harikari.com

Barack Obama and John McCain squared off in a “town hall” style debate at Belmont University last night.  The debate didn’t seem very town-hall like to me, because there was not much audience participation.  I tend to think of town-hall forums to be pretty loosely controlled so that everyone there can participate.  This one was very structured.  All of the questions were screened ahead of time and the audience could not ask follow-up questions, although the moderator, Tom Brokaw, was able to ask a few.  The candidates did walk around and address the audience, but they weren’t allowed to respond, so if you weren’t watching on TV, you wouldn’t really notice the difference between this one and the last one, except for the occasional question asked by someone in the audience.

Another problem with this debate was the amount of time that was allotted to follow-ups and rebuttals.  Tom had to remind both candidates several times that they had agreed to limit their time to one minute.  One minute?  In a presidential debate?  That’s ridiculous, and both candidates went over the limit almost every time.  They should have been more realistic and doubled that time.

So what of the substance of the debate?

Obama and McCain outlined their own health-care plans and criticized their opponents. I think McCain’s attack was a little over the top, but then it probably had to be because his plan is clearly inferior to Obama’s.  (Not that Obama’s is the best plan.  Personally I would love to see us go to a single-payer plan like the one France has.  But we must progress in baby steps…)  McCain kept saying that Obama would fine employers if they did not participate.  As far as I can tell, that’s an outright lie, but you can check here if you’d like.

Obama clearly has a much better understanding of economics that McCain.  McCain seemed to rattle on about taxes, taxes and more taxes as if that was the only major factor.  Yes, he did talk a bit about spending, and he did throw out a wild card about he would like to spend another 300 billion dollars to buy up bad mortgages.  My interpretation was that it would be in addition to the 700 billion we just threw in.  This we get from a guy who says he wants to reduce spending?  The Center for American Progress has been pushing this idea since December 2007, and the post on their website today tells how perplexing McCain’s announcement was because “he had previously rejected similar mortgage relief.”

Obama’s discussions about the economy and his tax plans were fare more comprehensive that McCain’s. Obama was able to draw a big picture that did not focus on just one or two economic variables.  He spoke of a need for fairness in tax rates, of rebuilding our infrastructure, of effective tax cuts, and surgical spending cuts.  He spoke of his grand ambition of weaning our country from foreign oil in ten years.  He spoke of expanding our economy by investing in the development alternative energy sources and then exporting that technology to China. 

Yes, McCain did touch on some of these same topics but his presentation seemed fractured while Obama’s seemed more coherent and easier to understand.

I am convinced that everyone’s opinion of who does better in the foreign policy section of the debates ultimately gets down to whether or not one thinks it was right or wrong to invade Iraq.  I think it was a horrible mistake, so I side with Obama.  Those who think we should have gone in and that we can win the war will side with McCain.  That said, I think Obama presented his side much more eloquently than McCain, but eloquence doesn’t seem to matter when it comes to this issue.

A few other observations:

• The word “maverick” was not spoken last night.
• The words “My friends” were spoken sixteen times.  It got pretty old after about nine times.
• Obama looks good.   He is calm and thoughtful.  He looks, sounds, and acts like I think a president should.
• McCain is and old man.  He looks older every time I see him.  He seems kind of rash and not very thoughtful.  I don’t think he has the proper temperament to be president.

Bottom line:  Obama won the debate.  Again.  Most every survey that I saw on news channels and websites also showed Obama as the winner.  The only exception was FOX News.

If you missed it, you can watch and/or read the whole thing here.