The secret of Bush's debate success

While watching Bush's debate performance on Thursday, I was reminded of the article James Fallows wrote earlier this year in Atlantic Monthly. In the article Fallows compared the Bush and Kerry debate record, in particularly just how good and articulate Bush was during his debate with Ann Richards, in his first run for the governorship of Texas. But what struck me, in thinking about the article yesterday, were the comments of Paul Burka, a reporter for Texas Monthly. Burka wrote that the single debate that Bush accepted during his run for reelection was very different. Unlike the effusive good guy Texas voters had seen four years before, the governor demanded a very different debate structure and Bush was a very different personality on stage.

Burka says that the change began when Bush took seriously a run for the White House. He became more partisan, more formal, more cautious. The results were evident in his second Texas debate, against Garry Mauro. Again the Bush team stonewalled in debate negotiations—this time out of haughtiness, because of Bush's huge lead in the polls. Mauro wanted as many debates as possible; Bush finally agreed to only one. It was on a Friday night in mid-October, head-to-head against high school football games, for minimal statewide viewership. The location was in El Paso, so remote from the rest of the state it is in a different time zone, and with a heavily Hispanic, Democratic electorate. Bush thought that if he could become the first Republican in memory to carry El Paso—as he ultimately did—he might demonstrate the potential breadth of his nationwide appeal.

As a result, Mauro and the entire debate were essentially props for a Bush campaign blitz in West Texas. The debate was held in a tiny basement room on the campus of the University of Texas at El Paso. The candidates' families and a few local officials sat on metal folding chairs in the room; everyone else, including reporters, watched TV monitors elsewhere. Laura Bush sat a few feet away from Mauro's children, whom she knew but (according to Mauro) did not speak to or acknowledge. According to the rules of this debate, insisted on by Bush's team, the screen had to show only whichever candidate was speaking—that is, no cutaway or reaction shots were allowed.

Therefore no one outside the room saw the miniature drama inside. Bush was halfway toward his presidential style, speaking more slowly and less gracefully than four years earlier, and with a more dismissive air toward his opponent. While Mauro was speaking, Bush would sigh, grimace, and send body-language messages of boredom or contempt. "It was incredible," Mauro told me recently. "I almost can't believe it in retelling it. Because the press was upstairs, they didn't realize how aggressive he was on the stage—pulling the sleeve of the moderator, staring or winking at Laura in the crowd." The moderator of the debate, Bob Moore, of the El Paso Times, told me that Bush actually grabbed him just before the debate: "In the hallway, Bush did grab me by the lapels, pull me close to his face, and say, 'Bobby, you clean up real good.' Typical Bush." When Bush was on stage but off camera, Moore said, "there was that Bush smirk, rolling his eyes, all of which Bush is very good at."

So, it wasn't simply that the boy in the bubble's performance the other night was solely the result of 3-1/2 years in the Oval Office isolation chamber. That guy on stage Thursday night? That's our Bush!