The Arizona Republic recently reported that the Bush campaign is considering dropping out of the Oct. 13 debate with John Kerry, but the Washington Post says it may be the Oct. 8 event in St. Louis that Bush skips out of.
President Bush may skip one of the three debates that have been proposed by the Commission on Presidential Debates and accepted by Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), Republican officials said yesterday.
The officials said Bush’s negotiating team plans to resist the middle debate, which was to be Oct. 8 in a town meeting format in the crucial state of Missouri.
Last week I insisted that this was part of an elaborate game to manage pre-debate expectations and I’m sticking to that. I simply don’t believe Bush is willing to be viewed as a coward, afraid to debate Kerry in a key swing state. By running away from the challenge, Bush would be handing Kerry a compelling new campaign attack (“He’s afraid to face me, so how can we trust him to face terrorists?”) and I just don’t see that happening.
I did think it was amusing, however, to see the administration’s justification for skipping the St. Louis event.
The audience for the second debate, to be at Washington University in St. Louis, was to be picked by the Gallup Organization. The commission said participants should be undecided voters from the St. Louis area.
A presidential adviser said campaign officials were concerned that people could pose as undecided when they actually are partisans.
As I’ve mentioned on countless occasions, Bush will only speak to audiences of pre-screened, carefully-chosen sycophants. The funny thing is, when it’s even possible that the president might have to answer a question form a voter that (eek!) doesn’t like him, his campaign has “concerns” and is prepared to bow out.
I still believe this is an elaborate head-fake and that the president will participate in all three debates, but if Bush skips the St. Louis event because he’s afraid of voters, there has to be a political price for such spinelessness. For a man who pretends to be so strong, this will highlight a man who is embarrassingly weak.