November 11, 2004

The Third Debate

It was not until the third presidential debate did I make up my mind who I was going to vote for. I was an undecided voter until then. In the course of my reaction to the third debate, Bob Kieve and I exchanged e-mails.

One of my mentor's is Bob Kieve, a winner of the San Jose Award (four given in the last twenty years) for doing the most for his community, founder of a series of radio stations, perhaps best known when he was one of President Dwight Eisenhower's speech writers. He is not only very intelligent, and extremely witty, he speaks his mind. When he talks, I listen.

Bob is very independent. I got to know him when on the San Jose Symphony Board where I served on the nomination committee for several years, plus three years as the committee chairman. We brought the symphony into the black is our claim to fame.

We were talking about how the candidates were presenting themselves in the television debates, primarily how they were coached. I was telling Bob how turned off I had become with John Kerry. ( think his wife was worse, but that is another subject. )

Now I know about writers coming up with radio/TV bites and phrases, writing speeches, as I used to do it for Leo Ryan, among others. I basically did not like the orchestrated answer by John Kerry .

It was near the end, when the moderator said he and the two he was presenting questions to all had something in common: They all had two daughters. It was Kerry's reaction that made me sit up.

Bush talked about his two daughters, then about when he met his wife, and seemed very sincere, even with a sense of humor, about raising two children in political office and how he and his wife managed it.

Kerry's answer was as if he wasn't listening to the question, but had something else in mind. First, he turned me off when he did not correct the moderator, saying he also had two sons. He didn't mention his two step- sons. Ask any divorced man about their extended family, and they will say, like Sue and I do, we have six kids---three by Sue and three from my first wife. I consider Sue's kids part of my family---the three I helped raise and participated in their lives since the oldest was eight and the youngest two or three years old. Sue has also done a lot for my three kids. You might say I was a part of Sue's family, but from my viewpoint, her kids were part of my family. So when Kerry did not acknowledge his “extended” family that bothered me a lot. It also showed that he was performing for the “camera” and didn't consider his two step sons as part of his family.

I was already annoyed with his answer when he seemed to switch subjects. It was obviously planned to me, a “canned plug.” It didn't belong in the sequence. While Bush had talked about how he first met his wife, here comes Kerry from out of no where, bringing up his mother, relating that when he told her he was running for the presidential office, she answered, “Integrity. Integrity. Integrity.”

I could not believe it. I know the purpose was to show the audience what he had—or would emphasize. Maybe implying that Bush did not have “integrity.”

This was a rehearsed line, and to me, too phony. It really turned me off, especially following the extended family non-answer, And for me to believe, that if I went to my mother and I told her I was running for presidential office that she would say that!!!

My mother has passed away, but if she were alive, and I had told her I was running for president, she most likely might say, “ I hope you know what your are doing..” Or “Let me know if there is anything your father and I can do for you” or “ I wish you the best as you are a good son.” I like to think she would have said the last one. She might even have said, “ I hope you beat the S.O.B.”

But never, never---never--- would she have answered, “ Integrity. Integrity. Integrity.”

My reaction was Kerry is fully scripted, whereas Bush may make fumbles, and come up with one liners, he shoots straight from where he is—whether you like it or not, that's who he is. I don't know who Kerry is, and while I am not fond of the current economic condition or going to war in Iraq, is it safer to vote for someone you know where they stand? Or for someone who tells you what his handlers want you to hear?

In the communication with Bob Kieve, he responded:

“ You and I are really pretty much on the same page.  I find Kerry simply an opportunist,  an eternal candidate.  On the other hand,  even though Bush is more consistent in his beliefs,  he does manage at times to use canned stuff,  such as when he quotes discussions he's had with individual Americans.  Anyhow, I'm voting for Bush for the same general reason you use.  I don't know who the hell the other guy is or what he stands for -- other than, as defined by the Mercury news -- he is NOT George Bush.”