Enjablog

Definitely the most active and engaging out of all the debates. I had concerns that even though the stuff McCain was saying wasn’t completely based on reality/fact, he was being very aggressive and people would portray him as the victor for the night. Fortunately, he fizzled out quickly and spent the last hour huffing and puffing to himself.

Obama, on the other hand, was incredibly calm. I pretend to be a nice person. I don’t make waves and I’m non-confrontational. But when McCain started talking about Obama’s “attacks” [on his health care plan], I was yelling at the TV. I was angry that Obama wasn’t pointing out the death threats and encouragement of the us/them Arab=terrorist divisiveness. And he didn’t mention the fact that McCain has been a keynote speaker for ACORN! (Plus, ACORN wasn’t committing fraud, etc.)

But in the end, two wrongs don’t make a right. He did an amazing job not taking things personally and rightly so. None of this is actually personal. Arguing accusations and pointing out that “he started it” or “what he did was worse” doesn’t help your cause.

So, wow. I was thoroughly impressed.

And great job by Bob Schieffer! He was like a good marriage counselor. Bringing up the uncomfortable topics, allowing each person their chance to respond, kept the debate moving, while reminding the candidates what the original question was to keep them on track. Granted, not necessarily questions the political junkies want to hear, but good for the general population who are seeing all these ads/clips out of context.

Memorable moments:
- McCain’s bug eyes upon hearing small businesses are not fined for failing to provide health care to their employees.
- McCain’s “I’m not Bush” line. I can see what people liked about it. I thought it was too little, too late. But I’m also not a voter he’s going to sway. So, good moment for him.
- “And we find bad teachers another line of work.” (followed by “We need to encourage programs… [where people] can go right to teaching and not have to take these examinations…”)
“I’m sorry… You’re not good at this. Let’s make you a janitor instead.”

Omg! I was trying to make fun of this, but it’s genius! I want to use this philosophy at work. They let people be engineers without certifications. I’ll just start pulling people aside, “I’m sorry. You’re a huge moron. I think you’re more suited for a career as Underwear Inspector #312.”

Annoyances:
- Hatchet/scalpel analogy. Let it die already. It makes no sense! Who uses a hatchet and then a scalpel? I better call up BFF for her professional medical opinion.
- Does McCain not know the difference between autism and Downs?
- Joe the Plumber (winner of the night by a landslide, and I say this grudgingly… what with him not being named Joe, not a licensed plumber, a registered Republican, and delinquent on the taxes that he’s so very concerned about)

Come on Focus Group! What was up with last night?

“I was disappointed in their responses. I didn’t hear anything new.”
“Both candidates were just using talking points.”
“After watching this debate, I’m still not convinced either candidate has a plan.”

Uh, if they said anything new, they’d be flip-flopping and people would complain that they didn’t know what their plan was. And, yeah, they’re politicians. They’re going to steer their answers to some practiced speech they’ve used before.

No plan? No plan??

Go visit both candidates’ websites. Listen to what they’re saying. They’re not going to detail out their plan during the debate because then you’ll be bored by that. But they give generalities and you can get the specifics from their websites.

Both candidates have plans. You just have to decide which one you agree with more.

I’m disappointed with last night’s Focus Group.

But the dial group! Ohio undecided voters — Wow. Those women were maxing out their dials, like, every third time Obama spoke. The men came close a few times, but those women. There was one point where they had completely maxed out the entire length of the screen!

As far as the debate went, I really don’t like the Town Hall style. McCain made me uncomfortable with how close he was standing to people. Kinda creeped me out. I guess I just really like my personal space and need other people to have theirs too.

Also, I don’t know if I’m slow, but Ian and I figured out the whole sharpie thing with McCain. I don’t think he could read his own handwriting without glasses/squinting if he used a pen. He has to use a fat marker so he can read his notes. We did notice that he came prepared this time though. He brought a spare marker in case the old, used one wore out.

I thought Tom Brokaw did a good job. Some of the analysts (last night’s winner: Castellanos; CNN got rid of Rollins and Rosen from last week though) didn’t like him, but I thought he did a good job trying to stick to rules that no one else wanted to abide by. Both candidates made themselves sound bad because of this too. Obama for asking permission to respond, and McCain sounded childish, “Well, if he gets that, I want that too.”

And the hole in the back wall! I thought it was just for the camera to look at Tom Brokaw; Ian and I kept looking at it when the camera panned past it. Thank goodness for that flub at the end where they showed the teleprompter. It explained why the hole was so big.

From our heckling last night, after finding out that Michelle Obama was planted in the audience:

Tom: And now we have an audience question from Michelle O. of Illinois.
Michelle: Whose socks are these on the bathroom floor?
Tom: Senator McCain? Your response?
McCain: *pointing* That guy’s.
Obama: Now wait just a minute. There’s enough blame to go around here. But this isn’t a time to be asking, “Whose socks are these?” We don’t have times to be pointing fingers. We need to ask ourselves, “Who will help pick these socks up?”

Last night’s debate, in my opinion, had an obvious winner: CNN.

Their technology is far superior to what the other networks demonstrated. Their HD broadcast had 6 analysts who were scoring the debate real-time, as well as independents in Ohio with dials who could react throughout the debate.

I love watching independents react. Last week’s debate, they reacted positively every time someone spoke. Last night, they were divided on the graph as men and women. At one point, the men went back in time and reacted very negatively. The women reacted positively as stereotypically expected — personal stories, things that would cause empathy or other strong emotions, etc.

And then the analysts! Last week, Begala was asleep for the first half hour, but totally came back and had a score close to the rest of the analysts.

Rosen and Rollins were the token extremists. Their scoring was clearly partisan, sometimes giving their candidate more points than the other analysts combined. Last night, Rosen was keeping up and was pretty even with Rollins… until about 10 o’clock. At which point, Rollins fell asleep on the plus button for Palin and gave her 10 points all at once, even though she had stopped talking. This was obviously a mistake, because soon after that, he reduced that to only a 9-point increase.

By the end of the night, Rollins definitely had the win for the most total points on his scorecard, awarding Palin 4 times as many points as other analysts and twice what he awarded Biden.

QOTD: “Did Rollins just have a thumbgasm?”