CHICAGO – There were biting rhetorical jabs, a few flashes of spontaneity and plenty of frowns between the two podiums.

But when it came to the facts, the first of three presidential debates didn’t always shoot straight down the fairway Thursday, potentially leaving voters confused, misinformed or frustrated.

As tens of millions of Americans watched on television, President Bush reprised a standard attack from his stump speech, as he presented Sen. John Kerry as a flip-flopper who once said he “actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.”

The quote, something Kerry has acknowledged as an inarticulate moment, was in reference to a military funding bill that included money for troops in Iraq.

But the reality is a little more complex. The senator did vote for an amendment approving the money, but only if it was paid for by repealing tax cuts pushed by Bush. When that proposal failed, Kerry voted against the bill to protest what he considered a flawed and costly war.

The two candidates continued their sharp disagreement about how Bush led the nation to war and whether effective plans were in place for what to do after Saddam Hussein was toppled from power.

Although Bush did seek United Nations approval before invading Iraq, the White House moved rapidly from diplomacy to prewar mobilization.

As other nations suggested alternatives that would have allowed inspectors to continue working, Bush rejected such suggestions.

Weapons of mass destruction so far have not been found inside Iraq, even though Bush based much of the run-up to war on the premise that they were there.

While Kerry has tried to suggest that Bush falsely used alleged weapons of mass destruction to take the nation to war, there was a consensus before the war among experts that Iraq did have at least some of the weapons.

Kerry also suggested that $200 billion has been spent in Iraq, but that amount includes what has already been spent – about $120 billion – as well as the projected cost through next summer.

He may have also over-reached when he said Bush hadn’t put “one nickel into the effort to fix some of our tunnels and bridges and most exposed subway systems. That’s why they had to close down the subway in New York when the Republican Convention was there.” Some of the subway stations around Madison Square Garden were closed for the convention because of security concerns, but not for lack of maintenance.

Bush, for his part, presented himself as a strong advocate for the Department of Homeland Security. While he did create the department, he initially resisted congressional demands to do so.

Kerry also said there were “10 times” as many troops in Iraq as in Afghanistan. That’s close, but it appears his arithmetic was a little off. The U.S. has about 130,000 troops in Iraq and an additional 17,500 in Afghanistan.

In another Afghanistan-related assertion, Bush praised reports that “10 million people have registered to vote in Afghanistan in the upcoming presidential election.” While that may be true, there are also fears of massive vote rigging in advance of the country’s first-ever presidential election Oct. 9 because the registration numbers are in some places significantly higher than what had been estimated for eligible voters.

Both campaigns created special “rapid response” sections on their Web sites to present their versions of the facts, just as they deluged reporters with news releases challenging the other side’s statements. Almost certainly, other half-truths or exaggerations will emerge in the coming days, just as they did after the debates in 2000.

Al Gore’s first debate performance was criticized for a tendency to embellish anecdotes about his role in events. Among several misstatements in that debate, Gore identified a schoolgirl in Florida who he said was such a victim of school crowding that she has to stand in class, although it was later reported that the girl had a desk and went without one for only one day.