Reply #53: Debate Set to Sharpen Bush-Kerry Contrast

[papau]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-debate30sep30.story
THE RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE
Debate Set to Sharpen Bush-Kerry Contrast
The stakes are high as undecided potential voters look for more substance on the issues dividing the major-party presidential candidates.
By Maria L. La Ganga and Mark Z. Barabak
Times Staff Writers

September 30, 2004

ALTOONA, Iowa — With so much at stake, they don't want polemics, they want plans. Instead of dirt, they want details about how President Bush and Sen. John F. Kerry would make America stronger, safer and healthier, and how the two men vying for the nation's highest office would extricate the country from a troubling war.

Voters here and across the country want to hear all of this tonight, when the two rivals face off in the first of three presidential debates, which could go a long way toward deciding whether Bush can solidify his upper hand in the contest or Kerry can capitalize on persistent voter unease about the incumbent.

With polls showing the contest fluid, the debate has become a critical juncture in the race for the White House — the first chance for voters to hear the two men's views at length, side by side and unfiltered. And as they arrived in Coral Gables, Fla., on Wednesday, the campaigns jockeyed to lower expectations about how the men would perform.

But in nearly two dozen interviews across this Midwestern battleground state, many voters said they had little hope that a campaign pocked with nastiness could yield a debate of much substance tonight.<snip>