I have to say, this was the single most dangerous Presidential debate in recent memory. I say that because I only got two hours of sleep last night, and I listened to it in the car on the way home. I damn near fell asleep at the wheel. In some small way it amuses me that I made a flow chart for the Biden / Palin debate. If there were ever an event whose energy and spark could best be summed up in a corporate office tool that no one ever reads, it was tonight’s debate.

So let’s get the preliminaries out of the way. The format sucked. I mean, really. It was boring, it was dry, and all it really offered was stump speech snippets and wind-piddling comments back and forth about the gritty details of each candidate’s plans. Details that won’t be remembered by most of the people who listened partially because they were number stew and partially because most of them probably drifted off. About the only thing this debate did for me was crystalize the need for universal health care, because I imagine that half of the people in that audience have since slipped into comas.

Tom Brokaw was, to be blunt, lame. I know he didn’t have a lot to work with, as some of the audience drawn questions were tortured and vague, but his follow ups were equally bad. The format itself left no real room for actual debate, and even when both candidates chaffed under those rules (which they agreed to before hand, admittedly), Brokaw stuck to them, often cutting off or curtailing the more interesting material in the interest of moving on. The one minute follow ups were an equally bad idea, since they were never one minute and rarely acted as follow ups. Though it’s not like he had any real brain teasers in there. This felt a lot more like the Republican primary debates, if not in substance than in pacing and stammer.

As I said, the economics section was a jumble of numbers that even I can’t entirely remember, and I’ve studied both economic plans. Both candidates avoided saying who they would appoint as Secretary of the Treasury, which annoyed me at first. Though in retrospect, that could have actually been a violation of a federal law that prevents candidates form promising cabinet positions to individuals in exchange for their political support. Which means that Brokaw asked a stupid question. Though that loophole also allowed McCain to avoid mentioning former Texas Senator and noted boobie enthusiast Phil Gramm. That was a win for McCain, since blame for the nightmare of default credit swaps, the key deregulatory blunder in this recent financial crisis, can be placed squarely on Gramm’s greedy, lightbulb shaped head. Though really, does anyone believe that a Republican President would ever appoint William Buffett to a cabinet position? Give me a break.

Then came the section of “Obama will raise your taxes!” “But only if you’re really rich!” that had all the intellectual depth of a lolcat caption. McCain didn’t really score any points on the economy, though the only point that Obama scored was in the question about prioritizing the government’s domestic policies. McCain said that America was capable of making everything a top priority, which is both technically impossible and a weasel way of not wanting to put off single-issue voters (if those elusive creatures really do exist). Obama clearly stated that energy would be his top priority, and I agree with that idea. Nothing else can really be accomplished unless America regains its energy independence. Without that, whatever gains we make can simply be siphoned off at the pump. Comparing his goal of total independence in ten years to Kennedy’s promise to reach the moon in a decade was a nice piece of rhetoric, but it could come back to haunt him in 2012 if he wins the election and doesn’t make enough headway on that plan.

To be honest, the only moment that’s going to stick will be John McCain’s point-and-pout calling Barack Obama “That One” in reference to which Senator voted for the 2005 Energy Bill. Some people are going to throw down the Race Gauntlet here. Don’t. Really, just don’t. I honestly don’t think it was meant to be a racially charged comment. It sounded to me like a zinger that just fell on dead ears, like so many of McCain’s other little jokes tonight and just about all of Palin’s jokes on Thursday. He was trying to sound adult and dismissive, and he failed. He managed to do, in that moment, exactly what Biden went to great lengths not to do in his debate with Palin: sound like a smug, condescending old prat.

Then came the foreign policy segment, where McCain really had to make some ground. Unfortunately for both candidates, it was as mushy and meandering as the domestic policy section, and the questions just kept getting stupider. Granted, I was performing a three-lane change at the time, but did Brokaw really ask if Russia was  once again an evil empire? As in “Evil” evil? What the hell kind of question is that? I mean, I know it was a throwback to Saint Ronnie. I get the reference. And believe me when I tell you that I have no love lost for Putin. But what future President is going to stoke the flames by answering a flat yes to that question (sit down, Tom Tancredo, I said “future President” so that term automatically diqualified you)?

Ultimately, I feel like Obama should have come on stronger during the foreign policy section. He should have hit back harder on McCain’s judgment in going to war. He has the fine distinction of having publicly decried giving Bush the authority to use military force in Iraq, and the overwhelming public opinion is that invading Iraq was the wrong move. Don’t get me wrong, he hit that note. But he presented it like a bullet point when it should have been the fist of an angry god. What frustrated me most was that the entire foreign policy segment seemed dominated with hypothetical what-if questions. I suppose that’s what made me think of the Republican primaries, with its infinite doomsday scenarios that allowed the candidates to out-macho each other in their red-blooded, chest thumping Jack Bauer circle jerk.

The argument can be made – and will be made – that a draw in this debate was a loss for McCain. It’s common policical wisdom that the candidate trailing in the polls needs to use the debates to gain ground, while the candidate in the lead need only effect a stalemate. Add to that the fact that Obama out-performed him by a reasonable degree, and it’s a net loss for McCain. The immediate polling from CNN marked Obama as the more informative, stronger and likeable candidate. In short, McCain couldn’t even perform in his preferred debate format – wasn’t he the one pissing and moaning about Obama not debating him in Town Halls all over the country?

Personally? I don’t give a shit one way or another about those arguments. They are meaningless. To be blunt, this debate really didn’t matter all that much. The debate that mattered took place last Thursday. That was the true refferendum on John McCain as a candidate and what sort of judgment he would exercise if given free reign. The crap-tastrophe that is Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin will weign more heavily around McCain’s neck than anything he could have said tonight, or anything he could have gotten Obama to say. Frankly, unless he shows up to the third debate with Osama bin Laden’s head on a war pike, I don’t see how he’s going to win this thing come November.

Author’s Note: I somehow got through this enitre post without making a single “My Friends” joke. Don’t you smarmy bastards worry, Johnny Mac’s got it coming.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 7th, 2008 at 11:40 pm and is filed under Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.