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So, who won the 2nd debate??????
The 2nd debate's winner: Jim Lehrer (for struggling to find a difference)
WASHINGTON, DC -- After watching George W. Bush and Al Gore discuss policy issues in their second presidential debate on Wednesday, the Libertarian Party has declared a clear winner: Moderator Jim
Lehrer.
"Three cheers for Jim Lehrer," said the party's National Director Steve Dasbach. "Time and time, again the moderator challenged Bush and Gore to explain how their policies differed with one another
during this 90-minute Agree-A-Thon.
"But Lehrer's challenges drove home the point that trying to find a difference between Bush and Gore is like trying to find a difference between Coke and Pepsi. Lehrer, like the rest of America, had to struggle mightily to discover even a microscopic difference between the Democratic and Republican candidate on most issues."
Take just the following three topics, Dasbach said.
* The Middle East conflict. "Both unleashed cookie-cutter answers about the desire for peace and wanting the U.S. to serve as an
'honest broker' -- spurring Lehrer to ask: 'Is there any difference?'
"Where was the candidate with the courage to say: The real victims in the Middle East conflict are American taxpayers -- who have
been forced to fork over $5 billion a year in foreign aid to Israel and the Arab nations, and $150 billion over the past three decades.
"That money has purchased one thing: More war, as the current killings in the West Bank demonstrate. The expensive and obvious lesson is that foreign aid and U.S. interventionism, like other government
programs, simply don't work."
* Gun control. "Both Bush and Gore unholstered their so-called solutions: Background checks for gun buyers, taxpayer-financed trigger locks, enforcing the stratospheric number of gun-control laws, and 'keeping guns out of the hands of kids.' "
"And again Lehrer had to hound them to reveal a difference: 'Back to the question about the differences on gun control,' he said. 'What are they, governor, from your point of view?'
"Where was the candidate with the common sense to say: The solution isn't to enforce gun laws, it's to start repealing them -- and restoring your right to defend yourself from murderers, robbers, and rapists."
* The environment. "Both proposed massive new government intervention on the issue, prompting Lehrer to ask Gore, 'Where do you
see the basic difference...between you and the governor on the environment?'
"But where was the candidate with the wisdom to say: The only way to protect the environment is by rescuing it from government control and turning it over to private property owners who will care
for it like their own, because it will be their own?"
Throughout the entire debate, Bush and Gore sounded like "a couple of pet shop parrots," said Dasbach.
"The candidates mimicked each other's proposals for more government involvement in prescription drug coverage, in running the
school system, in fighting racial discrimination, and countless other
issues," he said. "They disagreed only about some small details, and about the size of their modest tax cuts.
"By the end of the so-called debate, it wasn't just Jim Lehrer, but tens of millions of other Americans, who were wondering out loud: Aren't the two candidates in a debate supposed to, well...debate?"
In other words, Jim Lehrer's questions were more insightful than Bush's or Gore's answers, Dasbach said.
"And that's why the PBS newsman won the second presidential debate hands down -- and why the American people lost."
Joel
[This message has been edited by Joel (edited 15 October 2000).]
WASHINGTON, DC -- After watching George W. Bush and Al Gore discuss policy issues in their second presidential debate on Wednesday, the Libertarian Party has declared a clear winner: Moderator Jim
Lehrer.
"Three cheers for Jim Lehrer," said the party's National Director Steve Dasbach. "Time and time, again the moderator challenged Bush and Gore to explain how their policies differed with one another
during this 90-minute Agree-A-Thon.
"But Lehrer's challenges drove home the point that trying to find a difference between Bush and Gore is like trying to find a difference between Coke and Pepsi. Lehrer, like the rest of America, had to struggle mightily to discover even a microscopic difference between the Democratic and Republican candidate on most issues."
Take just the following three topics, Dasbach said.
* The Middle East conflict. "Both unleashed cookie-cutter answers about the desire for peace and wanting the U.S. to serve as an
'honest broker' -- spurring Lehrer to ask: 'Is there any difference?'
"Where was the candidate with the courage to say: The real victims in the Middle East conflict are American taxpayers -- who have
been forced to fork over $5 billion a year in foreign aid to Israel and the Arab nations, and $150 billion over the past three decades.
"That money has purchased one thing: More war, as the current killings in the West Bank demonstrate. The expensive and obvious lesson is that foreign aid and U.S. interventionism, like other government
programs, simply don't work."
* Gun control. "Both Bush and Gore unholstered their so-called solutions: Background checks for gun buyers, taxpayer-financed trigger locks, enforcing the stratospheric number of gun-control laws, and 'keeping guns out of the hands of kids.' "
"And again Lehrer had to hound them to reveal a difference: 'Back to the question about the differences on gun control,' he said. 'What are they, governor, from your point of view?'
"Where was the candidate with the common sense to say: The solution isn't to enforce gun laws, it's to start repealing them -- and restoring your right to defend yourself from murderers, robbers, and rapists."
* The environment. "Both proposed massive new government intervention on the issue, prompting Lehrer to ask Gore, 'Where do you
see the basic difference...between you and the governor on the environment?'
"But where was the candidate with the wisdom to say: The only way to protect the environment is by rescuing it from government control and turning it over to private property owners who will care
for it like their own, because it will be their own?"
Throughout the entire debate, Bush and Gore sounded like "a couple of pet shop parrots," said Dasbach.
"The candidates mimicked each other's proposals for more government involvement in prescription drug coverage, in running the
school system, in fighting racial discrimination, and countless other
issues," he said. "They disagreed only about some small details, and about the size of their modest tax cuts.
"By the end of the so-called debate, it wasn't just Jim Lehrer, but tens of millions of other Americans, who were wondering out loud: Aren't the two candidates in a debate supposed to, well...debate?"
In other words, Jim Lehrer's questions were more insightful than Bush's or Gore's answers, Dasbach said.
"And that's why the PBS newsman won the second presidential debate hands down -- and why the American people lost."
Joel
[This message has been edited by Joel (edited 15 October 2000).]
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