Friday, October 15, 2004
The Debate
Yesterday I noticed that a truck must have hit the crosswalk sign. I took a picture because I thought it looked funny. Is it ever really safe to cross the road?
Last night I attended a Democrat and Republican Dinner Debate at Joe Allen restaurant in the 1st arrondisement. The dinner was hosted by the American Women's Group and the English Speaking Union. The dinner was scheduled to start at 7:30pm. As we are getting off the metro at 7:50pm, my husband says, "what do you want to bet that we are among the first to arrive?" In France it's fashionable to be late, so it was a good bet. Well, when we walked into the restaurant, we discovered we were nearly the last to arrive and had to move people around to find a seat. Between the two English-speaking groups the room the restaurant had reserved was packed!
I tell you, the French love a debate and they love to hate George Bush. At our table, we sat next to two women, one of whom had a book written by a friend called "Bush on a Couch," which claims to be, according to the author a "psychological case-study and partisan polemic." The other woman next to us brought a deck of Bush playing cards. Among the more obvious people on the playing cards, I was amused to see an old boss of mine, Tom Scully, as the 2 of clubs. The card said something like, when a report said that one of his programs was going to lead to increasing premiums for seniors, Scully said he'd release the report "if I feel like it." It sounded just like him! Of course he has since resigned as the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid.
Getting back on track... the "debate" wasn't really much of a debate. The chairperson from the Democrats Abroad spoke and then the chairperson from the Republicans Abroad. I kind of felt they've been debating amongst themselves for too long. The Democrat chick talked more about why Bush was bad than Kerry good. The Republican guy talked about /defended Bush's religious side more than I cared about. But having lived in D.C. for 10 years, maybe I'm just spoiled about the quality of debates. Also, to be fair, my husband and I left at 10:45pm and the debate was just in the thick of things. Maybe more important issues were discussed. Of course, we already knew who'd we'd be voting for before the event last night. We'll be filling in our absentee ballot over the weekend.
To my husband.... Happy 10th Anniversary!
-- said Auntie M in Paris
11:20 AM