mystification
Tom Shales is the only analysis I'm going to read (going to admit to reading anyway) of last night's debate, which we ended up watching after all at a friend's house. (We had planned to miss it.) He's been doing a sharp-eyed appraisal of these things as television and, in so doing, getting a lot closer I think to the actual voter reaction than the people analyzing them strictly as politics. Not to mention doing a better job at the latter sometimes anyway.
Today's piece is well worth your effort and almost explains to me the probably unfathomable (by me) mystery of how anyone anywhere can think Bush won that debate or is fit to be president. I just don't get it. I try and put myself into the mindset of someone who watches the debate and thinks: "That's my guy!" But, I can't do it. I'm beginning to think the people that vote for Bush are people who don't watch TV or follow politics at all, ever, but just flip a coin or something.
Don't give me the bs line on the folksy charm either. I wouldn't want Bush as president, OR to back me up in a bar fight. Who would?
Today's piece is well worth your effort and almost explains to me the probably unfathomable (by me) mystery of how anyone anywhere can think Bush won that debate or is fit to be president. I just don't get it. I try and put myself into the mindset of someone who watches the debate and thinks: "That's my guy!" But, I can't do it. I'm beginning to think the people that vote for Bush are people who don't watch TV or follow politics at all, ever, but just flip a coin or something.
Don't give me the bs line on the folksy charm either. I wouldn't want Bush as president, OR to back me up in a bar fight. Who would?
posted by Gwenda @ 10/09/2004 10:13:00 AM
2 Comments:
At 11:42 AM ,
Christopher Barzak said...
Nope, you're dead on. Bush is the kind of smart-mouthed little jerk who gets you *into* a fight at the bar, and then turns tail and lets you get your ass kicked while you're fighting with people that are pissed off at something *HE* said. Little coward. Guys like him are a dime a dozen. I think those must be his huge audience.
At 3:41 PM ,
Dave said...
I'm similarly bewildered. I ended up watching in the student union here in Champaign (librarian boot camp redux), and I was stunned at how poorly Bush was performing. Kerry was so calm, and Bush was nearly apopleptic, repeating himself, seemingly unable to form an original thought, particularly in the foreign policy half. And yet all the news programs are describing him as "engaged" and "feisty." I saw a petulant little boy unable to explain his decisions and positions, mystified that anyone would question him.
The question on the Patriot Act and the question about three mistakes made during his administration were particularly egregious. He didn't rebut the former question's thesis that the Patriot Act was an abrogation of our civil rights; he just said "I don't think it is" and launched into his talking points. And claiming not to have made any mistakes except for a few appointments which "you probably never heard of" and "I'm not going to say their names because I don't want to embarrass them on national TV" was not an answer to the latter questioner, who was clearly looking for some indication that he was not as bull-headed as he appears. And there are people who thought he performed well? I want to know what these people are smoking.
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