…increased fragmentation of the television audience with the decline of the networks and the rise of cable channels might diminish the viewership for the debates and thereby change their effect.

Recent studies of the debates four years ago by Prof. Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania and others indicate that it matters whether a voter actually watches the debates or forms an opinion from reading media commentary devoted to them (empasis mine – Karl). Those who watched the first debate, Professor Jamieson said, tended to think Al Gore won, while those who merely read about it reflected the view of many journalists that Mr. Bush had succeeded in making Mr. Gore look hypocritical.

NYTimes: 09-21-2004

Folks, PA Victory 04, the Pennsylvania campaign site for Kerry/Edwards, needs your links so that people kind find it in Google.

It needs more than that if you can: volunteer! There is little time left before the election.

They will ask you about your skills and time availability. There is plenty to do but they are flexible.

But at least link to it and let people know it exists.

Pretty, pretty please 🙂

Disclaimer: They’ve made me its Director of Internet Outreach.

So common folks!

The White House put government agencies on notice this month that if Bush is reelected, his budget for 2006 may include $2.3 billion in spending cuts from virtually all domestic programs not mandated by law, including education, homeland security and others…

Washington Post: 09-14/2004

The Pennsylvania Democratic Party site, PA Victory ’04, has made me “Director of Internet Outreach”. If you have any ideas to spread the word about the site, or to improve it. Let me know.

Better yet, if you’d like to join me in volunteering go here.

Not to be too mean, but I have begun to feel like it’s a referendum on the intelligence and attention span of the American people. It seems to me that support President Bush at this point, you have to basically believe that everything reported in the news is simply untrue.

rc3: 09-13-2004

cite="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5973272/site/newsweek/">For U.S.
troops in Iraq, one especially sore point is the stateside public’s
obsession with the candidates’ decades-old military service. “Stop
talking about Vietnam,” says one U.S. official who has spent time in
the Sunni Triangle. “People should be debating this war, not that
one.” His point was not that America ought to walk away from Iraq.
Hardly any U.S. personnel would call that a sane suggestion. But
there’s widespread agreement that Washington needs to rethink its
objectives, and quickly. “We’re dealing with a population that hovers
between bare tolerance and outright hostility,” says a senior U.S.
diplomat in Baghdad. “This idea of a functioning democracy here is
crazy. We thought that there would be a reprieve after sovereignty,
but all hell is breaking loose.

MSNBC:
09-12-2004

the key to winning an election is often simply a matter of bringing to the surface of the public consciousness what voters already really know. They know Iraq is a disaster. They know it’s President Bush’s fault.

Josh Marshall: 09-12-2004

If facts mattered in American politics, the Bush-Cheney ticket would not be basing its re-election campaign on the fear-mongering contention that the surest defense against future terrorist attacks lies in the badly discredited doctrine of preventive war. Vice President Dick Cheney took this argument to a disgraceful low last week when he implied that electing John Kerry and returning to traditional American foreign policy values would invite a devastating new strike.

So far, the preventive war doctrine has had one real test: the invasion of Iraq. Mr. Bush terrified millions of Americans into believing that forcibly changing the regime in Baghdad was the only way to keep Iraq’s supposed stockpiles of unconventional weapons out of the hands of Al Qaeda. Then it turned out that there were no stockpiles and no operational links between Saddam Hussein’s regime and Al Qaeda’s anti-American terrorism.

NYTimes: 09-12-2004

Four years ago, George Bush said he?d stand with and protect America?s police officers by extending the assault weapons ban ? which keeps the most dangerous assault weapons off our streets. The same weapons that America?s police officers want off our streets, not just to fight ordinary crime but to take on terrorists. In fact, an al Qaeda training manual recovered in Afghanistan included a chapter urging terrorists to get assault weapons in the United States. Why is George Bush making the job of the terrorists easier and making the job for America?s police officers harder?

…Here?s the question: is George Bush going to stand with special interests or with the safety of the American people? He has 72 hours to decide.

…Let me be very clear. I support the Second Amendment. I?ve been a hunter all my life. But I don?t think we need to make the job of the terrorists any easier. I stand with the vast majority of the American people and call on George W. Bush to protect our police ? and our security ? and keep assault weapons off our street.

John Kerry: 09-10-2004

If this lapses, we’ll be seeing machine guns back on the streets of Philly.