Veep Debate

Well I tried to take notes, but gave up after about 15 minutes. Here are my impressions:

Cheney won. I'm vacillating on whether he won by a little or by an ass-kicking. I'm also vacillating on whether or not it will matter. A lot of liberals are going to take solace in the prevailing wisdom that VP debates don't matter (or some, like Kos and his commenters, will go into denial), and they'll cite as evidence Dan Quayle wetting his pants against Lloyd Bentsen. Of course, part of the reason that didn't make a difference is that Bush I was in a much better position relative to Dukakis than Kerry is to Bush II. Bottom line: Edwards definitely did not help the Democratic ticket tonight.

The remarkable thing about this debate was its converse resemblance to the presidential debate; in this debate, it was the Republican candidate presenting a forensic, detailed prosecution of his opponents, and the Democrat who was left responding with platitudes and talking points, struggling somewhat to fill up his time. Cheney projected foreign policy competence, and Edwards often looked out of his depth. Unlike Bush last Thursday, Edwards actually did show up to debate. He wasn't a stammering fool and he didn't run out of things to say after 30 minutes. Nor did he go through a series of bizarre facial contortions---though as my roommate pointed out, Edwards couldn't really control a decidedly reddish hue coming over his face as Cheney steamrolled him on foreign policy. (Indeed, Edwards was a bit rattled for the remainder of the debate, and stuttered through some otherwise strong points.)

Edwards landed some clean punches of his own, on Cheney's extraordinarily reactionary record as a Congressman and his ties to Halliburton ("cue evil theme music" as Lileks says). His best moment during the foreign policy section was pointing out that Dick Cheney, as Secretary of Defense, proposed and lobbied for the most significant defense spending cut that he now criticizes John Kerry for supporting. As the debate turned towards domestic policy, Edwards rallied somewhat, but couldn't really ever turn things decisively in his favor. The last half of the debate---in which Edwards at least fought to a draw---was also rather snooze-inducing. I suspect that a lot of viewers either fell asleep or turned to the baseball game. (Hopefully a substantial number opted to watch the game rather than the debate.)

By what I would estimate to be a 3:1 ratio, Cheney dominated Edwards in terms of cutting attacks. He compellingly argued that Kerry's position on the war has shifted with political necessity, and likely got some jaws dropping when he asked how Kerry and Edwards could stand up to al Qaeda when the couldn't stand up to Howard Dean. And he more or less pissed in Edwards' open mouth on denigrating the contribution of Iraqi troops to the fight against the insurgency. I'm absolutely baffled about why Edwards didn't respond with the contents of Spencer Ackerman's very straightforward fisking of the administration's claims about Iraqi security forces; ditto to why he didn't see fit to mention that Poland withdrew from Iraq
or that its president felt he'd been "taken for a ride." What Cheney accomplished so well---which Bush failed at and won't get a chance to do again---was to make the debate about John Kerry's record. The Republicans know that George Bush has already lost the referendum on his own re-election, so they want the election to be a referendum on John Kerry. And Cheney fostered that dynamic brilliantly.

I could go on talking about how well Cheney did, but I'd really prefer not to. I hope other people saw the debate differently than I did, but I can't imagine that this debate did anything good for John Kerry.

On to the wierdnesses: there's really only one, namely John Edwards' somewhat mangled criticism of the Federal Marriage Amendment, and Dick Cheney's rather overt departure from the Republican platform and official Bush administration position. Who knows---maybe, by affirming his love and respect for his daughter, Cheney alienated some evangelical voters.

Silver lining: Kerry won't go into Friday's debate overconfident. Bush might.

Dark cloud: Edwards is officially a liability. I don't know if there was necessarily a better choice for the VP nomination, and in any case, Kerry would have pissed off a lot of people if he hadn't picked Edwards. But Edwards gave decidedly mediocre performances both in his convention speech and his only national debate. And this guy was supposed to run rhetorical circles around Kerry?!! Good thing he didn't get the nomination outright. This much is for sure: Edwards adds 0 electoral votes to the ticket. Had Gephardt been picked, Kerry would likely be ahead in Missouri. If Richardson had been picked, New Mexico wouldn't be in contention and Arizona would. [Vilsack would still have been a mistake. Way too scrotal--ed.] The choice should have been---the DNC can start cutting me checks now---Russell Feingold. With Feingold, we wouldn't be in danger of losing Wisconsin, and he'd have strengthened Kerry's position in every midwestern state. Moreover, his integrity is absolutely impeccable, and he's in the best position to make a principled criticism of the war, having voted against authorization but for the $87 billion supplemental.

And the "pat yourself on the back, why don't you" award goes to: Gwenn Ifill. A thoroughly unprofessional performance. Her questions to Edwards were blatantly wife-beating. When she insisted that Edwards adhere to the bizarre stipulation of not saying "John Kerry" in answer to a particular question she (I hope) blew any chance of getting to do this again. The follow-up, had there been one, would have been for Edwards to enunciate his position on the Iraq war through an interpretive dance.

To my liberal friends who will complain that Cheney was lying through his half-opened mouth all night: You're right. So what.

UPDATE: The Reason bloggers have what seems to me a pretty sensible take on the debate here and here.

Tim Cavanaugh thinks the whole affair was off-putting:

Well, it's just about to wrap up, and I'm now embarrassed that I was actually hoping for an interesting evening. Cheney and Edwards' butch/femme dynamic was intriguing for about ten minutes, and my initial takeaway is that Cheney wins the Drool at the School in a split decision. Edwards loses me because he's more obviously full of rhetorical bluster, repeating and repeating and repeating phrases for effect, and best of all saying the American People know that he has less experience than Cheney, "and they deserve to know that." (Thanks, Johnno!)

Whereas Nick Gillespie thinks it put people to sleep:

It seems only fair that the candidates got to sit down through the whole thing, since the audience must have been lying down and sleeping by the end of it.

If that's the headline for the debate, then it won't have done too much damage.

SECOND UPDATE: Jesse Walker thinks the winner was Maurice Chevalier: Who won? It's close, but I guess I have to give it to Cheney. Neither of these guys was impressive, but Edwards' empty suit was showing.

I hope he's right.