U.S. presidential candidates Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama met Tuesday for the second of three scheduled debates in the general election. Who won? Did the candidates accomplish what they needed to do?
My initial impression of this town hall-style event was that it was uncommonly dull, and I’m the sort of person who gets all worked up reading an environmental-impact report.
Barack Obama, I knew, didn’t have to wow anyone last night. Unless the world around him changes radically in the next couple of weeks, Obama’s mission is to keep stimulating voters who’ve already decided to support him and to deny McCain the ability to rest. Obama needs to be vigilant against positive poll numbers lulling him into becoming complacent, of course, but he also needs to watch against trying to push so hard against McCain that he takes unnecessary chances. Still, Obama seemed off his game Tuesday, and I think he spent too much time counterattacking McCain instead of steering perceptions in the direction he wanted.
What’s interesting to me is that I don’t think it was McCain’s debate performance at the debate that forced Obama into a reactive stance: McCain was jumpy, vague and awkward, and he didn’t effectively make a case for a McCain presidency. Instead, Obama seemed to have decided before the debate to respond to and counterattack against McCain, and it didn’t come off well.
I’ve written before that I think McCain conservatism is much better for our nation than the Bush brand, so it was with some regret that I watched McCain’s ineffective performance last night.
All right, so what grades do the candidates get?
Keep in mind that I’m grading two different things in this analysis. First, I grade the candidates on their performance in the debate, looking at it as a stand-alone contest that could be reduced to box scores like a baseball game. This tells who “won” or “lost” the debate but doesn’t get into what that means for the campaign as a whole. Second, I assess the debate not as a single night’s contest, but rather as part of the continuum of the campaign. In other words, how does the debate fit into the context of the race as a whole? The candidate who “loses” the debate doesn’t necessarily hurt his campaign, and a candidate who “wins” doesn’t necessarily help himself going forward.
Overall grades on the debate itself
John McCain C-plus
Barack Obama C-plus
The second McCain-Obama presidential debate was so boring I’m not going to spend much time on the debate itself.
As far as McCain’s performance went, he got in a number of good points and clearly won a couple of the questions, but overall he didn’t produce a memorable narrative. In the first debate he gave a good narrative of himself, but this time he couldn’t articulate a narrative of how a President McCain would turn around the American economy. There were bits here and there, but nothing that came together in a memorable way.
If all an undecided voter saw of Barack Obama was Tuesday’s debate, he would be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss is about. He wasn’t awful: Like McCain, Obama got in some points and dominated some of the questions. He also did better according to the gut-check that CNN’s Approve-O-Meter provided — strikingly better among women. But there still was no there there.
Grades on the debate in the broader context of the campaign
Initial overall impressions of the Obama-McCain debate:
Obama: C-plus
McCain: F
I’ll post a more substantive analysis tomorrow, but John McCain failed to shift the momentum of the presidential campaign at tonight’s town hall debate. He scored some points here and there — and Barack Obama’s performance was largely dull, marred by go-nowhere attacks and counterattacks on McCain — but McCain needed a big night tonight and he failed to deliver. McCain’s grade on the town hall debate will be a bit better once I can analyze it in more detail, but the combined grade of the debate itself and the debate viewed in the broader context of the campaign still produces a failing score.
There are still four weeks left before Election Day and anything is possible, but unless McCain can find some other way to completely shift the direction of the race for the White House, he’s done.
I’ve got a teething baby who needs me, so I’ll make this short. U.S. presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain meet tonight at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn. for the second debate of the general election. What do the candidates need to do to win the town hall-style debate? How does it fit in with their overall campaigns?
Some analysts are already predicting that Obama has sewn up the election (if today were Election Day) and a number of others are convinced he’s very close to doing so. Polls show Obama has nailed the blue states, has opened up leads in some battleground states, and is pressing McCain hard in some red stronghold states such as North Carolina.
This means that Obama’s task tonight is simply to avoid a major blunder. He needs to be conservative (temperamentally, not politically) in his responses to audience questions and not give some wild off-the-cuff answer that hasn’t already been through the focus groups and practice sessions of his campaign apparatus. He needs to remember, as he did so well in the first debate, to give the headline answer first before delving into details. He needs to seize plausible opportunities to discuss the economic crisis, as long as he answers the questions put to him. He also needs to convey ease and confidence in his body language. In short, he needs to keep doing most of the things he’s been doing — except for the recent counterattacks on McCain.
McCain has a much harder task tonight. He’s behind, and running out of ammunition. Ideally, when the inevitable question about the economy comes his way, McCain needs to give a spectacular answer that not only shows he understands viscerally the impact on average Americans, but also has a plan simple enough to articulate in a few minutes and sufficiently different from Republican economic policy of the past eight years. Failing that, the only ammo McCain seems to have left is to attack Obama as a person. He needs to disrupt the Obama game and change the subject, forcing Obama to react to him. In a tight race, playing up fears about your opponent can be very effective, but I don’t think McCain can make up enough points this way to even put him within striking distance of Obama. Another problem for McCain is that this kind of attack typically doesn’t play well in town hall debates, and it’s possible that no one will ask directly about the subject of any of the character attacks the McCain campaign has made against Obama. So absent that really spectacular answer about how McCain would fix the economy and protect the average American, McCain is stuck having to delicately sow seeds of doubt about Barack Obama.
It would be nice to hear some honest talk from both the candidates about how they’ll have to change their tax-cut plans — neither one will be able to carry out the plans they articulated before the recent acceleration of the economic crisis — but I don’t expect either one of them to even own up to the need for changes.
The debate starts at 6 p.m. Pacific time, 9 p.m. Eastern. On almost everywhere.
I don’t know what was more fun this week, watching the Palin-Biden debate on TV or watching MC Hammer at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass in Golden Gate Park. In any case, both events proved quite popular among visitors to PretePress. I’m sure that if I had included that photo of a woman dressed as a cow that’s going around, it would have beat everything.
Some of the search terms that brought people to my blog this week, in no particular order (remember that WordPress truncates some terms when compiling its lists):
And now, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, your humble unindicted co-conspirator presents — MC Hammer performing at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival on Friday, Oct. 3, 2008. Man cannot live on politics alone.
In case you missed it and this shaky, low-quality video doesn’t satisfy your urge for a little quality Hammer Time, take heart in the fact that Warren Hellman told the crowd (mostly San Francisco schoolchildren, given exclusive access to the field in front of the stage) that Hammer said he would come back next year.
U.S. vice-presidential hopefuls Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden met Thursday for their only debate of the 2008 race. Who won the Palin-Biden debate? Did the candidates accomplish what their campaigns needed them to do?
Overall grades on the Palin-Biden debate itself
Sarah Palin B-minus
Joseph Biden B
I think it’s fair to say that Sarah Palin exceeded expectations by a long shot on Thursday. I wouldn’t say she aggressively attacked Joe Biden in the way that Politico reported she would, but she couched her early responses in emotional language that did a great job of reflecting the fears and frustrations that grip so many Americans now.
However, Palin seemed lost in parts of the latter half of the debate, which only strengthened my initial impressions about her. She did passably well on most of the policy questions — which, when combined with a strong performance in the first half of the debate, enabled her to come away with a B-minus. For someone who has had an awful two weeks in the media, including attacks from the right, this amounts to a very good grade.
Biden did well, too. His performance didn’t rate an “A,” but striving for that grade would have involved a significant risk of failure that just wouldn’t pencil out for a vice-presidential debate, particularly with Obama doing better than McCain in many polls.
Biden was brief — brief enough, anyway — and specific in his answers, and he treated Palin respectfully without appearing patronizing. He also scored some emotional points, showing that he can do as well in that regard as Palin can do on policy. However, sometimes he got too specific, and used jargon — not good for a TV audience of the general public. Overall, his grade reflects that he did the kind of job any experienced senator would do.
Grades on the success of the Palin-Biden debate in the broader context of the campaign
Sarah Palin B
Joseph Biden B-plus
Many people were expecting absurdity from Sarah Palin, but she didn’t give it to them. A really poor performance from the Republican vice-presidential nominee would have been a serious blow for John McCain, but Palin didn’t seem to do anything that would drive more voters away. On the other hand, she didn’t do any better than to allow the McCain campaign to hold its ground, and I don’t think she came across as someone who would make a credible president of the United States.
Joe Biden did a great job of hitting John McCain instead of Sarah Palin, particularly when he said that while McCain had been a maverick on some issues, they weren’t the “kitchen table” issues that touched the lives of most Americans. He also presented himself as a regular Joe done good — a guy whose son is going to Iraq and who knows just how lucky he is to have a good job and live in a nice house. But perhaps best for the Obama campaign, and in contrast to Palin, he showed that he could step in and be president of the United States if necessary.
By the way, even though I disagree with parts of his analysis, Decker’s post on the debate is an example of what I consider a great blog entry. It comes from a source with expertise in the subject matter, it reads well, it provides unique opinion — and it’s brief enough to read quickly while providing enough information to make it worth passing on to other people.
Parting shots
CNN’s Approve-O-Meter looked better this time around. Trimming the graph to two lines (uncommitted male voters and uncommitted female voters) made it easier to read. It looked like they zoomed in closer to the zero line, too, which helped — though the unfortunate side effect was that the approval lines sometimes reached the limits of the graph, which meant that it was impossible to tell just how big the approval ratings were.
Many observers of the vice-presidential debate between Democratic Sen. Joseph Biden and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin noticed that Palin shares President George W. Bush’s mispronunciation of “nuclear” as “new-kyoo-lurr.” Why would an otherwise intelligent person mistake the correct way to say a word that isn’t any more difficult than “likelier”?
In a radio commentary from 2002, language expert Prof. Geoffrey Nunberg explained that in Bush’s case, the mispronunciation may be deliberate, a sort of modern shibboleth — a way to distinguish “us” from “them.” And in such cases, it’s used only for nuclear weapons. Could Sarah Palin be using “nucular” the same way?
In the mouths of those people, “nucular” is a choice, not an inadvertent mistake — a thinko, not a typo. I’m not sure exactly what they have in mind by it. Maybe it appeals to them to refer to the weapons in what seems like a folksy and familiar way, or maybe it’s a question of asserting their authority — as if to say, “We’re the ones with our fingers on the button, and we’ll pronounce the word however we damn well please.”
Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin wrapped up their only debate of the 2008 election half an hour ago. Some initial thoughts and observations:
Sarah Palin did very, very well at the start of the debate. She played Sarah Palin’s game, which was smart. If you can’t be better, be different — sometimes it’s just as effective.
In the front end of the debate, when Palin spoke generally about the plight of the midde class and a system stacked against them, CNN’s somewhat improved Approve-O-Meter pegged out with positive feedback.
When Biden talked about his own middle-class background, he likewise garnered strong positive feedback.
When Palin talked about deregulation, the Approve-O-Meter showed a neutral or mildly positive reaction from the men in CNN’s focus group of undecided voters. The line indicating women’s approval usually plunged.
Biden displayed his superior knowledge of foreign policy (and the issues in general) to great effect in the second half of the debate, while it was often difficult to discern an actual answer from the Alaska governor.
In the second half of the debate, Palin stumbled noticeably. Her response to the question about what branch of government properly comprises the office of the vice president was vague, rambling and incoherent. She sounded like a beauty pageant contestant stunned by the glare of the spotlights. Biden, on the other hand, showed that he knows exactly what the vice president does and where the office fits into the constitutional structure of U.S. government.’
I only saw Sarah Palin’s hands once that I remember. In that fraction of a second, I couldn’t tell what she held in her right hand, but she was squeezing it like she was trying to break it. How revealing it would be if we could see the hands of the debaters as well as their faces. People often are quite guarded with their facial expressions, while their hands provide a truer window to their souls. If you doubt this, the next time you interview someone or hold a one-on-one meeting, place a paper clip on the table within reach of the other person. Nervous people may play with it unconsciously and almost uncontrollably. Confident people may never so much as glance at it. Savvy people may move it out of the way before it becomes a temptation. It’s a cheap trick, but effective.
Overall, looking at the debate by itself, although I think Palin did better than expected, Biden did better still.
ST. LOUIS — Sarah Palin plans to go on the attack in tonight’s debate, hitting Joe Biden for what she will call his foreign policy blunders and penchant for adopting liberal positions on taxes and other issues, according to campaign officials involved in prepping her for tonight’s showdown.
Well, this certainly will make the debate more interesting to watch, but I’m not convinced it’s a surefire winning strategy for Palin. At best, it’s a gamble. Does anyone remember CNN’s Approve-O-Meter from the McCain-Obama debate? Approval among independents crashed whenever McCain attacked Obama. If Biden sticks to the plan as described in this article, I think he comes out with a big-picture win even if Palin lands a couple of jabs. The most likely positive outcome for Palin is a reinvigoration of the GOP base, but I don’t buy the idea that the base is in any danger of sitting out the elex or defecting to someone else.
U.S. vice-presidential nominees Sen. Joseph Biden and Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska square off tonight in their only scheduled debate of the campaign for the White House. What do the candidates need to do? What mistakes must they avoid? What should the astute observer look for?
Palin-Biden debate strategy
It may be that for both Palin and Biden, the best thing to do is as little as possible.
If I were advising either one of the candidates, my advice would be to forget about trying to win. Losing this debate by being cautious will be far less costly to either one of the campaigns than committing a memorable, quotable, sound bite-able blunder. It’s much better for them to be conservative and take a few hits than to be drawn into a vulnerable position.
Some of the talking heads and consultants on TV may say that both candidates have to play to win, that they have to prove they could be president if called upon, but I disagree. The news cycle just won’t let this debate live long enough to matter much (again, unless one or both of the candidates commits a huge blunder). On Friday, the U.S. House of Representatives will vote on a controversial Wall Street bailout bill (now stuffed full of pork-barrel goodies by the Senate), and Friday also will bring a new batch of unemployment numbers. This all adds up to the fact that unless something spectacular comes out of tonight’s debate, the news media will be on to the next topic in just a few days, if not sooner.
The debate may still make the news on Monday, particularly if there’s good tape from the Sunday-morning talk shows to use as follow-up material. But the next debate between Barack Obama and John McCain is Tuesday, and even without that new debate, both campaigns are capable of pushing some new story — any new story — hard enough that by Tuesday, the debate will be way down the list.
Vice presidential debate: what to watch for
In spite of my belief that it would be in the interests of both Joe Biden and Sarah Palin to take a conservative approach to the debate, this is a very highly anticipated TV event that will draw a big audience. So, what should viewers expect to see tonight?
Palin’s awkward silences, inability to answer simple questions with specificity and tendency to dodge inquiries with folksy, tail-chasing palaver — strikingly reminiscent of President George W. Bush’s well-known verbal floundering, and captured artfully by Tina Fey — have become the stuff of pop culture. If Biden can manage to just leave her alone, it would seem that Palin has plenty of rope and knows how to tie her own knots.
On the other hand, some very successful politicians (Ronald Reagan comes to mind) have made pat, easily-remembered statements their stock in trade. And as I wrote earlier regarding Palin’s speech at the Republican National Convention, the Alaska governor seems to possess a real talent for enthralling the party base this way.
The bottom line for Palin is that I will be surprised if she doesn’t stick fairly closely to a rehearsed script peppered with a couple of the kind of lines that supporters see as down-home zingers and that make detractors roll their eyes.
Biden’s tendency to ramble on is almost as well-known as Palin’s inability to give a substantive answer. On the other hand, he’s a bright guy who knows foreign policy as well as anybody in the Senate — including John McCain. And he’s no stranger to the rough-and-tumble required to get laws passed. To ask him to not go after Sarah Palin is like asking a fighting bull not to go after a cape-waving first-time matador with a gammy leg. But he can’t go after her — there’s no way for him to win a contest of public perception, even if he gets her on the facts. If he attacks anyone, it has to be John McCain.
I expect Biden to be polite to Palin, but not overly deferential. If she says something stupid, he might quickly say that he’s not sure what she meant, but then he’ll quickly move on to his own answer, which will be more succinct than usual.
I would be really surprised if the Obama people let Biden go out on stage without knowing more or less what he was going to say, so I don’t expect him to come out with any wild statements on policy. However, his tendency to improvise the filler material around policy statements, such as when he said that FDR addressed the nation on TV after the 1929 stock market crash, may still produce some interesting moments.
The Padin-Biden vice-presidential debate time is set for 9 p.m. EDT, 6 p.m. PDT.
Posted by Tom Prete 
PretePress 
Grading the second McCain-Obama debate
October 8, 2008U.S. presidential candidates Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama met Tuesday for the second of three scheduled debates in the general election. Who won? Did the candidates accomplish what they needed to do?
My initial impression of this town hall-style event was that it was uncommonly dull, and I’m the sort of person who gets all worked up reading an environmental-impact report.
Barack Obama, I knew, didn’t have to wow anyone last night. Unless the world around him changes radically in the next couple of weeks, Obama’s mission is to keep stimulating voters who’ve already decided to support him and to deny McCain the ability to rest. Obama needs to be vigilant against positive poll numbers lulling him into becoming complacent, of course, but he also needs to watch against trying to push so hard against McCain that he takes unnecessary chances. Still, Obama seemed off his game Tuesday, and I think he spent too much time counterattacking McCain instead of steering perceptions in the direction he wanted.
What’s interesting to me is that I don’t think it was McCain’s debate performance at the debate that forced Obama into a reactive stance: McCain was jumpy, vague and awkward, and he didn’t effectively make a case for a McCain presidency. Instead, Obama seemed to have decided before the debate to respond to and counterattack against McCain, and it didn’t come off well.
I’ve written before that I think McCain conservatism is much better for our nation than the Bush brand, so it was with some regret that I watched McCain’s ineffective performance last night.
All right, so what grades do the candidates get?
Keep in mind that I’m grading two different things in this analysis. First, I grade the candidates on their performance in the debate, looking at it as a stand-alone contest that could be reduced to box scores like a baseball game. This tells who “won” or “lost” the debate but doesn’t get into what that means for the campaign as a whole. Second, I assess the debate not as a single night’s contest, but rather as part of the continuum of the campaign. In other words, how does the debate fit into the context of the race as a whole? The candidate who “loses” the debate doesn’t necessarily hurt his campaign, and a candidate who “wins” doesn’t necessarily help himself going forward.
Overall grades on the debate itself
John McCain C-plus
Barack Obama C-plus
The second McCain-Obama presidential debate was so boring I’m not going to spend much time on the debate itself.
As far as McCain’s performance went, he got in a number of good points and clearly won a couple of the questions, but overall he didn’t produce a memorable narrative. In the first debate he gave a good narrative of himself, but this time he couldn’t articulate a narrative of how a President McCain would turn around the American economy. There were bits here and there, but nothing that came together in a memorable way.
If all an undecided voter saw of Barack Obama was Tuesday’s debate, he would be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss is about. He wasn’t awful: Like McCain, Obama got in some points and dominated some of the questions. He also did better according to the gut-check that CNN’s Approve-O-Meter provided — strikingly better among women. But there still was no there there.
Grades on the debate in the broader context of the campaign
John McCain F
Barack Obama C-plus
Read the rest of this entry »