Blowing it?

Slate's William Saletan logs Kerry's blown opportunities in the debate last Friday night. Some of his points are well-taken -- particularly on the final "three mistakes" question. I think Kerry's abortion answer was just fine, although I admit it's hard for me to imagine a Catholic's reaction to that exchange. But Saletan's Monday morning quarterbacking (or, following his metaphor, second-guessing the manager) seems to be the type that comes too easily to non-speechwriters. His charge of "trying to look like a man who takes notes" comes out of nowhere, and should have stayed there.

Kerry has made up a LOT of ground in the debates. I suppose Edwards helped too last Tuesday night, although I've seen widely differing accounts of who won that one. If he can take it to the house in the last debate, I'll finally believe he can win the election.... but of course there's no telling what will turn up in the final days before the vote.

My old professor Mark Crispin Miller writes in The Bush Dyslexicon that while working on his father's campaign in 1988, W himself "ensured that the notorious -- and effective -- Willie Horton ads could be blamed plausibly on mavericks unaffiliated with the Bush campaign. The first son raised the money for those ads and devised the cover operation that could then be said to have produced them on its own (a ruse that -- to paraphrase our president -- allowed Bush/Quayle to claim the high horse while taking the low road)." [Miller attributes to all of Bush's biographers, but notes J.H. Hatfield's coke-arrest-alleging Fortunate Son as the most detailed source.] Sound familiar?

Maybe he doesn't need Karl Rove after all.

Meanwhile, there's this too. Already declared illegal, I understand.