Again, better bloggers than I have covered and will cover this, so I’m really just wasting space. Still, it’s my space to waste, right?

Links:
Captain’s Quarters Blog
Instapundit (Not just one post, so there’s no permalink)
Vodkapundit
Shape of Days

In general, I think it was pretty even. Bush hit a lot of home runs, and Kerry swung and missed a lot… for me. However, if you were leaning toward Kerry to begin with, I’m sure it seemed the other way around.

With Dad supporting Kerry and me leaning toward Bush, and our habits of talking a little more loudly than necessary when at home, I should’ve realized that watching the debate here wasn’t a great idea. We got yelled at to be quiet at least once, and I think I heard grumblings from the other room throughtout most of the debate, honestly.

I KNOW I got yelled at when Kerry made a comment about “the last man to die for a mistake,” and then said that Iraq wasn’t a mistake… when he’d just said it was not three minutes before.

Quote from Captain’s Quarters (Post):

“8:30 – ‘Last man to die for a mistake’ — Kerry now says that it’s not a mistake. It’s a mistake, it’s not a mistake — which is it? I mean, HE JUST GOT DONE SAYING THAT INVADING IRAQ IS A MISTAKE! Sheesh! …”

My favorite line of the entire night, though, was the “nuanced” response about Kerry’s promise to have the troops out in 6 months. “I never said I’d have our troops home in six months. What I said was that, with my plan, we would start pulling troops home in six months.” You never said… but you said… HUH?!

Basically, the debates were more of the same, with neither candidate falling on their face too badly. Kerry flip-flopped a few times, and Bush missed a few chances to really pound on him, but he did well. I would really have liked to have had Badnarik included in these debates (and possibly Nader, too). I like Badnarik, from what I’ve seen of his stances, except for the war, and that’s the big one this election season, so I’m going to stick by Bush barring some big shift.
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I’ve heard it said (and I want to attribute this to Peter David, though I have no idea if he said it at all, much less if he said it at all, much less if he were the first to say it…) that the only real way to fight free speech is with more of it. That is, if someone says something horribly racist and hate filled, the response should not be to have government silence that person, but for other, right-minded (correct-right, not conservative-right, though the two do coincide sometimes) people to speak up as well.

This article, from CrushKerry.com (found through Instapundit), says the same thing, while covering the specific issue of “Rathergate.”

I’m sorry if this offends someone who believes that it’s not right to take the morals of our culture and judge another, but there should never, ever, ever be a situation in which someone sues to be beaten “only” once a week.

The next time NOW or some similar organization complains about sexism in America, remind them how far we’ve come.

(I don’t know where I found this link, or I’d give credit. Sorry.)
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