First US Presidential debate Reaction

Well since everyone is doing it, and the internet is nothing if not a soapbox for loudmouths to impress their opinion on others (sorry i mean the rational democratic exchange of views and ideas as per a universal civil society..)

Final Result: Tie

Which means a minor victory for the Obama Camp. Neither candidate impressed much. McCain looked tense and slightly arrogant in his response to Obama (such as not looking at him all night), but sometimes was also very genuine. His closing arguments, which off the cuff dealt with the issue if veteran support with the words "they know I love them and will take care of them" was a off-message but great closer. The embracing elder president looking after his flock.

Obama looked strong and much better than his past debates, but again seemed to want to talk to much and didn't land some of the hard blows he could have. A key of good rhetoric is to put your best lines either at the start to gain attention, or at the end to linger in the audiences mind. Ideally, you do both. Obama seemed to put them somewhere in the middle, before he lead off on another tangent that however important, ended up distracting from his arguments. Obama has much to say, which is a necessary quantity of a genuine thinker (and he is), but less so in a great communicator, where every excess word costs dearly). Yet in the end, rhetoric aside Obama gains simply for being on stage, and holding his own. He looked calm, collected and Presidential. No one who liked him before tonight will doubt him, and plenty will have reason to calm their concerns.

Both Candidates did well in their respective strengths, Economy for Obama, Foreign Policy for McCain. Neither would have changed many opinions from tonights effort, although as McCain seemed to intimately feel, the simple fact of having Obama in the same room, on the same stage and talking back and forth helps raise the junior sentor to his level. And he was not happy about it. I doubt it will matter, but whilst we always need to distinguish ourselves from our opponents, I've always thought it a true weakness in a politician that they resent their opponents mere existence or disagreement. Bush's critics do it, so do Kevin Rudd's. If nothing else it shows you have got under their skin and from there it is very hard to show real strength and capability over them.
Better to be civil and then casually dismissive when you're ahead, rather than angry, petulant and selfish if ever lucky enough to get the upper hand.

So nothing major has changed for all that. But Obama, whilst he will certainly want to and have to improve will be pretty happy with his efforts tonight. McCain didn't get the game changer he wanted, and time is running out. (Thats two big opportunities this week missed for McCain, his "suspension" of the campaign seems to have been ignored by Americans, and the Debate left most people seeing them as equals.)

Bring on Thursday's VP debate (Screened 11am Friday morning in Australia on ABC1). Joe Biden - who has been comfortably doing debate response on the US cable shows after the debate- is sure to steamroll over Palin -who is no where to be seen tonight- That should tell you all you need to know.

p.s If you havn't seen it, check out Malcolm Turnbull's effort on Q&A via the ABC's iView site. Impressive, though still slightly fake. He chose the political distortion over the honest engagement a few times, but thats what politican's think is expected of them. This far out, for a minor ABC show its not, and the people see it as fake.

But otherwise quite impressive. I'm looking for him to give me a reason to vote Liberal, (though I have little doubt Rudd will win a second term)