ichigan gave the nation two more weeks of a Republican presidential campaign - and possibly more. It is a welcome gift. George Bush and John McCain have plenty to talk about.
McCain is an architect of the proposed tobacco settlement; Bush opposes it. Both stress early childhood education, but McCain supports full funding for Head Start, while Bush would add restrictions, lopping off programs that lack sufficient educational value. The two have dramatically different views of campaign finance reform. McCain targets some of the special advantages of big business, referring to Theodore Roosevelt; Bush generally supports business, more like Calvin Coolidge.
Neither has said enough about the shameful fact that the number of Americans with no health insurance continues to grow. Both could articulate far more clearly their view of presidential power.
There are more than enough of such issues for a two-week debate. Despite the predictions of many analysts that one or the other candidate was about to fall off the precipice immediately after New Hampshire - or South Carolina, or Michigan - it hasn't happened. With luck, the contest might even last beyond the big bicoastal primary date, March 7.
So it is an excellent time for voters to consider how this campaign will affect their own futures, rather than the candidates', and to ask the candidates to respond substantively.
But most of the post-Michigan talk has focused on the number of independents and Democrats who voted in the GOP primary - a phenomenon that is totally the responsibility of state officials desperate for an early headline and national party officials too weak to exercise any discipline.
If Bush and McCain waste these precious days trading flak or making charges about each others' supporters, such as Warren Rudman and Pat Robertson, they will do a disservice to their party and to whichever man is the nominee in November.
Now, in states that will also have Democratic contests, McCain and Bush have an opportunity for deeper definition and elaboration. They should embrace it.
