By the standards of a debating club regarding style, etc., Sen. John Kerry has won the first presidential debate on foreign policy.

President Bush was not at his best, but he prevailed on the much more important matter of substance.

Sen. Kerry asserted that the Iraq war was “the wrong war, at the wrong time, in the wrong place,” a “colossal mistake,” a “grand diversion” from the war on terror.

Whom does he think we are fighting in Iraq? As commander in chief, how can he look our brave military men and women in the eye telling them they must win that war?

Mayor Ed Koch – a liberal Democrat – said on TV that he disagrees on most policy issues with President Bush, but that the Iraq war transcends everything and he will vote for President Bush.

He is right because if we don’t prevail in Iraq, everything else is irrelevant.

Klaus D. Kuck, Lewiston