I’m not an unbiased observer by any means, but I thought McCain won this tonight. My expectations were pretty low…I wasn’t sure he’d be completely prepared given the events of the last few days, and I feared he’d go into “I’ll work with both sides” mode and not really draw a contrast between himself and Obama. I was wrong. McCain appeared strong and resolute, staying on offense throughout and keeping Obama, for the most part, on the defensive. Obama was best on the economy and on the war in Iraq, but in each case McCain handled it pretty well and responded appropriately by talking about reigning in government spending and leaving Iraq in victory, respectively.
The exchange on Iran, though, was particularly telling, especially when McCain attacked Obama over the latter’s previous suggestion that he’d be willing to meet with “leaders” like Ahmadinejad without preconditions. McCain used it to hammer home his central point that Obama was naive and inexperienced, and I thought he was very effective in doing so. At this point in the debate Obama looked flustered, maybe a little angry…it was clear McCain had gotten to him.
Also, I have to give credit to the debate moderator, Jim Lehrer of PBS. I am always a little skeptical of how fair members of the mainstream media will be, but I thought he did a terrific job of asking questions, following up, and letting each respond when they wanted to.
So…what did you guys think?
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I didn’t see it. I heard about a very awkward bracelet moment.
I listened to the debate at first, and Obama sounded like a fag the way he pronounced some of his words. Or like he had some strange affect going on, not exactly like a fag. Warssssssss. Stampssss. Whenever he ended the sentence with a word ending in S he seemed to hiss. He kept attacking Pubs and McCain, and McCain seemed to just take it and let him.
Then I watched some, and was struck how Obama looked like a little kid playing a grown up. His skinny little neck in that over-sized shirt. Yuck. McCain seemed too eager to grab those idiot un-decideds and moderates that he let this skinny little geek run all over him with the insults. Course, I didn’t see much more than a 1/2 hr or so. But I did notice McCain let Obama keep repeating the lie that the Pubs and deregulation caused the current economic situation.
Yeah…the bracelet moment. McCain mentioned that the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq had given him a bracelet with her son’s name on it and had urged him to not let her son die in vain. Obama responds by saying “I’ve got a bracelet too!!”, then takes a few seconds to look down at said bracelet to get the name of the soldier on it. It was kind of awkward…
And HRR, McCain was definitely weakest on the economy, and I too was hoping he’d defend free market princples a little more, maybe hit Obama on Fannie/Freddie. But, watching it I thought it was ok, and I assume those things wll be brought up at a later debate which will focus more on economics. I did like the fact he talked about how strong and reslient the Amerian worker was, and he seemed more optimstic than Mr gloom n doom.
Ok, in the spirit of No Surprises last remark, I take back the fag comment. Let’s just say when he said Warsssssss, he sounded strange.
I think they should just let them duke it out, and have only a moderator who could turn off their mike if they didn’t take turns. Get rid of the liberal moderator.
RF, what you think about who needs to win more? I’m thinkin McCain because he is behind. Or is it that all the racist whiteys will flock to him if he doesn’t get creamed? I’m being somewhat facetious. But what do you think?
Saw this utube this morning. I was surprised McCain did so well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec3aC8ZJZTc&eurl=http://embeds.blogs.foxnews.com/2008/09/26/john-is-right/
You’re right, HRR (naturally). McCain does need to really win these…I’m not sure he did enough to really change anything last night, but honestly, watching it with as open a mind as I can muster, I thought he came out on top.
Its been a little disheartening to see these so-called “undecideds” and independents say that Obama won. I don’t get it…even on the economic stuff, Obama looked silly talking about all the things he wanted to do while also acknowledging that current economic conditions might make all of it a pipe dream. But, people want all that…people buy into the class envy, and they want the gov’t to give them what everyone else has while taking from those that do. That’s the bottom line…none of these morons seem to realize that with a huge deficit now, and all these bailouts, THERE WILL BE NO MONEY FOR ANY OF IT. Oh, but Barry has it all paid for…yeah, right.
What frustrates me the most is the Surge. McCain went after him on it, but not enough in my opinion. We all need to understand that if Obama had his way, our soldiers would be coming home IN DEFEAT, and that country would be in chaos. Do these independents get that? Do they know what a mistake that would’ve been? Yeah, he talked about what a mistake it was to go in…um, we’re there now. The issue is how you will handle it NOW.
I also think there’s something else at play here. I think some of these independent people, for whatever reason, are sympathetic to Obama. He’s young, telegenic (though they caked on the makeup…sheesh), somewhat articulate, has a nice family (hey Lefties, notice how I didn’t call Michelle O a slut)…it doesn’t matter if he is the second coming of Jimmy Carter.
My opinion is that McCain wasn’t as terrible as I expected him to be and Obama wasn’t as good.
I still support Obama and his policies, it’s just that I thought he could have presented them in a stronger way than he did.
Thanks No Surprise, you seem like a very good example of a liberal/progressive/Democrat, as opposed to some of the nasty ones out there. I hope you keep sharing your thoughts here. I likely will not agree with much of what you say, but I appreciate your perspective, and your kind way of putting things! No reason we can’t all agree to discuss and to disagree in a civilized manner. Obviously, the attack dog comment I just posted does not apply to you.
Hey, thanks! I want to come to this site. As long as no one bites my head off, I won’t bite anyone else’s head off either! Actually, I wouldn’t bite anyone’s head off, I’d just leave the blog.
I like posting on smaller blogs, where we can actually discuss the subject of the post. On the Huffington Post and Daily Kos, there are 300 minimum comments, and no one has time to read all that or to interact with each other.
I do post on those blogs, but a lot of what I post is a rant about how frusterated I feel and I don’t expect too many people to read my comment when it’s comment #1090.
I try to say things nicely when I come to this blog, even when I disagree. I don’t want to come to someone else’s blog and make a butt of myself by slamming their beliefs.
No Surprise, I’m curious…what did McCain do that exceeded your expectations, and what should Obama have done to present his side a little stronger?
McCain was better prepared and spoke more forcefully than I had expected, given the chaos of this past week. True, he did pull his rhetorical punches a couple times when Obama left himself wide open, but he got some good shots, showing a strong command of the issues and detailed knowledge. Both he and Obama wasted time arguing over numbers. I was surprised that Obama came across as so hesitant. I expected him to be ready with a bunch of juicy “gotcha” one-liners, but likewise he held back. I guess they are both getting a feel for each other in preparation for later debates.
I agree with Andrew Clem. I had expected McCain to stumble over his words and not be prepared and to make huge gaffes. He did seem to speak forcefully and with self assurance.
I expected Obama to basically win this debate hands down. I expected Obama to give top quality answers that would leave McCain dumbfounded and searching for words.
I was all geared up for a big Obama triumph and ended up being kind of bored by it all.
McCain had good energy for having such a stressful week. I didn’t expect Obama to be tired, but I thought J Mac might be. Obama seemed to attack more the small part I saw, and McCain didn’t fight back. I’m hoping he got his digs in after I stopped watching. Funny, I was with thirty other people and NOBODY cared that the debate was on except me. I wonder how many others out there cared. We have seventeen per cent undecided, and I’ll bet the huge majority of them didn’t watch. Just we political junkies watched, hoping our guy won?