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First, I'd like to say that, overall, I was very, very pleased with the performances of all ten candidates yesterday afternoon. I agree entirely with one of the commentators on Hardball after the 9:00 MSNBC airing, who said the real winner yesterday was the Democratic Party. Now then, on to commentary on the candidates.
First, although I admit I'm a bit biased, I thought Kerry's performance was excellent. He was calm, poised, presidential, and put his debating skills on display in a couple of his exchanges with Dean and Gephardt. I thought he did a very good job outlining his plans (although he sometimes needed more than his allotted time to do so :)), and that, when he criticized other candidates, it was on policy differences and not personal grudges. The commentators on the aforementioned special debate edition of Hardball seemed to sgree with me: three of the four said Kerry came off as the most presidential- although, in fairness, I should point out that one of them was a Rep from Tennessee who's helping to head up Kerry's campaign and another was Joe Scarborough.
I also thought Dean did pretty well. He defended himself nicely, if a bit too angrily, from Gephardt's Gingrich comparison, and, for the most part, turned in a solid performance. I must confess, however, that I did have to laugh at his response to Gephardt's attack (which, for the record, I think was pretty baseless). Apparently, Dean was shocked- shocked!- that any Democratic candidate would stoop so appallingly low as to compare another with a reviled Republican leader. Presumably he will now be removing the word "Bushlite" from his vocabluary and telling his supporters to stop bringing "Busch Lite" beer to Kerry's campaign rallies. Again, I think Dean did a good job, and that the Gingrich comparison was unnecessary and wrong, but the hypocrisy of that comment irked me a bit.
Clark, although he did avoid giving a direct answer to most of the questions put to him, actually surprised me with what seemed to be a pretty respectable depth of knowledge on domestic political issues. We have to remember, folks, this guy has been in politics for nine days, and this was his first debate. Considering that, his showing was quite good, and I think he'll make an excellent addition to the field.
Gephardt, in my view, didn't have his best performance. He seems to me to be even more shocked by Dean's success in Iowa than Kerry is by Dean's lead in New Hampshire, probably because Dean also comes from a neighboring state to NH, while Gephardt was planning to run away with Iowa. As a result, he seems to be really desparate for a way to knock Dean down, and I really don't think there was much of a factual basis behind the Gingrich comment (if I'm wrong there, if Dean really was a supporter of Gingrich's Medicare plan during this time, somebody please let me know). In any case, Gephardt really seems to be getting desparate, and I don't think he did especially well.
I really, really don't get why Edwards hasn't been getting more support in the polls. He's a very impressive speaker with Southern roots and a great middle-class story, and while it's true that his policy experience is limited, he has more of it than Clark, who seems to be leading national polls now. I thought Edwards was solid again last night.
The other candidates all did pretty well too. Kucinich, Graham, Sharpton and Braun all made their points fairly well, but right now none of them seem to have the support or fundraising that will be necessary to win the nomination. Graham particularly impressed me- he certainly has no Elvis factor, but the man knows what he's talking about.
Anyway, that's just my opinion. Feel free to chime in with comments or disagreements or whatever.
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