Public Speaking is Like, Sooo Overrated

Here is s list of excuses I have heard in the last 24 hours regarding the president's poor performance in the first debate:

1. I don't know what you're talking about. The president clearly won!
2. Well, the president was very tired from comforting the Florida hurricaine victims.
3. The podium was set way too high, making the president appear gimpy next to Kerry's much taller stature.
4. No fair! They promised no cut-aways to the candidates while they were listening to their opponents responses! (Becuase god forbid we see somebody's face while they are live on national television.)
5. Well, the debates don't really matter that much anyway and won't really change anybody's mind.
6. We need a commander in chief, not a debator in chief!
7. It doesn't matter that the president is a poor public speaker. People love him anyway.


So, if I'm hearing this correctly, the spin morphed from Bush won the debate easily to debates are unimportant in the long run and you don't have to speak well to be president. But if he truly won, wouldn't they play up how vital the debates really are? I hate spin- on both sides. I wish we could be allowed to watch for ourselves and not have some pundit or campaign advisor tell us what we just saw and what to think about it. Honestly, I was expecting it to be a draw or even for Bush to slightly edge out Kerry, simply becuase foreign policy is supposed to be his strongest area. However, I was very surprised to see Kerry perform better than expected and Bush perform poorer than expected. Did it just get interesting? I still think that Kerry needs to definitely win the remaining two debates to make it a race but at least Bush has his work cut out for him now.

To be fair, there are many conservatives (not directly linked to the Bush campaign) that are telling it like it is. In fact, many right wing bloggers are not defending the president's performance. Here is an interesing post from the managing editor of the (right wing) National Review magazine.