Weenie Bush, Lowering Expectations?

That macho paragon of preemptive masculinity, George W. Bush, is so clearly trying to weasel out of as much face-to-face debate time as he thinks he can weasel out of, without getting caught. But he's caught.

The bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debates has proposed three events, the first on September 30th. El Presidente hasn't agreed to any debates as of yet, but it's an open secret that he only wants to do two (dropping the dreaded "town hall" style event, when members of the audience can throw curve balls), and his negotiating team wants the other two limited to an hour instead of 90 minutes.

El Presidente's negotiating team? James A. Baker III; the hard-nuckled lobbyist turned governor of Mississippi who once headed the Republican Party, Haley Barbour; and one of the party' sharpest media personalities, Mary Matalin. Oh, yeah, and Karen P. Hughes.

For his part, John Kerry has ageed to the schedule, format, and moderators announced by the commission weeks ago. The commission's first debate is set for Sept. 30 at the University of Miami, with the PBS anchor Jim Lehrer as moderator; it is to focus primarily on domestic policy. Two more presidential debates are to follow soon after: a town-hall-style meeting in St. Louis with the ABC News anchor Charles Gibson as moderator and a traditional debate in Arizona focusing primarily on foreign policy, with the CBS News anchor Bob Schieffer as moderator. A vice-presidential debate is scheduled for October in Cleveland, with Gwen Ifill of PBS as host.

The New York Times quotes Stephanie Cutter, a spokeswoman for Kerry: "If there's one debate they [Bush's people] want to avoid it's the town-hall setting. He's been on the campaign trail for close to a year, and he hasn't had to answer one tough question about Iraq, health care and the economy."

But here's an angle we bet you hadn't considered, also according to the Times: "...one Republican official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the perception that Mr. Bush was ducking the debates did serve a purpose, by helping to lower expectations for Mr. Bush, who exceeded all expectations in his debates with Al Gore in 2000."