Overall, I’d say it was actually one of the better Presidential debates I’ve seen. There were actually some substantive points covered. In terms of speaking style, Kerry definitely was smooth and confident without seeming arrogant or pompous. Bush came off as exasperated and impatient with Kerry–he actually reminded me of Gore in the 2000 debates.

In terms of substance, I found myself surprised to give Bush a slight edge, but both had plusses and minuses.

Kerry Plusses:

• Criticism of Bush: I think Kerry overall did a pretty good job of making good, substantive cirticisms of Bush’s policies, particularly with regards to nuclear proliferation and pulling back in Fallujah.

• Sudan: One thing that impressed me was Kerry’s willingness to provide logistical support to an African Union military intervention in the Sudan. I think that’s a good move, and I thought he showed more guts on the matter than Bush did.
• Nuclear proliferation: If there’s one thing that impressed the hell out of me, it’s that Kerry was prepped and eager to discuss nuclear proliferation. It is an important issue and it’s also one that Kerry himself has a good record on. Now, as to the development of new weapons, I think that’s a misstep, because the obvious concern is nuclear weapons in the hands of rogue states and terrorists. But overall, good marks.
• Certainty vs. hardheadedness: I personally think Kerry did a good job turning around the “flip-flopper” argument by pointing that that too much certainty can be dangerous.

Kerry Minuses:

• North Korea: Kerry’s just flat out wrong on North Korea. Bilateral talks are what Kim Jong-Il wants because it increases his bargaining ability. Multilateral talks for North Korea that include China, Japan and South Korea are, in my opinion, the best way to deal with the problem.

• Iraq: I just wish Kerry would have articulated a plan for Iraq. Personally, I think that the hidden subtext of his remarks is that he’s going to get U.S. troops out as soon as possible. But he’s got to know that’s a mistake, right? But just saying, “we need more troops” and “we need to get allies” is not a substantive answer. What if nobody volunteers for duty? What if no more allies come on board? What then? It’s Kerry’s weakest point, I think.
• “The enemy is al-Qaeda”: As someone who’s considering voting for Kerry, I was more than a little dishearted to see him make the “al-Qaeda is the only enemy” argument. Because they’re not. Hezbollah, Hamas, Zarqawi’s organization, and god only knows what others are the enemy. The enemy is anyone, but particularly Islamic fundamentalists, who is willing to indiscriminately kill to achieve their goals. The debate would lead me to believe that Kerry is less concerned with other terrorists. I think that’s a mistake.

As for Bush, he did about the job I expected him to. Substantively, he’s stuck to the same script as he has since 9/11, so there’s not much to say on the matter that I haven’t already said. I did, however, think that he did a pretty poor job of defending his Iraq policy, especially the post-war mess we have now. But he did nail Kerry on Iraq and also, I think, won the point on North Korea.

I sincerely doubt that I’m going to watch the next two debates, as they’ll focus on domestic poicy, and I don’t have a kind word to say about either man’s domestic policy, so that’s not what I’m voting on.

The debate is about halfway over - apparently it only takes that long for the candidates to run out of new sound bites for their points. Most of the questions are answered within the first half of the time allowed, and they use the remaining time to re-emphasize points or mistakes their opponent made.

Still, Amanda and I noticed that the challenger (Kerry) has both a disadvantage and an advantage in the debates. The advantage is that he has 4 years worth of ammo to use against Bush. The disadvantage is that he has to use it all - he can’t say he would keep doing what Bush is doing on any given issue because then he wouldn’t need to be running at all. The other aspect is that while Kerry is using all that ammunition, he still seems to lack any solid and structured plan for Iraq and the war on terror, other than to “bring in allies” and “spend more money on Homeland Security”. How he plans on convincing the allies to change their mind, or rustle up this money hasn’t been addressed. Bush even reiterated his exit criteria for Iraq, which went unanswered by Kerry. Kerry wins points when he points out weaknesses in Bush’s plan.

This debate seems to be good in solidifying the opinions of the individual candidates so there can be a side by side comparison on the important issues - like a handy pocket reference guide. Unfortunately, nothing they are saying is material I haven’t heard before, and I am left where I was before the debates. Will this do anything to sway the undecided voters? Maybe. But most likely it will reaffirm what people already had decided. Democrats will laud Kerry for attacking Bush on key issues, and Republicans will shoot at Kerry for still “flip-flopping” and cheer Bush’s resolve. Nothing’s changed.

** Jeez, just go look at a lefty blog and a righty blog. It’s like people are watching two completely different debates. Why bother? **

Interesting.

Reports that The Washington Post Co. is close to buying Microsoft’s online magazine Slate are correct, a source at the software company confirmed yesterday.

Speculation about Slate’s sale has swirled since Microsoft disclosed in July that it was talking to potential buyers. . .

. . .It’s unclear what would happen to Slate’s Redmond staff under a sale. It has about 30 employees, mostly journalists. A dozen are based in Redmond. About five, including Editor Jacob Weisberg, are based in New York, and eight are in Washington, D.C.

The Washington Post Co. has facilities in the area — it owns the Herald newspaper in Everett.

The Washington Post is probably my favorite mainstream newspaper, and Slate is my second favorite online magazine after Reason. It seems to me that this buy wouldn’t adversely affect Slate much. At least, I hope not. It’ll be interesting to see if the rumors are true, though, because it might have wider implications in the “new media/old media” conflict…

A Federal District Judge has ruled some of the FBI surveillance powers granted by the Patriot Act unconstitutional.

Surveillance powers granted to the FBI under the Patriot Act, a cornerstone of the Bush Administration’s war on terror, were ruled unconstitutional by a judge on Wednesday in a new blow to U.S. security policies.

U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero, in the first decision against a surveillance portion of the act, ruled for the American Civil Liberties Union in its challenge against what it called “unchecked power” by the FBI to demand confidential customer records from communication companies, such as Internet service providers or telephone companies.

Marrero, stating that “democracy abhors undue secrecy,” found that the law violates constitutional prohibitions against unreasonable searches. He said it also violated free speech rights by barring those who received FBI demands from disclosing they had to turn over records.

I don’t know enough about the case to comment super-intelligently, but at first glance this appears like a solid ruling. Whether it will hold up on appeal is something else entirely. But I hope it does.

UPDATE: Patriot Act, Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986–it’s all the same if you’re the media!

But is it too much to ask that when the mainstream media reports on court decisions that they properly identify the law that is struck down and the Administration that is rebuked? Apparently it is, at least if the Thursday morning papers are any guide.

As I noted in my post below, a recent decision of the Southern District of New York struck down part of a 1986 law known as the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. How does the press report the decision? No mention of the 1986 law, of course. Instead, the press is reporting that the court struck down a major part of the Patriot Act, in a blow to the Bush Administration’s overzealous response to terrorism. As I trace the history of the statute, this is quite inaccurate: the basic law was implemented in 1986, almost 20 years ago. To be fair, the Patriot Act did amend some language in this section; just not in a relevant way. As best I can tell, the court’s decision does not rely on or even address anything in the Patriot Act.

One of these days I’m going to learn not to trust mainstream press accounts of legal matters, seeing as how they almost always get them wrong.

Thanks to Dodd for the tip.

“Whoever is elected in November will be President of all of us. I don’t know who it will be - and I’m not making this appeal because I secretly think it will be one or the other and I want to ‘bind the wounds’ - but I’ll have no problem saying “President Kerry” as I have no problem today saying “President Bush”.

Either man will be my President - and yours as well.”
– Marc Danziger

The unofficial bar results were posted today. They are likely pretty reliable (because who’d want to deal with the hassle of putting a name up wrong?) That being the case, I can say with a good deal of confidence that I have passed the bar and given Republicans one more lawyer to scare people with.

“In religion and politics people’s beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing.”
– Mark Twain

This item is from Ain’t It Cool News, so take it with a grain of salt. But it looks like Mel Brooks is planning a Spaceballs sequel.

Playbill : Will you have a role in it?

MB : It’s doubtful, but I’m writing myself back into the Spaceballs sequel that I’m now writing, so you haven’t seen the last of my face. Why another Spaceballs? It wouldn’t feel right have anyone else play Yoghurt and the first one was the best experience I’ve had making a movie since Blazing Saddles.

Playbill : When can we expect that?

MB : Best case scenario : a week before the new Star Wars opens. Worst Case Scenario : a year after the new star wars opens.

Mel Brooks’ post-Spaceballs films haven’t been very good–Life Stinks, anyone? But The Producers muscial is, by all accounts, extremely good (I haven’t it seen it myself). So hopefully Mel Brooks can pull off one last great movie. Lord knows the sci-fi genre since Spaceballs is ripe for parody.

David Brooks has a fascinating column comparing the situation of Iraq to that of El Salvador in the early 1980’s. The upshot, argues Brooks, is that the best way to stabilize Iraq and Afghanistan is to make sure that elections are held.

As we saw in El Salvador and as Iraqi insurgents understand, elections suck the oxygen from a rebel army. They refute the claim that violence is the best way to change things. Moreover, they produce democratic leaders who are much better equipped to win an insurgency war.

It’s hard to beat an illegitimate insurgency with an illegitimate dictatorship. Strongmen have to whip up ethnic nationalism to lure soldiers to their side. They end up inciting blood feuds and reaping the whirlwind.

A democratically elected leader, on the other hand, can do what Duarte did. He can negotiate with rebels, invite them into the political process and co-opt any legitimate grievances. He can rally people on all sides of the political spectrum, who are united by their attachment to the democratic idea. In Iraq, he can exploit the insurgents’ greatest weakness: they have no positive agenda.

Of course the situation in El Salvador is not easily comparable to the situations in Afghanistan or Iraq. On the other hand, over the past 30-odd years, democracy has spread at the rate of one and a half nations per year. It has spread among violence-racked nations and to 18 that are desperately poor. And it has spread not only because it inspires, but also because it works.

Interesting. Voter registration starts next week, and it goes without saying that the insurgency will try to disrupt it. But it never occurred to me until reading this column how powerful elections in Iraq will be. After all, it’d be hard to claim that the new Prime Minister of Iraq is a “puppet of America” if he’s elected by a majority of the voters, right? It’s an interesting thought.

Every time I read one of these articles about an asteroid passing near the Earth, I can’t help but stand agape at the fact that we don’t have any plan to deal with such a strike at all. If an asteroid the size of Toutatis (the asteroid that passed Earth yesterday) were to strike the Earth, civilization as we know it would be wiped out. So why aren’t we making strides to do something about it?