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Marketing and University Communication UW-Green Bay, CL 815 2420 Nicolet Drive Green Bay, WI 54311-7001 (920) 465-2626 E-mail: hildebrs@uwgb.edu Last update: 9/27/07 |
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In
the News Archive - Year:
October 1, 2004 Students tune in debate to tune up on choices By Terry Anderson Several hundred prospective voters attended a campus- community viewing
of the debate in the student union at the University of Wisconsin-Green
Bay.
It was the first of three debates between the candidates to be held
in the next two weeks.
"I know which way I'm leaning, but I really believe that it's important
that I take the time to make up my own mind," Johanna Winters, 20, of
St. Paul, Minn., said after the debate. "I really want to have my own
opinion."
The 90-minute debate eased Winters' worries about accusations that Kerry
waffles on major issues.
"I think that he made it clear that he's not the flip-flopper that some
claim he is," Winters said.
On the other side of the political aisle was Andrew Fondow, a 20-year-old
junior from Park Rapids, Minn.
"It was nice to hear both sides, and I thought that President Bush attacked
Sen. Kerry in the right way on the right issues. John Kerry's inconsistencies
on homeland security," Fondow said.
For many of the students who listened to Thursday's debate, the upcoming
election poses their first opportunity to vote in a presidential election.
"I hate to say it, but until now I haven't been following the race,"
said sophomore Heather Madden. "I want to listen to the debates to help
me make up my mind. And to me the most important factor will be what they
say about education."
The campus-community gathering was part of DebateWatch, a national voter
education program of the Commission on Presidential Debates.
By candidate agreement, Thursday's debate focused on foreign policy
and homeland security.
Afterward, UWGB political science professor Scott Furlong hosted an
open discussion about presidential debates, which have become part of
the political landscape since the 1960 debate between John F. Kennedy
and Richard Nixon.
Going into Thursday's debate, two polls of likely voters in Wisconsin
showed President Bush holding a 6 to 10 percentage point lead over Democratic
challenger Kerry.
The crowd watching Thursday's debate in the UWGB student union was part
of an audience of tens of millions television viewers/voters.
Previous polls have suggested that nearly one-third of those viewers
will cast their vote based upon what they hear in the first debate.
Northeast Wisconsin Technical College student Justin Bachelor of Green
Bay said that he voted for Al Gore in the 2000 election, but he is not
sure who'll get his vote this year.
Bachelor added that Thursday's debate won't be sufficient to settle
the issue.
"I don't align with any party, so both will have to prove to me that
they deserve my vote," Bachelor said. "And it's way too early to be a
lock."
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