Nightline 9/13: Toons with Walt Handelsman, Mike Lukovich, Jimmy Margulies

[Bozita]

after Monday Night Football 

Nightline Daily E-Mail
September 13, 2004


TONIGHT'S FOCUS: 50 days to go until Election Day and we are entering the homestretch. At the moment, the President is enjoying a post-convention bounce, which happens to coincide with the traditional Labor Day launch of the campaign. This is the time when people are supposedly really focusing on the election for the first time. And what are the candidates talking about? National security. And also tonight, what are the political cartoonists saying about this election?

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Tonight, Nightline kicks off a regular Monday night look at politics. Between tonight and November 1st we hope to provide some insight and analysis into this season's political campaigns and even, on occasion, have some fun with it.

We are a week out of Labor Day and so far the news has been dominated by the attacks and counter-attacks between the Bush-Cheney and Kerry-Edwards campaigns on Iraq and the war on terror. Is this going to turn out to be an election decided on that alone? At the moment the President is basking in his post-convention bounce and is showing a steady lead in polls on issues regarding the handling of both Iraq and the war on terror. But can this lead be sustained, or will other issues come in to play? We've asked our correspondents who are covering the candidates to look at that question and how each candidate is campaigning on the issues. How it is playing with the crowds? Are the candidates talking about anything else or does it always come back to national security? Republican strategist Mike Murphy and Democratic strategist John Podesta will join us tonight and every Monday to analyze the key political issues of the day.

We'll also profile some people you don't typically see, but their work informs and entertains us everyday. Political cartoonists convey in one drawing and a few words the top issues of the day. What goes on in their head as they think about the key features they need to highlight of President Bush or Senator Kerry? Do cartoons have to be funny? We talk to three cartoonists - Walt Handelsman of NY Newsday, Mike Lukovich of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Jimmy Margulies of The New Jersey Record. Handelsman says "the hardest part of our job is taking complex topics and synthesizing them down to a very small short-worded editorial cartoon, as well as being able to twist it and turn enough but not turn it too much where the reader doesn't understand what you are trying to say anymore."

Chris Bury will anchor tonight. Dean Reynolds will report on the Kerry campaign and Jonathan Karl on the Bush campaign. We'll have a look ahead at the political week and, of course, we'll give you the latest on Hurricane Ivan as Florida prepares for the possibility of yet another hurricane.

We hope you'll join us.

Madhulika Sikka and the Nightline Staff
Nightline Offices
ABC News Washington Bureau

[Bozita]

1. kicking for the toon guys

The most honest segment of the American media.

[Blecht]

2. Thanks

Gonna try to catch it.

[Bozita]

3. should be showing up soon in the EDT zone -- kick