The debate

For a supposedly impromptu debate, this one has already been almost totally scripted. The two sides have dickered over just about everything--a rule preventing candidates from quizzing each other directly, the height of the podiums, you name it. When President Bush and Sen. John Kerry walk onto the stage at the University of Miami in Coral Gables on Thursday, they will even know what kind of pen and notepad they can use. The scripted cordiality even extends as far as the opening-bell handshake.

  Iraq Net article

Ah, yes. The important stuff. While the rest of the world grapples with the reality and the enormity of our insane and inhumane foreign policy, these two asshats are dickering over who looks the tallest.

Below the surface, there are actually many similarities in the candidates' worldviews. "Kerry and Bush really buy into a larger consensus about what America's role in the world should be and what the implication and meaning of 9/11 was," says [ Boston University foreign policy Prof. Andrew] Bacevich. It quickly becomes less of a debate about where America should go than how it should get there. "