First Presidental Candidates Debate of '08

So, Obama/McCain #1 is history.

I wasn't too impressed. No knockout. If you like McCain, you'll still like him; if you like Obama, same-same. They both did workman-like presentations of their policy differences enough to let people see the differences. Neither of them would come home with the class debate trophy.

McCain did better than I thought he would; Obama missed a couple of chances to make hay.

Obama seemed more reasonable, offering that McCain was correct on several points, and I thought McCain was irritated to the point where he wanted to take a swing at Obama.

I thought Obama's segues could have used a little work. I thought McCain nearly lost his temper a couple times. Neither of them had convincing smiles.

On balance, I thought Obama more gracious, and I thought his closing argument about looking at the bigger picture of world events as opposed to narrow focus on Iraq was his best point. Restoring American prestige around the world scored with me.

If McCain had dragged up his war record once more I was going to have to go fetch the emesis basin. If he had hammered how wonderful the surge worked again, I think he might have fallen over like John Henry he was beating it so hard.

Neither of them knew enough about the economy to make cogent statement and that's no surprise.

I'm still of a mind that real change is needed, and Obama better represents it. He's the future, whatever it might bring. McCain is the bridge to the past, and we've had enough of that, for my money. If I have any once the government bails everybody out ...

Next Thursday is Biden v. Palin ...