Rick T. Wilking / AP
John Kerry answers a question as President Bush looks on during
the third and final debate Wednesday at Arizona State University
in Tempe, Ariz.
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TEMPE, Ariz. — Sen. John Kerry said Wednesday night that President Bush
bears responsibility for a misguided war in Iraq, lost jobs at home and
mounting millions without health care. Bush tagged his Democratic rival
as a lifelong liberal bent on raising taxes and government spending.
"There's a mainstream in American politics and you sit right on the far
left bank," Bush said in the final debate of a close and contentious
campaign for the White House. "Your record is such that Ted Kennedy,
your colleague, is the conservative senator from Massachusetts."
Undeterred, the Democratic challenger said many of the nation's ills can
be laid at Bush's feet.
He "regrettably rushed us into war" in Iraq, Kerry said, and the country
is less safe as a result. He said 11 consecutive presidents, Republicans
and Democrats alike, have been hit with recession and war, yet "none of
them lost jobs the way this president has."
As for health care, the Democratic senator said, 5 million Americans
have lost coverage under Bush's watch. "The president has turned his
back on the wellness of America, and there is no system and it's
starting to fall apart," Kerry said.
Kerry and the president also debated abortion, gay rights, immigration
and more in a 90-minute debate that underscored deep differences only 19
campaign days before Election Day.
This debate was similar in format to the first – the two rivals standing
behind identical lecterns set precisely 10 feet apart. Bush was on
better behavior, though, and there was no grimacing and scowling this
time when it was Kerry's turn to speak.
Two instant polls made the Massachusetts senator out to be the winner of
the debate and a third said it was a tie, but that said nothing about
the encounter's impact on the race for the presidency. A wealth of
surveys said that was close – and getting closer, with Bush and Kerry
concentrating their time and money on a dozen or so battleground states.
The encounter was also a policy wonk's dream – a blizzard of facts and
figures, references to "budget caps" and other terms meaningful only to
Washington insiders.
It also turned into a tug of war of sorts over Sen. John McCain of
Arizona, the Republican maverick who is Kerry's Senate friend but Bush's
campaign supporter. Kerry twice invoked his name during the debate, and
the second time Bush pounced.
"John McCain is for me for president" he said, because of his position
on Iraq. Kerry, he said, offers a policy of "retreat and defeat."
Taxes was a particular flash point between the president and his
challenger.
Questioned by moderator Bob Schieffer of CBS, Kerry said he would follow
through on his plan to roll back tax cuts for Americans who earn more
than $200,000 a year while preserving the reductions that have gone to
lower and middle income wage earners.
Under Bush, he said, the tax burden of the wealthy has gone down and
that of the middle class has gone up. But Bush said Kerry would never
stick to his promise, and his election would mean higher taxes for all.
He said that in more than 20 years in the Senate, Kerry had voted to
increase taxes 98 times. "When they tried to reduce taxes, he voted
against that 127 times," he added.
"Anybody can play with those votes, everybody knows that," Kerry
retorted to Bush.
"Senator, no one's playing with your votes," the president said.
Bush made a similar point when the debate turned to health care. While
Kerry said he had a plan to help expand health coverage for those who
lack it, Bush said, "plan is not a litany of complaints. And a plan is
not to lay out programs you can't pay for."
The president said Kerry's proposal would cost the government $7,700 per
family. "If every family in America signed up, it would cost the federal
government $5 trillion over 10 years," he said. "It's an empty promise.
It's called bait-and-switch."
The two men disagreed over abortion, Kerry saying the choice should be
"between a woman, God and her doctor."
The president said he wants to promote a "culture of life, and said
Kerry voted "out of the mainstream" when he opposed legislation to ban
so-called partial birth abortions.
Asked directly whether he supports overturning the 1973 Supreme Court
ruling that gave women the right to abortion, Bush sidestepped. "What
you're asking me is will I have a litmus test for my judges, and the
answer is no," the president said.
The president dodged a bit, too, when the issue of a minimum wage
increase came up.
Kerry said emphatically he favors one, and said that Republicans in
control of Congress had repeatedly blocked Democratic attempts to pass
legislation.
Bush said he supported "Mitch McConnell's" bill to raise the minimum
wage, without explanation. McConnell is a Republican senator from
Kentucky. As a candidate four years ago, Bush said he favored raising a
minimum wage so long as individual states were permitted to exclude
workers within their borders.
Bush and Kerry agreed on one point, stating that marriage should be
preserved for heterosexual couples. But they gave different answers when
asked about whether homosexuality was a choice.
"I don't know," said the president.
Kerry referred to Vice President Dick Cheney's gay daughter, and said it
was not a choice. "We're all God's children," he said.
Kerry said that the recent expiration of a ban on certain semiautomatic
weapons was a "failure of presidential leadership" and that because of
it, terrorists can purchase weapons at gun shows in the United States.
Bush said there weren't enough votes in Congress to extend the ban.
But Kerry said if he were told by Tom DeLay he'd insist on a fight to
win the necessary support. DeLay, R-Texas, is the House majority leader
and an opponent of gun control.
Asked about the Catholic bishops who have advised parishioners it would
be a sin to vote for a candidate who supports abortion rights, Kerry
evoked the name of John F. Kennedy, another Massachusetts senator and
the first Catholic elected president.
He quoted Kennedy's famous 1960 campaign statement in which he said he
wasn't running to become a Catholic president, but the first president
who happens to be a Catholic.
AP-WS-10-13-04 2350EDT
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