Debate

That was a good debate tonight.

Who won?  I think McCain had his best performance this go round, and I think Obama held his own.  I’d call it either a draw or a marginal McCain victory…but I do think Obama won the full series of the debates.

McCain was a little weak in frequently drifting off topic to make attacks against Obama (understandable, consider recent polling), and with his reactions while Obama was talking (remember Gore’s eye-rolling and sighing?).  However, he did exceed my low expectations…and he probably “won” by being able to possibly stop hemorrhaging public support.

Having said all that, earlier today I mentioned that I was likely to make a random choice for President when I cast my absentee ballot tonight.  That did actually change tonight.

I will vote for Obama.

I am still extremely concerned with the notion of Dems having a monopoly on power in Washington.    I didn’t like the GOP monopoly, and I don’t trust Dems to do any better.

In spite of that, there have been a couple of threads in Obama’s campaign that have intrigued me – the promotion of a culture of personal responsibility.  In nationally-covered events, I’ve only heard a hint here or there….but perhaps we saw slightly more than a hint a couple of times in tonight’s debate.   For example, consider this part of Obama’s response to an education question:

This was the second time I caught the theme in the debate.  Consider also this partial response to the deficit question:

It could very well be that such comments are the art of a skillful politician, and that he really is a creature of the Democratic party institution.  That seems likely to me at least.

Even if Obama is sincere about a culture change, it’s unlikely that the momentum of American politics will permit such change.

But, I suppose that there is a slight chance that he’s sincere, and a slight chance that he could start to effect such change.  The consequences of that would be profound…and that’s enough to shift me slightly from casting a purely random vote.

I watched tonight’s debate on CNN, where one could also observe the real-time reactions to 25 metered undecided voters.

You know, it’s a shame that such real-time metering isn’t available to the debating candidates.  You could tell that when actual ideas were being expressed, and questions were being answered, real people reacted.  When attacking each other, or delving into the sausage-making of politics…both candidates seemed out of touch.

If I had to pick a winner, it would be Obama if only for spending more time answering questions, rather than answering rhetoric.

Having said that, I wish someone would have asked the question that gets to the heart of my concerns with Obama – how can we know that he will carry out his agenda for change, rather than just unifying a new Democratic majority on power in Washington?

Bah; too many politicians and sheeple are too content with riding the same pendulum, back and forth.

Bill Schneider at CNN observed:

Palin’s answers do not lack confidence, they lack coherence.

I’m not sure I’d go quite that far…but I wasn’t kidding when I said we had to change the channel.

Still, I wonder how Palin is playing with “Joe Sixpack” this evening.

Can anyone hear what Governor Palin is saying? 

I could swear that she’s being drowned out by the sound of every dead grammar teacher spinning in his/her grave.

My wife just changed the channel with my blessing.  Governor Palin is coming across as better-prepared than in recent interviews…but it was getting extremely painful for us to listen to her.

Yet another indication of how low expectations have been set for Governor Palin, via MSNBC:

If she doesn’t run off the stage crying, she wins.

For all those teetotalers who have been left out by debate/speech drinking games….

Just a few random observations:

• I’ve been rather annoyed with McCain this past week  I have to admit that part of me would have loved to have seen him fumble tonight’s appearance.  He didn’t, and I suspect he “won” by being able to end his bad week on a good note.
   
• I don’t think there was a clear winner tonight.  Obama presented better than McCain on the “economy as it relates to national security” half of the debate, and McCain clearly shined on the pure foreign policy aspect.
   
• Actually, there probably was a winner.  Props to Jim Lehrer for being such a capable moderator.
   
• I was a little annoyed by Obama’s argumentativeness at times.  It’s understandable that he’d want to correct some of McCain’s misrepresentations, but he should have been more presidential in the delivery of his rebuttals.
   
• However, Obama did succeed at appearing not-incompetent on foreign policy.  He had a chance to show off his credentials, and show that he might not be as inexperienced as the McCain camp has been trying to portray.
   
• If foreign issues were at the top of Americans’ minds…McCain might have good reason to claim victory, by virtue of successfully illuminated his superior experience, and McCain definitely lucked out by the first debate being on foreign policy.  However…
   
• Foreign policy isn’t forefront in Americans’ consciousness.  This year, it is the economy, stupid.  Neither candidate was particularly satisfactory in that regard, although I think Obama may have edged McCain in terms of being “least unacceptable” or “further removed from blame”.

I suspect that the next debate, the Veep debate, has the potential of being particularly interesting, especially given the likelihood that tonight’s debate didn’t move America from it’s “almost evenly split” political condition.  The potential of a Biden gaffe or an “I can see Russia from my house!” moment should be entertaining, at least.

Just before heading to bed, I browsed past the live stats for this site, and noticed that many folks are arriving here seeking answers to a question:

What’s with all the owls being shown in the background in the debate wrap-up coverage on MSNBC?

Well, that’s an easy one to answer:  The debate was held at Florida Atlantic University, where the mascot is the Burrowing Owl.

I still think that he’s not viable, and he did suffer from a little bit of conspiracy-theory-ness leaking out…but Ron Paul’s response at the end of the debate was wonderful.  When asked about whether he’d leave the Republican Party, he took the party to task for having left its principles, audibly wishing that the GOP would be big tent enough to accept lovers of individual liberty.

It’s a shame that in the past few weeks, that message has been lost in questions about Ron Paul’s newsletter.

It’s also a shame that that message doesn’t have a more capable messenger.

I’m listening to the GOP debate on MSNBC, currently in the candidates-ask-each-other-questions phase, and unsurprisingly Giuliani posed a question on the concept of a national cat pool to to Romney (with McCain jumping in as his name was taken in vain).  Giuliani  posed his question to Romney,

A few thoughts:

• We just had more discussion on the concept than most MSNBC viewers have likely ever have been exposed to previously.
    
• Romney expressed “familiarity” with the problem via Massachusetts snowbirds.  I’m sure that folks living on Cape Cod and the Islands are feelin’ the love.  (Of course, considering what they think of the relative lack of capacity in that corner of Massachusetts…maybe he doesn’t want to associate with them.)
   
• I’m a little disappointed that the discussion didn’t acknowledge the magnitude of the expense involved (although McCain, in his rebuttal, at least raised the concern about lack of funding of current proposals).
   
• At least Romney did make a key point (looking beyond the Florida primaries) — that he didn’t want folks in Iowa to subsidize Florida risk.
   
• Interesting transition to the question of global warming at the tail of the insurance question (using threat to beach property as a segue).  Probably not a question that Republicans like to hear…but a big hat-tip to McCain for his observation on his cap-and-trade plan — “if global warming isn’t real, we leave the world cleaner for our children” (paraphrase).