transcript here in case you are too lazy to look it up
http://www.debates.org/pages/trans2004c.html
i thought it was pretty close. guess kerry had a slight edge.
with respect to the conflict b/w 1.9 million and 1.6 million, Kerry's figures are based on the time period from when Bush took office until a few months ago. Bush claims creating 1.9 mil in the last 13 months. after the job numbers released today, bush still sees a net loss of about 600,000 jobs during his full tenure. you may want to check on this yourself, but this is my best recollection from various sources in the last week.
Edit....it's more like 817,000 after today's numbers (96000 new jobs in sept.)
From the real debate winner,
factcheck.org:
Quote:
Jobs Figures
Both Edwards and Cheney quoted selective and misleading figures about jobs, and even Cheney got confused.
Edwards said 1.6 million private sector jobs and 2.7 million manufacturing jobs had been lost during the Bush administration. Both figures are accurate, but omit the growth in employment by federal, state and local governments. The net loss in total employment is actually 913,000 as of August, the most recent figures available.
Cheney claimed Edwards was using old data from 2003, which wasn't the case.
Cheney correctly noted that 1.7 million jobs have been added in the past year, since payroll employment bottomed out in August of last year. New employment figures are due on Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the last report before election day. It now appears certain that Bush and Cheney will end their term with payroll employment still below where it was when they took office, the first time that's happened since the Hoover administration.
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