James Lileks On the Debate

I didn't watch the debate last night. My wife did, but I was on the computer, so I got to listen to it instead. I heard a lot of "I have a plan!" I heard a lot of "international community!" I didn't hear anything new, from either party.

My wife, who is a non-citizen and cannot vote (she's not a Democrat), thought Bush won. I thought Kerry was a better presenter. Her point, Kerry was a car salesman. Bush was a regular guy doing a hard job.

I understand that during the Nixon/Kennedy debate, the people who heard the debate believed Nixon won - handily. But the people who saw the debate believed Kennedy won it. It was appearance vs. substance.

Last night, it was again. Kerry was the better used car salesman, but I trust that the one Bush is selling is more reliable.

James Lileks, as usual, does an outstanding job of reviewing at least the first 30 minutes of the debate - the part he could stand - in today's screed. Some excellent excerpts:

But mostly I hate the debates because I simply cannot abide hearing certain statements I’ve been hearing over, and over, and over again. I can’t take any more talk about bringing allies to the table. Which ones? Brazil? Mynmar? Microfrickin’nesia? Are there some incredibly important and powerful nations out there whose existence has hitherto escaped me? Fermany? Gerance? The Galactic Order of the Belgian Dominion? Did we piss off the Vulcans? Who? If we mean “France and Germany,” then please explain to me why the reluctant participation of these two countries somehow bestows the magic kiss of legitimacy. They want in? Fine. They don’t? Fine. At this point mooning over France is like being that sophomore loser dorm pal who spent his dateless weekends telling his loser roommate about a high school sweetheart who stood him up for the prom. Give it up. Move on. I understand; they are wise and nuanced, we are young and dumb. We’re the cowboy leaning with his back against the bar, elbows on the rail, watching the door; we need our European betters to teach us how to ape the subtle forms of Nijinsky, limbs arrayed in the exquisite form of the Dying Swan. Understood. But I don’t want to be the Dying Swan. And I don’t want posture lessons from a country that spent the last 20 years flopping on its back and grabbing its ankles when Saddam showed up waving stacks of Francs in exchange for bang-sticks. Don’t you think I know about France’s relations with Saddam? Surely the advocates of the French Touch must know, and don’t care. Or they don’t know – in which case their advice is useless.

Germany? Whatever.

And it took lots of dead Americans to be able to say that.

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Summits are convened not to solve a problem but solve the perception that there is a problem. Imagine if the government had been different in 2002 - we’d have had a summit with France and Germany. End result: the sanctions would be dropped by now, and Saddam would still be in power.

Why don't people understand that? That's precisely where we were headed, and I firmly believe where we would have gone with Gore as President.

The entire point of the summit would be to establish “goals and timetables” cooked up by various bored Eurocrats attempting to smooth the path towards full and open trade with Iraq, instead of covert under-the-table deals. (It’s so nice when you can deal with thugs in the open, rather than skulking around; that makes one feel as though one’s doing something wrong.) The entire Iraq issue would have vanished from the A-section, because there had been – a summit! If there was backsliding or intransigence, well, this would require discussions, or perhaps frank discussions, or even a motion to bring up the issue in the General Assembly, after which it would be sent up the chain to be discussed in the Security Council, right after they get done crafting a resolution that warns China not to be mean to Taiwan, and warns Taiwan about those provocative elections they’ve had lately.

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So, I get it. We are wrong and bad and stupid and stupidly wrong-bad. We failed to make France act as though it wasn’t, you know, France, a militarily insignificant nation that is understandably motivated by self-interest, and we haven’t convened a summit so we could be castigated for ignoring the extralegal use of Israeli helicopters to turn Hamas kingpins into indistinct red smears. You’d think we nuked Paris and converted everyone to Lutheranism.

Here’s the thing. I’d really like to live in John Kerry’s world. It seems like such a rational, sensible place, where handshakes and signatures have the power to change the face of the planet. If only the terrorists lived there as well.

There's much more, in the same key.

Damn I wish I could write like that.