Tim Russert had Pat Buchanan and Natan Sharansky on. Buchanan’s a great talker and a great debater. Sharansky is neither, though I don’t think he did that bad.

But what, exactly, was Russert’s thinking? President Bush faces significant political opposition from the Democratic Party and its leftwing base — not from the Buchanan wing of the Buchanan Party. Ted Kennedy or Michael Moore would be more accurate and representative of political reality. Is it that it’s unseemly to have Democrats shown-up for their lack of democratic idealism? Or did Democrats simply refuse to come on? Or, was Russert more attracted to the box-office appeal of Sharansky and Buchanan trading punches? Of course, as anybody could have predicted, they ended up trading punches over Israel more than they did over Bush’s foreign policy. Entertaining, maybe. But not exactly a debate which reflected where the policy-makers or the two parties are.