Editor:

After reading Jared Essig's evaluation of the first of the 2000 presidential debates, I felt compelled to write. The reason for this is that I was just wondering which presidential debate Essig watched. Surely it wasn't the one held at the University of Massachusetts a week ago. Essig states that for many students "ideology is more important than logic in informing their [the candidates'] political preferences," and one can only assume from this that Essig himself believes in the importance of logic in a debate. One has to wonder then, what happened to the logic which is so blatantly missing from his article.

Essig makes it sound as if Bush is forced into a position of ambiguity on the issue of abortion, that he is "required to straddle the fence on this issue." How so? Abortion was one of the two topics of debate that the candidates took a clear-cut stance on. Bush did say that there would be no litmus test in his nomination of justices. But by saying that his choices would be in the same line of ideology as Clarence Thomas, Bush was telling the American people that he did not agree with the FDA's approval of RU 486 or with abortion in general. How much clearer can he get? By holding up a big sign saying "I'm pro-life"? Essig's conclusions on the debate proceedings regarding taxation are, frighteningly, even more illogical.

Essig says that Gore "retreated into generalities" regarding taxes. This was another of Essig's points which had me rolling on the floor in laughter. After all, we all know that Bush's consistent answer of "fuzzy math" in response to Gore's accusations of his taxation plan mainly benefiting the richest one percent of Americans is quite a specific way to debate. While Gore constantly brought up numbers and figures which were quite disconcerting, Bush was the one who tried to sidestep these issues by attempting to transform himself into a raving demagogue with cries of Gore trying to scare the American people into voting for him. And then, we have the issue of education.

Obviously Bush and Essig have taken the same logic course, because that can be the only explanation for the poor line of reasoning of both. Essig says that Gore made his claims of "I will fight for all Americans, not just the richest one percent" in response to Bush's arguments dealing with education. Somebody got mixed up in their sequence of events. For those of us who remember the debate somewhat more accurately, Gore countered with such responses in regards to taxation, not education. Perhaps Essig is forgetting how Gore made the apt point that basing the distribution of funding amongst schools only perpetuates the problem of the poor schools with the most need for funds continuing to lose out to those schools which are already doing well. Perhaps Essig forgot how Gore attacked Bush's vague timetable for teacher testing, while himself laying out a specific plan. Perhaps Essig was so busy listening to the snickers and heckles from the other students watching the debate that he did not see it himself.

The final example of complete irrationality has to be Essig's evaluation of the character issue. He says that by Gore not responding in full to Bush's criticism that it presented a slippery and sly reactionary thinking which describes the Vice President as a clone of Clinton. What the ?!@#$*& was Essig talking about? No one in their right mind would ever characterize Gore as a clone of Clinton. If Essig knew anything about debates and logic, he would know that by Gore saying that he would not respond to such attacks, the he was indeed giving the response of "I'm not sinking to this level." Gore "never bothered to offer an account of himself or his principles?" That's exactly what Gore did the entire night. But then again, Essig must not have noticed this amid Bush's smoke screen catch phrase of "fuzzy math". After all, Essig has what can only be described as fuzzy thinking.

Sincerely,

Thomas Lee '04