Presidential Debates

WHAT THEY SAID QUESTION: Do you believe the election of Senator Kerry on November the 2nd would increase the chances of the U.S. being hit by another 9/11-type terrorist attack? BUSH: M-tNo, I donM-Ft believe itM-Fs going to happen. I believe IM-Fm going to win, because the American people know I know how to lead. IM-Fve shown the American people I know how to lead. I understand everybody in this country doesnM-Ft agree with the decisions IM-Fve made. And I made some tough decisions. But people know where I stand.

CORAL GABLES, Fla. - Last night, John Kerry lived up to his reputation as a politician who's at his best with his back to the wall. Facing the largest audience of his life, and with his candidacy on the line, Kerry relentlessly pursued President Bush over his leadership in the war on terror, accusing him of taking his eye off the fight against al-Qaida when he invaded Iraq. Bush, though appearing rattled at times, aggressively defended himself. "Of course we're after Saddam Hussein, I mean bin Laden.

COLLEGE PARK - Many of the University of Maryland students here who watched the presidential debate last night came for extra credit. The rest seemingly came for entertainment. Although students were encouraged to leave their politics at the door, they repeatedly chuckled at President Bush's comments and chortled at Sen. John Kerry as the two candidates discussed homeland security and foreign policy. "He was funny, he didn't know what to say," Megan deMagnus, a freshman from Silver Spring, said of Bush.

If you read a news analysis in the The New York Times the morning after the first presidential debates four years ago, you learned that Al Gore was "the man who loves to show off how much he knows" while George W. Bush was "more eager to exchange good wishes." But patrons of The Washington Post discovered instead that Bush "took some punches and gave some back in return," while Gore "treated his opponent with relentless courtesy and occasional humor." Did Gore's and Bush's remarks reveal "pretty ideological" divisions, as Fox News Channel analyst Bill Kristol asserted just a few minutes at the close of the debate?

Expectations are high for the participants in the presidential debates. (An adviser to President Bush recently claimed Democrat John Kerry was "the best debater since Cicero." For his part, Kerry says Bush has never lost a political debate.) But what of the third participant? In each of the three presidential events, a moderator will be on hand to push candidates to answer questions directly, briefly and somewhat civilly. Tomorrow night, in a role he has performed frequently during the last 16 years, PBS' Jim Lehrer will moderate the first debate in Coral Gables, Fla. He'll be followed by ABC's Charlie Gibson in St. Louis and CBS' Bob Schieffer in Tempe, Ariz.

The World More than a year after becoming China's president, Hu Jintao was handed the full reins of power when his predecessor, Jiang Zemin, gave up the nation's most powerful military post. The move ends a power-sharing arrangement that has seen two rival camps maneuvering for position as China faces major foreign and domestic policy challenges, such as relations with Taiwan, North Korea's nuclear program, government corruption and dealing with rapid economic growth. Iran defied the United Nations by announcing that it had begun converting tons of uranium into the gas needed to turn the radioactive element into nuclear fuel.

WASHINGTON - For 90 minutes Thursday night at the University of Miami, presidential nominees George W. Bush and John Kerry will square off in the first of three nationally televised debates that could determine the outcome of the 2004 election. You have to say "could," because for all the potential importance of the confrontation on the designated subject of foreign policy, the history of such presidential debates since their beginnings on television 44 years ago has been uneven. The case for the contention that they are make-or-break events is usually best made by reference to the first, between Republican Richard M. Nixon and Democrat John F. Kennedy in 1960.

When Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry appeared on Late Night With David Letterman Monday, he took the opportunity to lob a few gibes at his opponents in the race for the White House. The Massachusetts senator's team had been wrangling with the George Bush campaign over the ground rules for the series of three nationally televised presidential debates that will begin next week, and he told Letterman's audience he'd found one at least one he could live with. "We compromised," he quipped, "and George Bush is going to sit on Dick Cheney's lap."

THE MEDIA gaggle that descended on Morgan State University last week for a Democratic presidential debate picked a favorite early in the night. It wasn't former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean or Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman. It was heartthrob actor George Clooney. Clooney was the most popular attraction inside the Carl Murphy Fine Arts Center, with scores of eyes following him wherever he went. Armed with a handheld camera, Clooney was shooting footage for his HBO series K Street, a new show filmed and edited on the fly that seeks to blend breaking news with the lives of real and fictional political consultants and lobbyists.

Former Gov. Howard Dean, the early front-runner in the Democratic presidential contest, defended his positions on the Middle East and gun control during a freewheeling debate last night on the Morgan State University campus. The nationally televised forum, sponsored by the Congressional Black Caucus, featured the liveliest exchanges thus far in the campaign among the nine candidates. Those who voted in favor of President Bush's war resolution - Sens. Joseph I. Lieberman, John Edwards and John Kerry and Rep. Richard A. Gephardt - came in for sharp criticism of their actions to the delight of the decidedly liberal audience at the Murphy Fine Arts Center.