Compare this Liberal pre-Debate "boilerplate" to the one the AP had -
does anyone think our liberal press will use something like this rather than the AP's GOP rewrite/spin of "conventional wisdom"?
One of the ways Kerry energized his base was with anti-Iraq war voice that avoided nuance in favor of a few clear, bumper sticker, crisp messages.
Kerry's likability gap shrunk as the joint appearance of two affable candidates showed there was not a major difference in likability.
Kerry managed to strike the right tone as he put Bush on the defensive on the war, health care, the economy, etc. without appearing to be bullying a President that Americans seem to like.
But this was a night for Foreign policy, and Kerry's connecting Iraq spinning out of control with how Bush squandered an opportunity to pursue Osama bin Laden with full global support by alienating long-time US allies and dissipating US troop strength was met by Bush's assertions that Iraq is not spinning out of control and that Kerry is a cut and run defeatist.
Bush's question of just what would Kerry do differently, and how can we trust him to actually do what he says was met by Kerry's "Just because Bush asserts something is true does not make it true" and "Refusing to change course in the face of disaster is not a character trait America needs in a leader".
AP Boiler Plate release at 1 pm by the AP is below- The links below worked until 5pm (ABC) and 7 pm (Boston Globe) LOL
Boston Globe posted before 2 pm and it is now after 5pm! LOL And ABC just took it off their site (5pm).
EDIT: GLOBE took it off Boston.com at 7 pm.
http://www.boston.com/dailynews/274/politics/Bush_and_K ...
Bush and Kerry meet in first of three debates with Kerry needing to make up ground
By Terence Hunt, Associated Press, 9/30/2004 13:47
CORAL GABLES, Fla. (AP) After a deluge of campaign speeches and hostile television ads, President Bush and challenger John Kerry got their chance to face each other directly Thursday night before an audience of tens of millions of voters in a high-stakes debate about terrorism, the Iraq war and the bloody aftermath.
The 90-minute encounter was particularly crucial for Kerry, trailing slightly in the polls and struggling for momentum less than five weeks before the election. The Democratic candidate faced the challenge of presenting himself as a credible commander in chief after a torrent of Republican criticism that he was prone to changing his positions.
Bush was expected to confront questions about leading the nation into war on the still-unproven premise that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. He also has faced accusations that he lacked a strategy to deal with the violence and chaos that have left more than 1,000 Americans dead and that the Iraq war has diverted U.S. attention from al-Qaida and other terrorists.
With a record of four years in office to defend, Bush had a debate strategy of being optimistic about Iraq but acknowledging that times were tough. His stance is that Americans know he is a decisive leader even if they don't always agree with his decisions and that Kerry has taken conflicting positions on Iraq and can't be trusted to lead the nation. <snip>
On the Net:
Transcript will be available at:
http://wid.ap.org/transcripts/debates/04prez.html 
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