Bob Somerby's "Howlings"
 

“Let me make sure the seniors hear me loud and clear,” Governor Bush said early on in
last Tuesday’s debate. Bush then told “the seniors” things about his prescription plan that
were completely inaccurate (see yesterday’s “Howlings”). He insisted that middle-income
seniors would get prescription drug coverage right away under his plan. Not true, Gore replied,
several times—and as it turned out, Gore was right. Despite that, Bush kept complaining about
Gore’s “fuzzy math” in the course of the extended exchange. “I’m beginning to think, not only
did he invent the Internet, but he invented the calculator,” Bush said.

Bush’s performance in this extended dispute can be described in one word— embarrassing.
It was perhaps the most incompetent performance in a presidential debate since President Ford
drove the Soviets out of Poland. Bush was completely unfamiliar with his own key plan; baldly
misstated his own proposals; and he repeatedly accused Gore of using “phony numbers” and
“scaring people” when Gore’s numbers and statements were perfectly accurate. But what did
the media’s pundits say, in the aftermath of the debate? The next morning, Howard Kurtz
assembled a set of comments for his Washington Post “Media Notes:”
 

Bob Schieffer, CBS: “Clearly tonight, if anyone gained from this debate it was George Bush.
He seemed to have as much of a grasp of the issues” as did Gore.

R.W. Apple, New York Times: “Neither man committed an obvious gaffe; Mr. Bush avoided
stumbling over his own syntax or comically mispronouncing words as he had in the past.”

Larry Sabato, University of Virginia: “The surprise for many people was that Bush was perfectly competent.”

John Zogby, Zogby Research: “Mr. Bush showed he was fully in command of the facts, avoided
any of the occasional flubs on which the news media has dwelled.”
 

These are statements of complete, total fantasy. But as I noted yesterday, it has been almost impossible,
in the past week, to find any assessment in the media of the candidates’ extended dispute about drugs.
This fascinating exchange between Bush and Gore has disappeared down a memory hole, while the
media engaged in trivial chatter about Gore’s slight misstatement about a school desk in Florida.

Rarely have our pundits made it so clear: They are simply addicted to trivia. And Bush’s grandiose
flubs about his prescription tax plan weren’t the only place where he grossly misstated. In the
governor’s opening statement, for example, he misrepresented the shape of his overall spending plan.
Here was Bush’s first substantive statement of the evening:
 

BUSH: I want to take one-half of the surplus and dedicate it to Social Security, one-quarter of the
surplus for important projects, and I want to send one-quarter of the surplus back to the people
who pay the bills. I want everybody who pays taxes to have their tax rates cut.
 

That is a fantasist’s version of Bush’s plan for the surplus. In fact, Bush’s new spending proposals—
by his campaign’s own assessment—add up to $474 billion. He describes the size of his tax cut as
$1.3 trillion. Though his tax cut is triple the size of new spending, he told the public that the two
components were equal in size. (This helps defeat Gore’s point that Bush’s cuts don’t leave enough
money for those important new projects.) And the point I make is hardly novel; economist
Paul Krugman has devoted three full columns in The New York Times to the inaccuracy of this
standard Bush presentation. Despite Krugman’s columns, Bush went ahead and gave his misleading
presentation. Bush also floundered when Gore offered this account of Bush’s tax cut and spending proposals:
 

GORE: [Bush’s] tax cut plan, for example, raises the question of whether it’s the right choice
for the country. And let me give you an example of what I mean: Under Governor Bush’s tax
cut proposal, he would spend more money on tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent than all of
the new spending that he proposes for education, health care, prescription drugs and national
defense, all combined. Now, I think those are the wrong priorities.
 

It was at this point that Bush first accused Gore of using those “phony numbers.” But according
to Time magazine, Gore’s statement is accurate if one assumes that just half the proceeds from
Bush’s estate tax cuts go to the top 1%.

Does it matter what the candidates say at these forums? We might as well call the whole thing off
if the press corps is going to critique the debates as it has done this past week. Two trivial Gore
flubs have been widely dissected. And Gore’s sighing has become a national topic; TV shows play
loops of the sighs (with the volume turned way up, of course). Meanwhile, no one seems to have
asked Governor Bush why he misstated his prescription drug policy. And since so much has been
made about courtesy: Is it polite to accuse an opponent of “phony numbers,” “fuzzy math,”
“inventing the calculator” and “using scare tactics” when the opponent’s numbers are perfectly
accurate, and the accuser’s own claims are completely incorrect? Pundits horrified by Gore’s
naughty manners have said not a word about this.

Readers, have you said your good-byes yet to Liberal Bias? No press corps trying to elect
Al Gore could have critiqued this debate in this fashion. But does it matter what the candidates
say in the debates? Governor Bush should still be asked to explain his wildly inaccurate claims
about his drug plan—and his naughty claims about Gore’s “phony numbers.” If our debates are
to have any meaning, Jim Lehrer should ask those questions—tonight.