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Bush, Kerry: Showdown time
08/10/2004 10:35 - (SA)
St Louis, Missouri - George W Bush faces 90 of the most critical minutes of his presidency on Friday, with his rationale for war in Iraq in tatters and his bid for a second term threatened by challenger John Kerry.
Bush, who shepherded the United States through the agony of September 11 and led the country into two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, finds his authority challenged as never before going into the second of three televised presidential debates.
After scowling through a lacklustre showing in the first head-to-head with Kerry in Florida last week, Bush is under pressure to check the Democrat's opinion poll surge ahead of a third head-to-head with Kerry next week.
But aides to Massachusetts senator Kerry expect a reinvigorated Bush to emerge in the second debate.
"The wild card here is which President will show up, will it be the disinterested, annoyed and unprepared one... or will it be the one we expect," said Kerry campaign strategist Joe Lockhart.
Republicans 'itching' to put Kerry on the spot
But Republicans are itching to put Kerry on the spot for what they say is a long catalogue of inconsistency on how best to defend the United States.
The debate is "an opportunity for Senator Kerry to defend a 30 year record of being wrong on defence," said Bush campaign manager Ken Mehlman.
Friday's showdown is promising to be one of the most bruising encounters in recent memory, with Bush branding Kerry's foreign policy a danger to America, and his challenger accusing him of weaving a "pattern of deception" over Iraq.
The argument has sharpened in the week and one day since the first debate, with Kerry sniffing blood and the Republicans realising that an expected coast to re-election may not materialise.
Both candidates will take questions from audience members, in a "town hall" style-debate supposed to mix foreign policy with economic questions.
That format supposedly will play into Bush's common touch, although Vietnam war veteran Kerry, seen as aloof at the beginning of his campaign, has honed his technique in a blizzard of town hall meetings in recent weeks.
The war in Iraq, which emerged slowly as a campaign issue but has become a prism through which each candidate's character is viewed, will likely dominate the debate.
Bush is dealing with a week of bad news on Iraq.
Former top US official in Baghdad Paul Bremer was this week caught complaining he never had enough troops to stabilise the country after the war.
And a report of the Iraq Survey Group set up to probe Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction programmes, said the Iraqi dictator had no such arms at the time of the US invasion in 2003, undercutting Bush's rationale for war.
- AFP
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