I disagree.  McCain tied on foreign policy and lost on the economy.

That is how I saw the debate, Noam - McCain on points and that was without the benefit of reading or hearing post-debate commentary. Right too, on Obama's lack of emotion and aggresive follow-up. Johnny Mac looks as though he wants the big enchilada more than Obama does.

What were you watching.  I saw McCain lose on substance on almost every issue.  Obama consistently (and quickly) pointed out McCain's frequent distortions and then went on to state his own policy.  Yes, McCain was more belligerant, but after 8 years of Bush, I don't think that works anymore.  After consistently hearing Obama calmly destroy one after another of McCain's sneering lies, the viewing public (who are more discerning than you give them credit) saw McCain as nothing but an empty suit.

Frankly, I don't know how you came up with a win on points.  On most issues, McCain was off point.

This is the stuff that pundits always go on and on about with Obama and he mercifully ignores.  On style, he comes across as the grown up while McCain comes across as a seething, entitled adolescent.

On substance: Obama destroyed on the economy and Pakistan, Afghanistan.  I liked McCain's idea for a league of democracies and his story about the bllboard in Georgia, he should tell more of these anecdotes and ditch the sneering.  They are very effective.

Despite McCain's respectable FP record, he comes across and way too emotional for me,  volitle - it makes me very uncomfortable rather than assured.  We've had so mch of that the last eight years, petulance as foreign policy doctrine.  

Please give me the adult!

The best take away line from the debate is Obama looking directly at McCain while going through a litany of issues on Iraq and stating that McCain was wrong.  McCain couldn't even be man enough to look Obama in the eye.  This guy doesn't have the temperment to be President.

I agree that Obama needs to find a way to connect his policies to voters' concerns, but doesn't he have an extra burden here in that he needs to avoid being cast as "The Angry Black Man"?  He really can't get too emotional without bringing up all sorts of uncomfortable associations.  

lib ref,

We agree on this. McCain seemed to want it more. But I think the candidates were hankering after different enchiladas. McCain's enchilada of choice: Beans-Guacamole-Pulled Pork (wink wink)-with a heaping dollop of god-save-me-from-going-down-with-Mondale-in-the-annals-of-presidential-wannabe-disgrace mole. (That's mol-ay, with an accent, because accents make redemption more festive.)

The enchilada that Obama wanted however was this one: Beans, Guac, Chicken, slathered with a few slices of Aren't-I-Unthreateningly Normal-While-Also-Being-Presidential American cheese.

Whether McCain wanted his respective enchilada more, both enchiladas were served, and eaten.

I think it highly amusing when angry "adults" celebrate the cerebral cool of Obama. Let's see: by this criteria Lyndon Johnson was not an adult. He had a vile temper and he exacted revenge liberally. Bill Clinton is clearly not an adult under this rubric. Legions of TNR bloggers should read Leon Wieseltier's current Diarist piece. Of course, Leon is a dialectical thinker whose meditations surely would not be comprehended by many of the blogosphere partisans at TNR.

Nippers: Your cutesy post is not amusing. McCain is in far better shape than Mondale was at this point in 1984.

the insufferable idiocy of these comments about Obama seeming too calm and not "feisty" enough amaze me. He cannot afford to come across as the "angry Black man" the stuff of white nightmares. And frankly it plays into his consistent presentation, the white shirt, the button down appearance...sober, thoughtful, ready to lead.

McSneer can afford an explosion. That would make him a "maverick" or a "fighter" or any of the other euphemisms the culture has for intemperate white folks. Vote for him or don't but BHO is going to go out looking like an adult. McSneer....not so much.

I think Politico says it best, "Mac is Back."  I knew Obama took a bad beating, but didn't realize that Obama had twice asked Jim Lehrer to move on because McCain was coming down so hard on him.  He didn't come off as angry man, he looked beaten.

There you go again, lib ref. There you go again.

"Leon is a dialectical thinker whose meditations surely would not be comprehended by many of the blogosphere partisans at TNR."

Hey, I recognize these footprints.

Once again (remembering his much-loved performances last spring) LR proves he's not a real person but rather a software program designed to take low-temperature commonplaces and squeeze them through a faux-Henry James prose style filter.

Yawn.

McCain was rattled all night. He blathered on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on (what happened to his short and snappy answers?) in response to yes or no questions. He got angry. He was petulant and confused. He didn't win the sounbite war, and he was stuck in the past from beginning to end. His mantra about Obama not understanding was transparently a mantra, and it didn't square with the reality that we all saw, namely, that Obama knows as much as (or more than) McCain about the world, the ongoing wars, and our most dangerous threats going forward.

The real killer for McCain was the split screen. He looked, as Bill Walton would say, "Hooorrrrrrrribbblllle" whenever Obama said something he didn't care for.

And his rehearsed bits - calling himself a maverick (who gives themselves a nickname? Losers, that's who.) and claiming he added another maverick to his ticket - ugh. Canned and insincere. People care about that stuff.

Oh, I love the way we all see the debate through our own set of glasses... I saw Obama in control, McCain rambling. And Obama didn't ask Lehrer to move on because McCain was coming down on him. Lehrer had said time was up, McCain kept talking, Obama started to respond, and then thought better of it because he wanted to stick to Lehrer's call of time.

McCain kept SAYING Obama was wrong, naive, inexperienced, etc. But Obama didn't do anything or say anything that would come across to an unbiased person as wrong, naive, inexperienced... the debate is a win for Obama because Obama didn't do anything bad, and the average American seeing him for the first time would see him as reassuring and knowledgeable.

We must have been watching a different debate. I thought Obama cleaned the floor with McCain on Iraq. Since most Americans now believe it was a mistake to go in and just want our guys to come home, the debate about whether the surge is a success is like arguing whether pink icing makes a shit sandwich taste better. And on meeting with four enemies, Obama hit a home run: again, the American people are tired of this belligerent view of the world that says we can't even meet with the Prime Minister of Spain.

As for earmarks, I have never heard a single voter express concern about them, except of course McCain, who I assume votes. Obama, on the other hand, has a vision for economic polivy that included not only concern for the middle class -- I'm not sure McCain even knows we exist -- with important investment in our future.

McCain didn't quite crap the bed, but overall I thought this was a palid, pathetic, patronising performance that managed to highlight every single one of his flaws.

I agree that it's better to have a calm, cool headed leader than a feisty emotional one.  We tend to want a president who's like us and gets angry and emotional, but we forget that it's the leader's role to stay calm and focused in times of trouble.  I thought Obama came off as very calm, focused, and even tempered.  McCain on the other hand seemed agravated and tense.  I think Obama's cerebrial and cool temper are his strengths.

McCain's necktie was very distracting. The stripes kept lighting up in rainbow colors.

Exactly right Noam.

McCain won the debate.

Spoke in pictures, not words and once again Obama's language left a lot to be desired: "Legally" and "appropriately" when talking about the WOT!

Maybe people are tired and want to tone it down. If so Obama's emotional deficit won't become an issue. I hope so.

I suspect McCain will claw back a point after three of these debates.

Obama could use a few more specific references - McCain ref'd the Marriot bombing in Paksitan and the billboard in Georgia, this is emotional connection in a good way - vivid, right now stuff that people can relate to.  

Obama needs to tell more specific stories like that, bring up specific incidents that offend, concern or inspire him, small bore in additon to big picture (which everyone had been hectoring him to do and now that he has, of course its time to hector him to do the opposite).  He seems genuinally offended by Republican ideology and how it impacts anyone but the wealthy, which is great - but he needs to tell small anecdotes too.

McCain would have been in a very strong position had be stuck more to those sorts of references with absolutely no seething, sneering.  But because he canot control himself, that is all you remember.  

Liberal:  I  see what you're saying about other Presidents having seething personalities and tempers and still be highly effective. A fair point.  

But the point here is context - who is the right man for these times?  How else does this man engage with the world? What and where has an impulsive, emotionally based right wing mindset gotten us at this time in our history?  Is McCain's temper an asset or a hinderence?

Bill Clinton does have a temper, but when he was President he also mostly had a sunny, gracious, charming rascal thing going which is all most people saw.  

He was almost never sarcastic - a clear sign of weakness - unless he was smiling a big smile when he did it ("Rush Limbaugh thinks I'm too fat to be President"). And he *never* seethed in debates. One of the best things about Clinton in debates is what a good time he seemed to be having no matter what - he loved every minute of it (yes, I wish Obama had that but he is not made up that way at all).  Clinton rarely, if ever, showed contempt for his opponents either, quite the opposite (Obama does have that, a fancy law school trick they all have).  

Clinton was also the right man for the times.

Lyndon Johnson had much of the same dynamic going on.

I had a wonderful teacher theater tell me once: if you want to have power over someone you cannot stand, be very very polite to them.

Interesting that the polls and the focus groups disagree. Specifically, the FOX focus group said Obama won handily, that McCain needed to show MORE passion, and that Obama needed to be more specific...not my impression tho

I just thought McCain came across as an out of touch jerk. I was someone who used to be sympathetic to him, but a few times I yelled at the screen that he was an asshole. I didn't even do that with Bush in 2000.

As I ponder.

I hope I am wrong but just the same I feel as if Obama is purposely trying to convey himself as some kind of congenial caucasion.  

In that American presidential debates are scored like a sporting event all Obama need do is deliver one effective (re: memorable) zinger against McCain.

Yet it appears as though Obama is handicapping himself in that he mustn't hurl any such zinger.

Must Democratic candidates be civil - all the while Republicans are free to be like the funny guy at the bar?

dbhuff - very enlightening stuff, indeed.  The FOX focus group thinks their guy needs to show more passion and Obama needs to show his hand!  Enlightening in that this shows the only way their guy can succeed is via being assuredly MANly and Obama, as an afterthought - must be cut and dried, all about policiy - which this very same FOX focus group will promptly decry with typical right-wing talking points.

I don't know if the tide will turn with this election.  I do, nevertheless, realize the fundamentalist/evangelical crowd the Republican party has counted on since Ronald Reagan reared his sleepy-cabinet head is no longer a given.  True to their sincere/Sacred allegiance other pre-eminent concerns have increasingly taken on great import.

I.e. the base of the Republican party is increasingly realizing their political home is antithetical to their core beliefs.

Nothing has force in the absence of resistance. I can't claim to have the ability to get inside Obama's head but that little tirade by McCain was akin to some third grader saying to another third grader, Your mother wears army boots. The rational third grader is going to look at the ranter as they merit being looked at and walk away not feeling violated but feeling sorry for the sad state of consciousness of the ranter.

Now if  you grew up in the circumstances that most children grew up in, they can not do that. Obviously, most people (including the writer if this piece) hew to the standard american response to this sort of stupidity i.e. fight back. Validate the ranting of the taunter by doing exactly that which the taunt is meant to do i.e. raise your hackles make you look like a fool.

When you ignore the rant (to the extent that you can), the ranter and the rant do exactly what they are meant to do in the larger picture. Contribute a slight amount of heat into the atmosphere where it dissipates leaving the ranter with a bit less energy and the target non the worse for the wear.

If you don't understand that, you are going to struggle when Obama becomes the next President. His entire message is that we as a society need to rethink our behavior patterns and radically change those patterns in order to get a result that is radically different from the ones we have been getting heretofore.

McCain on the  other hand, as is pointed out daily by Obama, tells you that by doing the exact same thing over and over again, you will achieve a different result and of course, even the least enlightened among us know that this is the definition of common stupidity.

I'm so sick and tired of this argument that he doesnt connect with voters on an emotional level what does that mean you want him to ell stories well he does tell stories.. He does nto have the kind of POW experiences that McCain and he never will. His heroes are the people who lost their jobs and their dignity that they got from work when the steel mill close. Do people want him to cry to get choked up. I mean give me a break when they say he has got to connect emotionally do they mean he has to talk like them for them to understand. I think folks have no clue what the american people are looking for and they just sit around in their pundit bubble talking like they are too stupid to get what Obama is saying. I find it insulting.

Carol

standing ovation for Carol.

only a bunch of pundits (sorry, love ya'll but you are a bunch of pundits) would pontificate why it is, that a man who has 80,000 people weeping in the aisles when he wants, can't connect with people.  

He's in a very workmanlike phase of this whole thing, he and his team are amazing.  Just the facts ma'am is exactly what this childish country needs.  God bless his consistenly ignoring anything but his own vision of his campaign.  

Cal80 - My reaction to the two instances where it appeared that Obama was asking of Lehrer to move on was just the opposite.   What I saw was that Obama was politely sifnaling"Jim, how long are we going to suffer the banality of this McCain rant?"   More tactful, polite and presidential than the expletive "you just don't get it" that we heard, ad nauseum, from McCain.