Kerry Actually DID Win the Debate…Before He LOST It!

October 5, 2004

Well, sports fans, we’ve now had four full days to review, recount, recant, refute, reexamine, and, possibly most important, request answers to polling questions concerning what transpired in the debate last Thursday night. And, with much fanfare, the winner is…George W. Bush!

Now, I know that some of the headline numbers from recently released polls quite suggest otherwise. And, to be sure, if this were a high school debate, we would probably all agree that Kerry did a much better job than the President, and, as a result, was the clear victor. However, this wasn’t a high school debate. This is one leg of a very long horse race that has been vied for lo these past fifteen months. As such, you can’t view any debate in a Presidential campaign by itself without trying to understand how it fits into the grand scheme of said campaign. Or, put another way, Democratic pundits right now are behaving like A’s and Giants fans who were ecstatic that their teams won yesterday even though they had already been eliminated from the playoffs.

Given this, it is important to take a big picture view of what transpired on Thursday night to determine just how it fits into the overall strategy being employed by the President and his advisors. As was outlined in a previous column of mine, the President has done a wonderful job recently of making this election about the wars in Iraq and on terror, and has now forced Senator Kerry to not only play on this battlefield, but also to take for all intents and purposes an opposing anti-war stance. As a result, it is now incumbent upon Senator Kerry to convince a majority of the electorate that the President made a mistake going to war, and is bungling the job now that we’re there. Furthermore, he must persuade voters that he is more qualified to prosecute this war in the manner that they feel is appropriate at this juncture in our nation’s history.

In reality, regardless of whom viewers perceived was the victor on Thursday night, Kerry appears to have failed to present himself to the electorate as the better choice to accomplish what they desire in Iraq. This is best exemplified by polls that Rasmussen Reports and Gallup did this weekend to determine whether the debate acted to materially change the minds of the electorate with regard to this war. Amazingly, the numbers are quite counterintuitive, and suggest that the debate acted to further the resolve of Americans to win this incursion and do so in much the same fashion the President currently is.

For example, prior to Thursday night’s debate, Rasmussen indicated that 52% of those polled felt that accomplishing the mission in Iraq was more important than getting the troops home ASAP, with 42% feeling the contrary. Now, after the debate, this has changed to 57% who are now for accomplishing the mission, and 37% who just want the troops out quickly. Furthermore, those who believe that the President’s goal is to accomplish the mission regardless of how long it takes has gone from 66% prior to the debate to 71% after. By contrast, although this number also improved for Mr. Kerry from 18% to 25%, 57% of those polled still feel that Kerry’s priority is to get us out as quickly as possible without concern for finishing the mission.

These numbers are nothing but FABULOUS news for the President, and demonstrate that the overall campaign is working even with the real or imagined failures on Thursday evening. In fact, these results show that regardless of his stammering, frowning, and eye rubbing, Mr. Bush STILL got his message across to the American people concerning this pivotal issue. Furthermore, although Kerry also improved his standing on Iraq with voters, it appears that all this debate accomplished was to further cement the wars in Iraq and on terror as being the primary concerns of the electorate. And, as the President’s numbers on these issues continue to be ahead of Kerry’s even after the debate, this is a HUGE victory for Mr. Bush.

Let’s examine this even further by looking at the Gallup results just released this morning. According to Gallup, prior to the debate, on the issue of who would be better to handle Iraq, Bush was leading Kerry by 14%. Now, after the debate, Bush is leading by 7%, with 51% still saying that the President will better handle the situation (down from 54%). Certainly, if you’re a Kerry pundit, you could make the case that your candidate just reduced the President’s lead in this matter by 50%. However, as this debate was on foreign policy issues – largely about Iraq – Kerry needed to accomplish MUCH more than reducing Bush’s lead in this issue by half. Furthermore, when it comes to handling terrorism, Bush’s lead has gone from 27% before the debate to 17% now. So, 56% of those polled after the debate still believe that the President is better suited to handle terrorism compared to 39% who believe Kerry will do a better job in this regard. Excuse me, but with basically four weeks to go before the election, this is like a football team getting to within 17 points down with five minutes to go in the game! More to the point, Kerry needs to cut into both of these leads in these two critical issues by much more than he has to have a legitimate chance of winning this election.

Taking this a step further, the panic by Conservatives over the past few days has been as a result of polling data released specifically by Newsweek and Gallup suggesting that Bush’s convention bounce has totally evaporated. However, the data being collected by other polling organizations is clearly not as dire. For example, Rasmussen before the debate had the race at Bush 49%, Kerry 45%. Today, their numbers are Bush 49%, Kerry 46%. So, Kerry gained a point. Furthermore, in a three-man race including Nader, Zogby shows Bush with the same three point lead he had prior to the debate. Beyond this, ABC News and The Washington Post just released their poll showing Bush is now ahead 51% to 46% versus 51% to 45% before the debate – another one point gain for Kerry. Moreover, Pew Research shows Bush at 48% and Kerry 41% now versus 48% to 40% respectively just before the debate. Again, with what was described by many on the Left and their media minions as a resounding victory on Thursday night, Kerry gained a point.

Given all these numbers, it quite appears that this debate did not act to change as many minds as we might have thought with all the Democratic and media celebration over the weekend. Now, that’s not to say that they had nothing to be cheerful about. The reality is that Senator Kerry has had a terrible two months since his convention. By contrast, Bush has had a fabulous August and September. As a result, Kerry clearly needed to stop the bleeding with a fine performance in this debate, as did his supporters. To that extent, one has to admit that he accomplished this. However, the internals of all these polls suggest that although the losing streak might have ended on Thursday night, it is way too soon to infer that Mr. Kerry has done anything more than stop the President’s momentum. The bad news for Mr. Kerry is that for this to be the beginning of his own winning streak, he’s going to have to convince the public this coming Friday night that last Thursday wasn’t just a flash in the pan.

Of course, the other way to look at these results is to consider the fact that most people who have witnessed Bush’s debates going back to when he first ran for governor of Texas have avowed that this is his worst performance ever. If this is indeed the case, and Kerry wasn’t able to truly score a decisive enough victory on Thursday night to move the polls more in his favor, how’s he going to do so if the President actually decides to show up for the next two? Put another way, maybe those of us on the Right should look at this first debate as though our hockey team just lost the opening playoff game without our star goalie, leading scorer, and best defenseman…but they’re all expected to be back in time for game two!

Noel Sheppard