Woo hoo!

[mattlistener]

Kerry wiped the floor with him!! He posed challenge after challenge that Bush couldn't answer, and Bush posed essentially only one challenge to Kerry, that he sends mixed messages -- which Kerry addressed with not only his standard replies, but more importantly by sending very consistent messages during the debate itself. Kerry took Bush to task for not securing loose nuclear material, for cutting funds for first responders, for the diplomatic failure of letting North Korea get the bomb, for committing the majority of our armed forces to Iraq while Al Quaeda was somewhere else, for using local warlords to go after a trapped Osama bin Laden when the most highly trained military in the world was right nearby, for retiring the general who before the invasion said they weren't prepared to win the peace, and more.

In answering a question about America's policy of pre-emptive attack, Bush said "The enemy attacked us first" -- demonstrating again his fundamental thinking that our invasion of Iraq was a counter-attack response to 9/11. He also actually said "Saddam Hussein" once when he was referring to "Osama bin Laden".

Bush was also very defensive, even sounding whiny many times. Kerry din't sound defensive in response to the "flip-flopper" type attacks, he sounded angry and firm.

Ok, off to watch the Daily Show coverage!