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. It's just another example of how our president has such a lack of understanding of history and the Constitution (and I imagine other things, given his ineloquence) that it's scary.

It's also very difficult to listen to Bush when everything he says sounds like spin on fact and news you hear every day to the contrary.

While I don't think Kerry is the ideal candidate, I do think the choice between Kerry and Bush is clear. The worst thing about this presidential race is having to choose the lesser of two evils. The best thing is the opportunity to deny the most divisive and dangerously singleminded president in recent memory a second term.

Don't forget to vote.

While we're talking about voting, don't forget to vote on my most recent poll. It's a very important issue to me at this point in my life.