Question Time Leader's Special

[Silent Hunter]

You can watch this here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/default.stm

What's your views?

My views-

Kennedy: Didn't see all of it, but he got a fairly rough ride on local income tax and Iraq (his 'go regardless of Iraqi wishes' policy is particularly stupid.

Howard: Nasty run in with the asylum seeker, dodged the question on negative campaigning, his Iraq answer was worse than John Kerry's.

Blair: Failed to remember which act banned 'top-up fees' (it was the 1998 Higher Education Act), was perhaps a bit rude to the young man about Iraq, sweated a bit too much, but generally competent in his answers.

I think Blair won this, with Howard and Kennedy tying.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

My take:

Kennedy; came across as pretty dull, generally got easier questions but struggled with a couple of them. Didn't really f*** up though.
I kept changing channels when he was on. It was that interesting...

Howard; got off to a bad start (a question along the lines of "would you let your parents in") to which he dodged the question in a way that was embarrasing to watch. Then there was that nasty business with the real life asylum seeker... and as for Iraq... he f***ed up that completely; effectivly saying at one point that he'd have gone in even if it was illegal. Throughout he acted a bit like a robot (how many times did he say "I tell it like it is" or words to that effect) and seemed to be under a lot of pressure. He also as good as confirmed that his private polls are as bad as the public ones by saying that he didn't follow/believe the polls...

Blair: with the exception of forgetting the 1998 Higher Education Act, he didn't do that badly; he had some nasty questions and dealt with them pretty well. Didn't go into knee jerk sloganeering either. A bit forceful at times though.

[minionofmidas]

Reminds me of that tidbit from the Guardian I bought several days ago...well, a bit off topic of course...

Obese Woman: "I won't vote for you! I remember that Michael Howard. He was a henchman, a henchman I tell you. Of that Margaret Thatcher!"
Martin Salter: "But we're Labour, love."
Obese Woman: "Oh, awright. I'll vote for you."

[Banana Republic]

That asylum seeker(if he was actually was one) was a complete twat. Howard shouldn't have been so polite towards him. I do agree that he did a poor job on explaining his support for the war. I especially liked it when he asked the audience to raise thier hands if they thought Tony Blair told the truth about Iraq. I seem to remember one hand.

Kennedy was neither good nor bad in my opinion. He gave all of the answers you expected him to.

I think Blair did the worst of the bunch. Whenever the audience asked a tough question there was massive applause, plus he got the biggest boos at the beginning of the segment. He sweated like a pig and dodged a couple of questions. While his answers may not have been terrible, he came off looking bad

[afleitch]

Kennedy one this one. Blair looked aggrivated and out of touch, especially on the '48 hour' question. Howard always finds these difficult but was far better than he was on Dimbleby or Paxman.