Sinclair Broadcoasting has ordered all its affilates to broadcast Stolen Honor, an anti-Kerry slam piece.

Media Matters tells you how to get involved. Here’s my letter:

Dear Sir,

As it seems you are very interested in ensuring voters are informed during
this election cycle, I assume that you will be instructing your affliates
to show "Going Upriver: The Long War of John Kerry" so that they get
multiple perspectives of the candidate, not just the perspective shown in
"Stolen Honor."

Please let me know when I can tune in and see "Going Upriver" on your
stations. Thank you, and I look forward to seeing it on your stations
before Election Day.

— Chris Lehmann

[Update: If you don’t really understand the importance of this issue, go read what Josh Marshall has to say about it. This is literally millions of dollars of negative campaign ads dressed up as "news" by a right-wing broadcast company. Puts that whole brouhaha from a few months back about media ownership and the FCC in a new light, doesn’t it?]

9:04 — First Question — Kerry didn’t start well, and Bush is eating this up.

9:09 — Second question — Bush is hoping that by mentioning 9/11 in an Iraq question, people will blur them. I hope Kerry nails him on this. Does Bush really think that if he tells his lies forcefully, people will believe it?

9:11 — Kerry needs to call Bush on his lies. He needs to attack back. If he keeps saying the same thing about his non-flip-flop, he strengthens the President’s story.

9:13 — Bush really just keeps telling the same flawed story.

9:14 — Kerry should have said, "we would have saved $200 billion dollars… and 1,000 American lives." Bring this back to lives lost unnecessarily. Using Republican critique of Bush is smart, though.

9:16 — Allawi is a puppet. Bush quoting him is a joke. "My opponent has a plan, it’s called the Bush Plan." This answer Bush is giving is a joke. Kerry has to attack. Hard.

9:19 — Bush’s attitude screams, "Does anyone else see how dumb my opponent is?" Does this play in the heartland? Is this working? Is anyone else noticing that Bush won’t say Kerry’s name? (Or Clinton’s?)

9:21 — For the record, we should have joined the International Criminal Court.

9:23 — Bush loves to talk about the fact that he has been President for four years. "Military’s job is to win the war. President’s job is to win the peace." Kerry’s first score of the debate.

9:25 — First CBS show of Bush looking snitty. He’s trying not to.

9:26 — Say what?!?! Bush doesn’t want to trust the inspectors. Is Bush really saying that Kerry is naive and dangerous?

9:28 — "Internets?" And Bush isn’t answering this question. He’s just saying, "We don’t need a mass army." But he’s not saying why. I don’t let my English students get away with answers like this in their papers. Why does he get away with it? And Kerry has an easy answer here: If what Bush says is true, we wouldn’t be having the problems we’re having in Iraq.

9:29 — Bush is arguing with the moderator. Um… Mr. Bush — Poland just pulled out. Kerry slammed the rebuttal.

9:33 — Hee hee… I think Kerry just slyly called Bush stupid. "The best weapon [in fighting terrorism] is intelligence." Overall, this has been an excellent answer.

9:36 — How can Bush talk about tripling the Homeland Security budget when there was no Department of Homeland Security before Bush’s administration?

9:38 — Good to know Bush is worried. Bush is worried that people are working overtime? Then why did he gut the overtime laws. And he thinks that Afghanistan and Iraq are better off now? How can he stand up there and say that?

This is a hard debate to blog, because honestly, Bush is just lying left and right. And Kerry is, for some reason, unwilling to really just call the President a liar. He’s all but saying it. "He’s misleading you…" But somehow, Kerry is falling into his worst habit of using three words when one would do.

9:43 — "We did something you don’t know how to do. We balanced the budget." Excellent.

9:44 — I’m glad that Kerry is reminding folks that he and Edwards have been much more of a champion for health care reform than Bush. This is a good brief explanation of his health care plan.

9:45 — Oh gawd. "You might say that’s hard work."

9:47 — YAY! "The president is just trying to scare people." Kerry is getting angry, and he’s scoring.

9:48 — I think Charles Gibson was just embarrased by Bush’s "trial lawyer" comments.

9:50 — Bush is playing with numbers. He has increased total expenditures for soldiers’ pay, because we have so many reserves on active pay. He has cut military salaries.

9:54 — I actually wish Kerry wouldn’t take this pledge. This is a gotcha question. Although, he’s being pretty good about specifics.

9:56 — I like bringing up Clinton’s economic plan.

9:57 — Why are we to believe that Bush’s numbers are more credible than Kerry’s numbers? I mean, the truth is probably in the middle.

9:58 — Kerry just used Bush’s old term for Gore with "fuzzy math." And citing a bipartisan bill with McCain is smart.

9:59 — Can Kerry just say, "Why is Bush arguing with sandbox lines like ‘You can run but you can’t hide?’"

10:00 — Bush can’t complete a sentence about the environment. "A good steward of the land?" Yeah, right.

10:02 — Kerry is getting meta. He’s attacking Bush’s attack-style of name-calling. I love that Kerry just said "Orwellian." And his answer about what they have done on the environment is 100% correct. "I’m going to be a President who believes in science."

10:06 — I admit, I’m having a hard time staying focused on this debate. I’m a total policy wonk (albiet a tired one), but if I’m losing interest, what is going on with the "average voter?"

10:07 — Bush is arguing for privitizing retirement. That’s a terrible, terrible plan. One, Kerry needs to argue that he’s been to work a lot more over the last four years than Bush. Two, and, nevermind, Kerry just corrected Bush’s lies.

10:09 — Bush has no idea what he’s talking about now.

10:10 — I’m so happy that Bush "appreciates" every question. Is Bush really arguing that the Patriot Act isn’t watering down civil rights? CBS just showed the reaction of the guy who asked the question, and he looked like he wanted to clobber the President.

10:12 — Kerry just lists Republicans who want to fix the Patriot Act, and he lists ways it takes away our rights. Just smart. Good answer.

10:15 — Heart-string pulling on why stem-cell research has to happen. I’m o.k. with that. Bush is trying to have gravitas on this one, but he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I wonder, how many folks out there understand the science of this issue.

10:18 — I really dislike Bush. "I had to decide if I was going to destroy more life." Oh ick.

10:20 — Dred Scot?!?!?!? What does that have anything to do with anything? Kerry should just say, "I have no idea what Bush just was talking about." The first part of Kerry’s answer, the "Potter Stewart" answer was "eh," but the closing was good.

10:25 — Bush’s "I’m trying to decipher that" is insulting. Kerry refuses to allow Bush simple answers.

10:27 — If Bush says "You can run, but you can’t hide" one more time… I really want him to say, "I’m rubber and you’re glue…" I mean, seriously, Kerry explained that this wasn’t a yes or no question. Bush wants it to be. Life isn’t that black and white.

10:29 — Last question — Bush was asked for three mistakes. He has refused to list one. I hope Kerry calls him on it. Once again, the woman who asked the question looks annoyed. Kerry is listing his mistakes, but this was a perfect "gotcha" moment. All he had to do was say, "The President just refused to list even one mistake. He has not, he does not, he will not be straight with the American people. He hasn’t been in the past, and he isn’t being straight with you tonight."

10:32 — Finally a Halliburton reference.

10:33 — Good close… not great, but good.

10:35 — Did anyone just believe, given Bush’s face, that he really thinks this debate was "enjoyable?" And what does he want us to think about corporate scandals? And his sentence fragments here sound like his father. And of course he had to mention 9/11 in his close. I’d love to get a count of how many times he said 9/11 tonight.

Overall impressions — Bush continues to lie and Kerry called him on some, not all. I think that Kerry did win, and I think that Bush’s tactics were overly simplistic, but I also think that Bush didn’t stumble or look as peevish as he did in the first debate, so I think that, sadly, the media will spin this as a draw. I hope not. It wasn’t. But even if they do, I think, at this point, Kerry / Edwards has gained momentum.

We took that last night. I was supposed to just be stopping home, grabbing some basketball gear and heading back out to play. But I walked in the door and Jakob looked up from the Excer-Saucer and saw me. He started jumping up and down and laughing, so any thought I had of going out was gone.

I remember listening to a lot of friends talking about how they never went out once they had kids. And certainly, Kat and I are realizing how we have to adjust our patterns and plan much more, but we have been travelling a ton, but mostly, we don’t want to go out without Jakob all that often. He’s just that much fun. Last night was a perfect example. Kat even told me to go play ball, because she knew I had been looking forward to it. But after another twelve hour day at work, a happy, playful Jakob was the perfect way to unwind — better even than an hour and a half of basketball.