Friday, October 01, 2004
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EDITORIAL: Tone-deaf Kerry loses crucial debate

Fails to lay a glove with talk of 'global tests,' and 'bringing in' the Europeans

Democratic challenger John Kerry entered the first presidential debate in Coral Gables, Fla., Thursday night running behind. He needed to win this debate. Many pundits proclaimed that he did so, simply by making no major mistakes while arguing a subject -- foreign policy -- considered to be his greatest weakness. They are wrong. He lost.

President Bush won the debate at precisely the midpoint. He did it with a reminiscence of an Iraq War widow named Misty Bryan visiting with him after losing her husband, P.J., in that war.

The very fact that George W. Bush is not a glib man made it obvious his emotion was sincere, as he said of the young war widow, "It's hard work to love her the best I can. I told her after we prayed together, and teared up and laughed some ... that her husband's sacrifice was noble."

The reminiscence was planned to reinforce Mr. Bush's insistence that the war in Iraq is not "the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time" -- the past statement by Mr. Kerry that Mr. Bush repeated like a mantra, asking how his opponent could lead troops in an effort he calls a mere "diversion."

Rather, the president insisted that a free Iraq and a free Afghanistan will serve as shining examples for millions in that part of the world who yearn for freedom -- that we are winning a war that was forced upon us on Sept. 11, 2001, and that the sacrifice of brave men such as P.J. Bryan is not in vain.

Through this war, the president said, "We're going to change the world."

What made this the defining moment of the debate was not just what the president said. It was the way Sen. Kerry responded. He did not respond. He did not get it. In precisely the way the governor under whom he served, Michael Dukakis, lost a similar debate 16 years ago by answering with cool analysis a question that called for warm emotion, Sen. Kerry demonstrated his tone deafness when he responded by channeling Ross Perot and referring the TV audience to his Web site, then appending a confusing attempt at humor concerning the "Pottery Barn Rule," under which he said Mr. Bush "now has to fix Iraq" since "he broke it."

Sen. Kerry actually said the war on terror will be won by "fixing the subways" and "making sure we'll be fully staffed in our firehouses." He said numerous times that we must "reach out to the world ... bring in new allies" -- the diffident Europeans and U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Perhaps in Boston and New York, talk of sharing responsibility for America's future with the French and with Kofi Annan -- and crippling America's economy with a global warming treaty that would leave Third World nations free to pollute at will -- could win a foreign policy debate.

But John Kerry needed to win the hearts and minds of voters in the heartland. Instead, he appeared smug as the incumbent concluded, "I'll never turn over our security to foreign leaders."