RENO, Nev. — President Bush plunged exuberantly into the final phase of the campaign yesterday, saying he was not fazed by polls showing the election tightening after the three presidential debates.
“The debate phase of the campaign is over, and now it’s a sprint to the finish,” he told reporters during a rare visit to the press cabin of Air Force One. “And I’m excited about it. My spirits are high. I’m enthusiastic about my chances.”
Mr. Bush brushed off questions about whether he had lost the debates to Democratic Sen. John Kerry.
“You know, the pundits and the spinners, they all have their opinion, but there’s only one opinion that matters, and that’s the opinion of the American people on November the second,” he said. “The great thing about a campaign is all the speculation ends on Election Day.”
Mr. Bush was joined by Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican, who said that although Mr. Kerry might have won the Wednesday debate on style points, the president won on substance.
“I don’t think we ever expected him to win on debating skills,” Mr. McCain said of Mr. Bush. “On substance, the president won, and that’s what the people think about when they go into the ballot booth.”
Mr. McCain added that Mr. Bush was trying to “come across as a man of convictions, of belief, and one that the American people can trust.”
Rather than retrench for the duration of the campaign in the 10 or so states still considered up for grabs, Mr. Bush has decided to stump next week in New Jersey, a Democratic stronghold that Mr. Kerry has long taken for granted.
A Kerry campaign official shrugged off the president’s unexpected travel plans, saying it suggested that the Bush campaign was scrambling to devise a new strategy after slipping in the usual battleground states.
Mr. Bush spent yesterday lampooning Mr. Kerry’s final debate performance. The president built on his earlier criticism of the Massachusetts senator for having asserted in an earlier debate that America should not go to war before passing a “global test.”
“With a straight face, the senator, shall we say, refined his answer on the proposed global test he would administer before acting to defend America,” Mr. Bush told a Las Vegas audience that lustily booed the reference.
“The senator now says we have to pass some international truth standard — those are his words,” he added. “The truth is, we should never turn over America’s national security decisions to international bodies or leaders of other countries.”
Although refusing to give an inch to Mr. Kerry on such policy issues, the president seemed to acknowledge that his opponent is a more articulate debater. But he tried to turn his own plain-spokenness into a political asset through self-deprecating humor.
“In the last few years, the American people have gotten to know me,” he said. “They know my blunt way of speaking — I get that from Mom.
“They know I sometimes mangle the English language — I get that from Dad,” he added. “Americans also know that I tell you exactly what I’m going to do, and I keep my word.”
Please read our comment policy before commenting.