I'm wondering who trains this guy in debate "strategies" and "tactics." Why would he repeat "he's wrong, he's wrong" and then turn around and say more than once: "Sen. McCain is absolutely right." Idiot. Also, if the oppo is going to tell a few lies about you, tell a few about him first, not reactive. Reactive is passive. Passive looses.

Fundamental rule, never say anything you don't want to be true. If it doesn't help to have Sen. McCain be "absolutely right," then don't say it. Never articulate anything in a debate you don't want to be true, or to happen.

Choose a strategy. Let's say the strategy is to equate John McCain with George Bush. The tactics would be to talk a lot about George Bush, not John McCain. Let the viewer make the connection. Repeat failures and negatives of Bush while sweeping your hand in John McCain's direction. Another tactic would be to repeat the mantra, "we can't afford another 4 years of this." Don't deviate from the mantra, don't shift one word of the sentence.

Democrats consistently put up lightweight candidates and Obama is no different. With the economy as it is, with the last 8 years as they have been, that he isn't trouncing the opposition is pathetic.

John McCain proved that he is a continuation of Bush's dirty politics. His message still unclear about the economy, foreign policy etc...John McCain and George Bush are, as the pygmies of Central African Republic say,"the fingers of the same hand."

Guy Blaise

If you were looking for a knockout - you never get those in Presidential debates. But clearly McCain had a depth of knowledge that left Obama agreeing with McCain on several issues.

Watch it again and see how often Obama concedes McCain's more substantive knowledge.

After this, I'm voting McCain. (Unless he blows the next two debates).

Sorry, Voice of Reason, but I think that you're wrong, and I say this with no disrespect.

After watching the debate, I thought that McCain won it (slightly). Then I saw the post-debate polls, and they're all breaking hugely towards Obama.

McCain is running a circa 2004 campaign. Talking tough on Iraq would have worked well in 2004, but right now, talking tough on Iraq only wins over, let's say, 39% of the voters, and they're all already voting for McCain.

McCain didn't do anything in this debate to make anyone vote for him who isn't already voting for him.

Obama did.

What did he do?

He was likeable.

That sounds weird and kind of shallow to say, but let me explain it this way. Obama is in the same position now as Bush was in 2004; voters are actively looking for a reason to vote for him. The economy tanking, the growing nightmare that is Sarah Palin, the endless war that even die-hard Republicans are secretly sick of...

George Bush won last time because it was 2004, average Americans were still terrified that Osama bin Laden was going to show up in their back yard and blow up their houses, and so people just wanted an excuses... he presented (somehow, again), as more "likeable" than John Kerry, and so voters went with their guts, because they wanted to vote for him anyway.

The important thing now is to win over independents and undecideds. If you're still independent or undecided at this point you are (let's face it) a little clueless, and you're going to go with your gut.

Obama was calm, relaxed, funny, composed, presidential. That was all he needed to be. He didn't respond to McCain's baiting or call McCain a liar. He was just... likeable.

This is all very new territory for us Dems because we're so used to being down in the presidential polls, but we're not now. We're up five to nine points. I know it would have fun for you (and me) to see Obama call McCain on all his b.s. and talk about how Iraq is an endless clusterf**k and how the Republicans are ruining the nation, but that would have just freaked out the undecideds.

What he needed to do was be more appealing than McCain, and he was. And it worked. People are just looking for an excuse... they don't want to vote Republican again this time, they really don't.

It's taken me a while, but I'm starting to really think that this Obama dude knows what he's doing.

And if all this isn't enough, we have the awesome prospect of the Palin/Biden debate to look forward to.

Good times...

For all the needling fact-check press releases from both campaigns, nothing said by either candidate Friday night seemed like an obvious gaffe that would be remembered by undecided voters on Election Day.

Not being a McCainiac, I saw what I think *should* be reported as gaffes, but I'm sure will be largely ignored by the highly-paid commentators. If I saw any Obama gaffes, I subconsciously blocked them out, 'cause I don't remember them.

McCain's bringing up how he "asked for Chris Cox's resignation" seems very odd, as what I remember is McCain saying "If I were President, I'd fire him today." I think his emphasis on a significantly different story ought to be noted by anyone concerned with facts. Does he think no one will remember what he said last week? Does he remember what he said last week?

On Iraq, I think McCain made a serious mistake in dodging the question about whether invading Iraq was right or wrong. Obama had pointed out that he was wrong about a few things, and McCain looked somewhat angry and stricken. He was completely unable to acknowledge that he might have been wrong about the invasion, but I don't think he wanted to start pushing the idea that it was a good idea. He could have done better if he'd tried to shift focus from "was I right" to [sorry, why tutor him on talking points?]. Heck, he could even have tried being a real man about it and admitting it was a mistake.

Instead, he said the future President doesn't have to worry about whether it was right or wrong because it's in the past. He's correct only in a narrow and clinical sense. A President *should* be informed and honest about the events of history. All McCain has been saying about Iraq is we should let him win it. Lots of people don't think we ever should have invaded, and he couldn't really explain for us what "winning" is...unless he was serious when he talked about a US-friendly burgeoning democratic government in Iraq.

(Was he serious about that? Iraq's going to get a stable democracy AND we're going to get Iraq back as a client-state? That's...ambitious.)

In all likelihood, more Americans were confused than convinced when the debate devolved into penny-ante disputes that Obama dismissed as "Senate inside baseball."

I disagree. I heard some real vague "attack questions" from McCain on Obama, and when Obama replied with a few details, I quickly had the impression that McCain was oversimplifying something into an insignificant "gotcha" attack. I think even many confused Americans will have understood that.

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McCain looked like he wanted to be doing a Town Hall, where he'd have been able to milk applause and cheer lines. This debate was far more substantive than I expected, and I think 90% of the reason was the silence of the auditorium.

All debates should be as quiet as that. Just a hundred loud people in a big room can really influence the rhythm of such an event.

It is now obvious why McCain wanted 10 Town Hall meetings as his format--he wants his less-numerous, more-vocal supporters to help him bluster through a debate of fact and policy.