Live-blogging the last Obama vs. McCain presidential debate

Keep reloading for live updated commentary.




9:01 - Starting.

9:02 - Oh yeah, this is the "domestic policy" debate.

9:03 - A forced, perfunctory "good to see you again" from McCain to Obama, after McCain's been roundly criticized for his supposedly contemptuous demeanor toward Obama.

9:07 - I'm finding it impossible to focus on the recitations of their policy prescriptions. Does this stuff really sway anyone? ... Ah, this is more like it: a story about Joe, a plumber.

9:09 - Obama says, looking at the screen, "95% of ya out there will get a tax cut." This kind of thing seems to have been pretty effective: surprisingly, more voters think McCain than Obama will raise taxes on "people like you."

9:13 - The last 5 or 10 minutes have been all about Joe the Plumber. Apparently he's the new Joe 6-Pack.

9:17 - My mom says: "Generally, Obama seems much more fluid and complex, and McCain is wooden and overprepared, unwilling to react on the spot."

9:19 - McCain is back to his trusty "overhead projector" distortion from the second debate.

9:20 - McCain whips out a scripted attempted at a strong moment: "Senator Obama, I am not President Bush. If you wanted to run against President Bush, you should have run against him 4 years ago." [UPDATE: Here's the clip.]

(Note: quotes in this post are approximate, since I'm typing in real-time.)

9:22 - Obama boasts that he hasn't "made [himself] popular with environmentalists."

9:25 - Good question from Schieffer (after listing inflammatory quotes from both campaigns' ads): "Are each of you willing to sit across the table and say to each other's face what your campaigns have been saying?" McCain says he "regret[s] some of the negative aspects of both campaigns." Oh, and it's all Obama's fault for not agreeing to more town-hall debates.

9:27 - For the first time in the debates, McCain is bringing up Obama's breaking his pledge to accept public funding. "You broke your word."

9:28 - Responding to McCain's comment that Obama has spent more money on negative ads than any other campaign in history, Obama says: "100% of your ads have been negative!"

9:31 - Obama brings up the McCain fan yelling, "Kill him!" in the middle of a Palin speech, with no response from Palin.

9:33 - Ah, a twist! Obama is the first one to bring up Ayers, albeit allusively: "pals around with terrorists."

9:34 - McCain speaks out against "very unacceptable" t-shirts at Obama rallies.

9:36 - "Mr. Ayers has been the centerpiece of Senator McCain's campaign for the last 2 weeks." Obama gives the full-fledged defense of his association with Ayers -- excellent.

9:45 - Best word of the night: "cockamamie."

9:51 - McCain admires Obama's "eloquence." How nice of him. Kind of like Obama praising Palin for being a "capable politician."

9:53 - McCain is back to the "he doesn't understand" line against Obama, this time about Colombia trade policy. Obama: "Actually, I understand it pretty well ..." Oh, but how can that be? He's never traveled south of the border!

9:57 - Ramesh Ponnuru over at the Corner gives a snapshot of the conservative response to the debate: "A couple folks here have been saying that McCain is doing better than in the previous two debates. I wish it were true, but I just don't see it."

10:00 - McCain is back to the "fine" that he railed against in the previous debate. "He'll fine you!" McCain needs to know whether you'll fine Joe! Obama responds, looking straight at the camera: "Joe, if you're out there [!!!] ... here's your fine: zero!" McCain is taken aback. [UDPATE: Here's the clip.]

10:07 - McCain incorrectly says that Obama voted against Justice Breyer.

10:08 - The same old question about whether they'd apply a litmus test to Supreme Court nominees. The answer is always no.

10:12 - Obama: "If it sounds incredible that I would vote to withhold life-saving treatment from an infant, that's because it's not true."

10:16 - The last question is about education. That means it's time for both candidates to tell you how fundamentally important education is and how passionately they feel about it, and then proceed to sway not a single voter based on their education policies.

10:23 - McCain is frankly surprised that Obama didn't pay more attention.

10:26 - I know I'm going to base my vote on whether the Washington, DC school superintendent supports vouchers or charters -- aren't you?

10:27 - The closing statements.

10:28 - McCain has been stumbling over his words like crazy tonight.

10:28 - "There's a long line of McCains" who have served their country. That's the first time I've heard McCain invoke his aristocratic lineage. Is that really going to win over many voters?

10:31 - McCain to Obama right after the debate: "Good job! Good job! Good job!"

10:40 - That's it. We're almost there.

My mom, listening to the closing statements, says:

McCain sounds over-rehearsed and he stumbles over many things. He says "abased" for "based." I think he knows he hasn't done enough tonight. He hasn't rattled Obama, not enough anyway. Obama is doing his final statement now. It's not particularly interesting, but it's filling the space, and we're probably not listening, because we know, he's survived the final ordeal. He will be our President, I think, and I think they both know that.

Live-blogging the second Obama vs. McCain presidential debate

Get ready! I'll be live-blogging tonight's debate in this post, so keep reloading for live updates.

UPDATE: The debate:

The New York Times not only has the full video, but also lets you search for any phrase, see a graph of when the phrase was said (and by whom), and jump right to that phrase in the video.

UPDATE: The debate in 10 minutes:

My pre-debate analysis.

Other live-bloggers (greyed-out links are obsolete):

• Althouse
  
• The Stump (The New Republic)
  
• The Corner (National Review)
  
• ThinkProgress (by Matthew Yglesias and others)
  
• Talking Points Memo
  
• Ambinder
  

9:02 - Starting!

9:06 - McCain walks over to the man who asked the first question and gets surprisingly close to him. He's pacing and self-consciously shifting his body position as mediocre actors often do.

9:10 - I can't remember seeing another debate with such an awkward note-taking set-up. I feel sorry for McCain having to reach over to that tiny table next to him.

9:11 - Yikes, McCain walks over to Obama and stands right in front of him while giving his answer.

9:15 - Obama gives a much more thorough answer to the man who asks how the bailout is going to help him.

9:16 - Strong moment from Obama: Brokaw asks, "Are you saying the economy is going to have to get worse before it gets better?" Obama: "No. I am confident about the economy."

(Disclaimer: since I'm doing this on the fly, the quotations in this post aren't necessarily verbatim, but I'm trying.)

9:19 - Obama grants an audience member's premise that both parties share the responsibility for the financial crisis.

9:20 - Obama: "I'm proposing more spending cuts than spending."

9:22 - McCain, showing his nervousness: "I have voted against excessive spending and outrageous." Outrageous what?

9:24 - McCain name-drops my old Senator (from when I lived in Wisconsin), Russ Feingold -- the actual "most liberal Senator" (besides Bernie Sanders).

9:25 - Josh Marshall asks: "Can't we have the angry McCain?"

9:27 - Obama will eliminate everything that doesn't work and make sure that everything that does work works even better. Sounds great!!

9:29 - McCain is really going after the anti-overhead-projector vote.

9:30 - I'll give McCain credit: he's probably giving the most impassioned, empathetic performance he has in him.

9:30 - Cringe-inducing word choice from Obama: "A lot of you remember the tragedy of 9/11..." He can safely assume we all remember.

9:34 - I think the town-hall format is flattering to both of them. Obama can be underwhelming in the conventional debates because he's soft-spoken (completely different from his speeches), so the more intimate, informal setting puts him in a better light. And everyone knows McCain loves town halls. Since the race is a zero-sum game, anything that "helps" both of them actually helps Obama and hurts McCain.

9:37 - Brokaw inappropriately refuses to let Obama rebut McCain's allegation about Obama's tax policy.

9:39 - Jon Cohn (not to be confused with me) says that CNN's instant graph of voter reactions to the debates seems to show that McCain's attack on Obama for excessive spending -- McCain's signature domestic issue -- got no response.

9:44 - We already heard from both candidates on nuclear power at the first debate, but McCain apparently thinks we need to hear more. At the first debate, Obama clearly said he's never been against nuclear power. (And he just said it again in this one.) So McCain knows he can't get away with outright saying Obama's against it. But he takes a more nuanced and sarcastic approach: "Senator Obama says he's for nuclear power but it has to be 'safe' ... or something like that..."

9:55 - Tom Brokaw asks: "Is health care in America a privilege, a right, or a responsibility?" Are single-word multiple-choice answers in a presidential debate simplistic, patronizing, or ridiculous?

10:01 - Obama reprises McCain's attack on him from the first presidential debate: "There are some things I don't understand..." [UPDATE: A theory.]

10:06 - Mickey Kaus says:

McCain rails against Obama's "$860 billion" in proposed "new spending," yet he just said he wants the government to buy up all the bad mortgages in the country, give all homeowners new purchase prices and protect them from their ill-advised decisions? Sounds expensive.

[UPDATE: McCain changed that proposal within 48 hours after the debate.] 

10:10 - A woman in the audience essentially asks both of them whether they agree with Obama's famous comment that he would order unilateral strikes against al Qaeda in Pakistan if necessary, which would seem to put McCain in an awkward position: either he doesn't answer her question, or he contradicts himself. He doesn't answer the question. Predictably, he takes the opportunity to falsely claim that Obama is in favor of "attacking Pakistan," which prompts a huge grin from Obama.

10:14 - Obama: "McCain wants you to think I'm green behind the ears ... he's somber and responsible ..." McCain: "Thank you very much!"

10:15 - McCain's defense of singing about bombing Iran: "I was joking with a veteran." That's why it helps to understand how the internet works -- if you're a presidential candidate, you are never just talking to someone; you're talking to America. And if you say things like that, you'll be talking to the world, because people around the world are going to see it. And they're going to draw their own conclusions without getting the benefit of McCain explaining it away with "context."

10:21 - Good point over at TNR:

McCain vows that he'll get bin Laden because "I know how to get him." If that's really the case, maybe he could just tell Bush when he gets home tonight? That would save some time.

10:24 - Brokaw: "Is Russia today an evil empire?" McCain: "Maybe!"

10:26 - All of the first 3 debates have included the phrase "stinking corpse."

10:27 - Obama needs to be coached to stop beginning so many of his answers with dead air while he thinks of what to say: "Uhhh ... ehhh ..."

10:29 - The last question "has a certain Zen-like quality, I'll give you fair warning. 'What don't you know, and how will you learn it?'" Obama: "Here is what I do know..." He's pulling Sarah Palin's trick from the VP debate: "What's your greatest weakness?" "Well, let me tell you about how experienced I am!"

10:34: Worst breaking-the-fourth-wall moment: Brokaw to Obama and McCain: Hey, you're blocking my teleprompter!

10:35 - It's over. In my pre-debate blogging earlier tonight, I wrote:

I assume McCain is going to flail away, trying to throw a bunch of guilt-by-association slime over Obama in a desperate attempt to avert electoral disaster.

I'm glad to know I was wrong.

Live-blogging the vice-presidential debate - Sarah Palin vs. Joe Biden

Click here to jump down to the live-blogging.

UPDATE: The debate:



UPDATE: The debate in 10 minutes (thanks to TalkingPointsMemo):




Other live-bloggers

• Althouse
  
  
• Talking Points Memo + cont'd
  
  
• The Corner (National Review)
  
  
• The Plank + The Stump (The New Republic)
  
  
• Wilkinson

Pre-debate points

1. I'm expecting a comeback. The expectations are so abysmally low for Palin that it's hard to imagine she won't impress.


2. What should you eat during the debate? Here are some suggestions.

My favorites (I usually go out of my way not to promote meat on the blog, but these are too good not to use):

• Lipstick (Ketchup) on a Pig in a Blanket
  
  
• Sloppy Joe
  
  
• Put some white Russians on the other side of a window. Close enough to see but not close enough to know anything about how they actually taste.
  

3. This debate is taking place in the shadow of seriously bad news for the McCain campaign today.

In addition to the McCain campaign's general doldrums and the various Palin embarrassments, the state of the race changed today -- Politico reports:

John McCain is pulling out of Michigan, according to two Republicans, a stunning move a month away from Election Day that indicates the difficulty Republicans are having in finding blue states to put in play.

McCain will go off TV in Michigan, stop dropping mail there and send most of his staff to more competitive states...

A McCain aide confirmed the move and chalked it up to the state's Democratic tilt and the resources Obama had put in place there.

Now, you might say: "He's just moving his resources from one state to other states, so couldn't that be a wash?"

Well, no. Michigan is special. According to fivethirtyeight.com, which specializes in crunching the poll data and predicting elections, there's almost no chance (less than 10%) that either candidate could lose Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan but win the election.

And where is he increasing his resources? The above-linked article mentions a few states, but this seems especially significant:

[T]he McCain campaign also announced yesterday that he's adding a dozen new offices in Virginia, where Obama has gained in recent days. If nothing else, Obama is forcing McCain to spend more money in a state that hasn't voted for a Dem for president for 44 years -- LBJ in 1964.

Big things happening.

I emailed A____, who lives in Michigan, about this development, and he emailed back this dispatch:

it's actually pretty shocking now that i think about it. we've been absolutely bombarded with McCain stuff even before Hillary conceded. my sense is that the poll numbers probably paired poorly with what have been absolutely MASSIVE voter registration drives in A2 [Ann Arbor] and Detroit...you literally cannot walk more than two blocks here without running into someone with a clipboard.

4. As far as the speculation about whether Joe Biden will be sufficiently "respectful" in how he interacts with Sarah Palin, I don't have much to add to what Tena Hollingsworth, had to say in the Talking Points Memo comments section today (in response to this report about how they're prepping Biden):

This coaching of Biden cause she's woman?

Sexist.

Just treat her like anyone else- that was the point that we women fought for.

This is so stupid.

Schrodingers Cat responds:

Couldn't agree more. Any woman who would stand back and say "Biden is picking on Palin" is an idiot. Did you hear anyone say "Biden was picking on Giuliani" after his famous quip?

If women expect to be treated equally in this society then we need to get over the victim-thing. Women shouldn't demand to play this game and then be expected to be treated differently. If you're a woman and you ... attack your opponent, you should expect the same in return.

Tena responds:

I'm so glad you agree. Frankly this ticks me off because I see it as a full on set back for women. Thank you Sarah for making us look different and stupid and in need of help from men.

I'm thrilled about it.

9:02 - Starting!

9:03 - They both tell each other, "Nice to meet you." I guess they'd never met.

9:05 - Biden is kind of hanging his head, and he's not making good eye contact. And like Obama in the first debate, he's talking a bit too fast. Nervous. 

9:06 - One of the first words out of Palin's mouth is "barometer," and she uses it a couple times in her first answer. Probably a poor choice of words, not based on meaning but just sound -- Barack Obameter!

9:09 - If this is about eye contact, Palin is winning.

9:09 - Both of them have sent the message loud and clear in the first 10 minutes: they really respect each other.

9:10 - Palinism: Darn right it was the predator lenders!

9:10 - Palin could hardly be coming across as more poised and confident so far.

9:13 - Again: Darn right we need tax relief!

9:13 - Even as an Obama supporter and no fan of Palin, I'm finding it hard not to root for her after everything she's been through in the last few weeks.

9:14 - Biden accuses Palin of using "a bogus standard" for gauging tax cuts, and says quite firmly that she was wrong in her previous answer. Glad to see that he's not afraid to debate her the way he would any other candidate. [As another example, a few minutes later he begins a rebuttal to Palin, "I don't know where to start!"]

9:15 - Palin: "I may not answer the questions the way you or the moderator want to hear..." Take that, Gwen Ifill!

(Note that I'm just writing down quotes as I go along, so the quotes in this post aren't necessarily accurate.)

9:20 - Biden clearly noticed that even though McCain doesn't usually give policy specifics, you can find them out on his website!

9:21 - Ifill notes that neither Obama nor McCain "quite answered" Jim Lehrer's question last week about what they'll have to change about their proposed policies in light of the financial crisis.

9:23 - Palin: One nice thing about running with McCain is that he doesn't tell one thing to one group and then another thing to another group. Oh, really?

9:27 - Palin is against corruption and greed on Wall Street.

9:33 - Apparently, each debate has one incongruous sexual word to jolt you to attention. In the first presidential debate: "orgy." In this debate: "raping."

9:34 - Needless to say, Palin is happy to be talking about energy.

9:35 - "Senator O'Biden!"

9:37 - Biden says -- correctly -- that the Constitution requires treating opposite-sex couples the same as same-sex couples.

9:38 - Palin is conspicuously brief in noting that she doesn't want to overly expand the definition of marriage, not even specifying what would be going too far. But she says no one would even propose limiting hospital visitation or any other such rights. Huh? I'm not sure how this isn't a bald-faced lie.

9:40 - Biden responding to Palin's answer on Iraq: "With all due respect, I didn't hear a plan."

9:42 - Unfortunate phrasing from Biden: "The only odd man out on Iraq is John McCain." (Are there any odd women out? Like, maybe...the one who's standing...right across from you...)

9:44 - Biden laughs warmly at Palin's remark that Biden once said he'd be happy to run against or with McCain.

9:44 - "John McCain voted to cut off funding for the troops. Let me say that again..." And you know he will.

9:47 - Palin says "nucular." If that's her worst gaffe tonight, it's a small miracle.

9:50 - Biden: "That's just simply not true about Barack Obama. He did not say he'd sit down and meet with Ahmadinejad..." Again, Biden is giving his normal debate performance and not holding back from criticizing Palin. Good for him.

9:52 - Palin is against a second Holocaust.

9:52 - Palin gives an extra ounce of pizzazz: "Build that embassy in Jerusalem!"

9:55 - Palin is glad to agree with Biden on Israel. Should Obama run an attack ad based on this admission?

9:55 - Biden, stop the sighin'!

9:58 - My mom was probably right when she said, about half an hour ago:

I'll bet a lot of people are tuning out about now, satisfied that Palin is competent and smart, but pretty bored.

10:03 - Someone should have coached Biden that when he mentions his work with Dick Lugar, it's not too effective to just say he "worked with Dick Lugar!" Many Americans are not a walking "Who's Who" of Republican members of Congress.

10:04 - Palin: "Oh, man, it's so obvious that I'm a Washington outsider and just not used to the way you guys operate!" And then, Biden pats down his brow. On sheer theatrics, Palin definitely won that moment.

10:07 - Palin tells us that tomorrow we'll find out which of them was right about Biden's position on Iraq because the "pundits" will tell us! So I guess she trusts the media elites on some things.

10:08 - Responding to Ifill's question about the possibility of Obama dying in office, Biden avoids becoming the next Michael Dukakis.

10:10 - Palin on her differences with McCain: "Whatdaya expect -- we're a team of mavericks! ... I'm gonna keep pushing him on ANWR." This is after she repeatedly raked Biden over the coals for arguable differences Biden has had with Obama. So I guess it's OK if the running mate and nominee disagree, as long as they ... what? Do it with a certain "can-do" attitude?

10:12 - "Oh, there you go, Joe ... now doggone it! ... I know your wife is a schoolteacher -- now God bless her, her reward is in Heaven!" Palin is going into Palin-overdrive!

10:18 - Palin apparently missed the fact that Ifill was asking her not whether her experience is valuable, but what her "real Achilles' heel" is.

10:19 - Palin used to not have health insurance, so she knows what that's like. Well, that's the problem with the excessive focus in this race on empathy. Anyone can have it. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with your policies.

10:21 - Biden starts to choke up talking about how even though he's a man, he knows what it's like to raise kids on his own (which he did after his first wife died). [Added: Video -- near the end of this short clip.]

10:23 - Biden on McCain: "I love him!" The McCain attack ad practically writes itself!

10:24 - Biden on McCain: "Maverick he is not." Syntax Biden has.

10:30 - Palin gently alludes to the enormous disparity between her performance in interviews and in this very debate: "I like being able to talk directly to the American people, without the filter of the media telling people what they're about to hear."

10:33 - Biden ends on a chilling note, referring to the fact that both he and Palin have sons who are being deployed to Iraq: "For both of us, selfishly, may God protect our troops."

10:34 - Palin to Ifill right after the debate: "'Preciate that! That was very helpful!"

10:34 - OK, so she's not that bad...

Live-blogging the first Obama vs. McCain presidential debate

Other live-bloggers: 

• Althouse
• Think Progress (including Matthew Yglesias)
• Instapundit
• Talking Points Memo (continued here)
• Tigerhawk

9:01 - Starting . . .

9:18 - The first interesting thing I've heard: McCain responds to the argument that earmarks are a tiny percentage of the budget, so why does he make it the center of his economic plan? He gives two reasons: it's grown at a very fast rate (of course, it's grown from really tiny to somewhat less tiny), and it's "corrupt." Typically, McCain substitutes moralism for facts.

9:27 - Obama says we won't get done everything that "needs" to be done, but we'll get done everything that "has" to be done. That's a pretty fine distinction!

9:29 - I agree with National Review's Rich Lowry: "Obama is talking too fast."

9:31 - Lehrer asks a key question: are you changing anything about your previous plans based on the financial crisis? Clearly they should both have prepared a strong answer to this, right? Yet neither one seems to have anything to say.

9:34 - Obama gives it another shot. He clearly acknowledges he might have to put some of his proposals on hold, but he won't give specifics. Neither of them seems to have rethought any of their ideas on a qualitative level, as opposed to just accepting that there might be fewer funds available to do what they already wanted to do. McCain's whole answer is that he would be against "wasteful spending" -- which, of course, is no change at all to his earlier economic "plan."

9:44 - Key line from Obama: "You act like the war began in 2007."

9:46 - Good catch from TNR: Obama used the word "orgy."

9:48 - A pithy reality check on McCain and health care.

9:55 - McCain says, "I would not publicly state that I'm going to attack [Pakistan]." But doesn't that very statement imply that he would privately plan to attack Pakistan? (Or, rather, strike inside Pakistan, since that's all they're really talking about.) Now that he's publicly made that implication, hasn't he sort of . . . publicly stated that he might strike inside Pakistan?

9:57 - McCain: "I don't think Obama understands that there was a failed state in Pakistan when Musharraf came into power." I don't think McCain understands what Obama understands.

10:00 - "I've got a bracelet." "I've got a bracelet too!" Are these serious adults running for president, or is this summer camp?

10:04 - Subtly insightful advice for Obama:

Obama would do well not to say things like "al Qaeda are attacking our troops in a brazen fashion, they feel emboldened." It's academic language to describe something he should be passionate and visceral about. It reminds me of John Kerry.

10:08 - One of the things you want to watch for in these debates is if a candidate has a tell-tale facial expression or gesture. McCain trying to pronounce "Ahmadinejad" might have been one such moment. For a split-second, he seemed crazed. [UPDATE: Here's the clip.]

10:13 - A creepy statistic from McCain: "The average South Korean is three inches taller than the average North Korean." And this comes shortly after McCain quotes Ahmadinejad calling Israel a "stinking corpse." He's apparently working on a strategy of revolting bodily imagery. I can't quite explain it, but there's something fundamentally McCain-esque about this.

10:19 - McCain's staff clearly told him in the prep sessions, "Keep repeating, 'Obama doesn't understand . . . doesn't understand . . . doesn't understand...'"

10:23 - Obama: "We have only 3% of the world's oil reserves, but we consume 25% of the world's oil," so we can't just drill our way out of the problem. Maybe Obama was reading my "How Obama lost me" list, particularly point (6)(a).

10:34 - McCain says Obama's refusal to admit he was wrong on the surge is a problem because "we need more flexibility in a president." Hmmm...

10:36 - Good for Obama for getting explicit about his exotic family background and name, and connecting it to patriotism.

10:37 - It's over. They casually shake hands — "Good job, John!" "Good job!" It's impossible to know, of course, but I'll bet they basically like and respect each other. They have to grasp at straws for attacks they can use against each other because it's their job, but it's hard to take any of it very seriously. For all Hillary Clinton's warnings about how she was just giving us a taste of what the Republicans would use against the Democratic nominee, her attacks had real bite to them in a way that's lacking here. There was plenty of negativity tonight, but doesn't it feel kind of rehashed and watered down? Does anyone really believe that either of these two guys still feels passionately about how to parse Obama's comments from last year about meeting with dictators?

Afterthought — It's hard to imagine this debate swaying a significant number of voters based on people thinking that one candidate did better than the other, though I can imagine it swaying people toward Obama if they simply weren't familiar with him before and had to get more comfortable with him. Earlier today I was listening to the Beatles song "Wait" (from Rubber Soul), which made me remember a critic's very apt comment (paraphrasing): "It has a hypothetical, unfinished quality that makes it hard to feel strongly about." That's how I feel about this debate. It's sort of like: "here are some things they might say if they had a debate." More like a rehearsal than the real thing. They both did as well as they had to and didn't say much that's likely to be remembered for very long.

One more thought — The media consensus seems to be that it was close to a draw, with maybe a slight edge for McCain. But two focus groups and two polls all show that undecided voters were much more likely to think Obama won. I have a theory to explain this discrepancy. If you're a professional journalist, you're so used to all McCain's and Obama's rhetorical and personality quirks that you look past them and focus on who scored the most points. Most normal people don't sit there with a notepad keeping score. It's not: "Oh, he was just oversimplifying about taxes, but oooh, then he made a good point about energy . . ." No — you take it all in and get an overall impression. Obama's presentation is simply more appealing than McCain's, and — obviously this is subjective, but I do believe this — Obama comes off seeming like the more reasonable and intelligent of the two.