Redstate

....but I thought Obama looked absolutely awful. Hillary got a lot of good attacks in on Obama and she didn't come across as shrill either.

“.....women and minorities hardest hit”

in this race. Obama has never looked so bad - he's good with a scripted speech, not in a debate setting.

He was trying to measure his words so carefully that he kept tripping over himself and came across just horribly.

McCain was the clear winner.

1) I was surprised at how good the moderating was. Although I think they spent too long on the "cling" and "Wright" controversies, they were good about follow-ups and asking the hard questions. When Obama said he would lift the SocSec cap, the moderators called him on going back on his promise to not raise taxes on anyone making less than $200,000/year. Matthews and other D pols turned "reporters" would not have caught that.

2) Obama did not look inspiring, new, or hopeful. His main strength was totally missing. He looked overwhelmed and exhausted at times. If the scandals have taken the New Politician Smell off of Obama, this performance might reinforce the "he's just another politician" meme.

3) Clinton looked prepared and experienced. If she was closer in delegates, this would be a big win for her. She is still the "safe" choice for people worried about Obama's inexperience and lack of vetting. But she's too far behind to win on that alone.

4) Clinton's attacks on Obama do nothing to help Clinton (she looks bad and mean) but they are great for McCain. McCain wouldn't be as direct with his criticism and thus it wouldn't sting as much. So Clinton does the harsh criticism, Obama has to deal with it, and McCain can focus on economic policy and being a natural Commander-in-Chief.

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For four reasons:
1. Charlie Gibson told the world that cuts in the capital gains rate leads to increased tax revenue (to which Uncle Milton would no doubt respond, "that means the rate hasn't been cut enough)

2. Both candidates inexplicably defined the middle class as those making up to $250,000.

3. Both candidates agreed to not raise taxes on the newly defined middle class (does this mean making the "Bush Tax Cuts" permanent?)

4. Hillary committed to a 20% cap on the capital gains rate.

I'm excited about that. This is a win for conservative ideas.

I don't believe either candidate, mind you, but it's good to know they feel like they have to say these things.

has Obama winning by a 2 to 1 margin as of 5 minutes from now (10:27 CT), of course HRC approval ratings among the Drudge Readership is probably in the single digits. I did not watch it though, as I was too busy watching baseball.

McCain '08

questions instead of splitting hairs over policies that have been discussed in the past 25 debates.

It is painfully obvious that Obama lost. He seemed almost resentful at some of the questions. Several seemed to go right over his head. Embarrassing.

The shocked Obama Cult is priceless.

Matthew Weaver

http://www.TheProblemWithObama.com
http://www.TheObamaCult.com

Hillary will run for NY Gov. and lose, then lose her Senate seat when NY realizes she hasn't accomplished anything. Question: Is there a job (other than a Congressman, or Senator) that allows you to interview full-time for another job while paying you full pay and benefits?

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"Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm." -- James Madison

...Barack ducked. HRC by TKO.

Without a script, Barack is lazy, repetitive, and incomprehensible. I'll make him a pre-emptive deal...he stops with the McCain = Bush's 3rd term schtick and I won't start with the Obama = Carter's 2nd term uppercut.

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"We want great men who, when fortune frowns, will not be discouraged." - Colonel Henry Knox

April 16, 2008:
Obama was asked by a voter via video why he did not wear the American flag in his lapel.

"I have never said that I don't wear flag pins or refuse to wear flag pins. This is the kind of manufactured issue that our politics has become obsessed with and, once again, distracts us," he said.

October 4, 2007:
Barack Obama says he doesn't wear an American flag lapel pin because it has become a substitute for "true patriotism" since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"I decided I won't wear that pin on my chest," he said in the interview. "Instead, I'm going to try to tell the American people what I believe will make this country great, and hopefully that will be a testament to my patriotism."

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8S2K3UO0&show_article=1

Here I thought an Ivy league presidential candidate would know what he said or when he said it. Those kinds of questions must be a "distraction" for him.

Then again I must be one of those who "manufactures issues" I'm "obsessesed" with. Guess I'll go back to "clinging" to my flag...

was that Obama looked rattled, and he said a number of stupid and untrue things. Minor, maybe, like saying that he had never said anything about wearing the flag pin, when of course he had -- his comment bout the false patriotism of wearing the flag is well known), his remark about disowning the Rev Wright, comparing Ayers to Coburn -- yeah they're just alike, though I don't think you can find Coburn's FBI mugshot on the internet the way you can Ayers'. All this adds up and contributes to the sense that Obama is simply in over his head. In the more sustantive parts he flailed around and was less effective than in the past.

Hillary is always good in cornered-rat mode, she got in some good knocks on Obama and appeared poised and knowledgeable. Her problem is that going negative doesn't really help her.

overall, though, the weakness of both these candidates is the overall Dem weakness of having to take and hold the extreme left-wing positions that always hurt them, like gun rights. The most telling part of the debate was when they both stated that no matter what the generals on the ground in iraq told them, they were committed to pulling out troops. This is a very clear statement of the ifference between them and McCain, and proof that they are committed to defeat.

I have to concur -- great night for McCain.

Without a doubt, she did much better. I don't think it will make much of a difference in PA, though. I thought the moderation was terrible, wasting the better half of the debate on meaningless gotcha issues, which seems to be the general consensus if you take a look at the responses on the ABC site:

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/DemocraticDebate/comments?type=story&id=4...

Sometimes I hear music from "Titanic" when the topic of the Dem candidates comes up. Is this normal?

That, or the theme song from "Jaws".

Well, the first hour was amusing at least, Hillary's entire shtick was "Well I of course won't make that an issue, but John McCain sure will." Heh. The second half was more a traditional Dem debate.

Barack was weird, he's just throwing out lie after lie now (flag pins, Ayers) along with being repetitive and stumbling. Hillary got her talking points in, but I don't think she really scored any points for the nomination (she certainly gave an assist to McCain though).

Winner? John McCain.

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Hillary won the debate hands down. Obama's inexperience in these situations was evident tonight.

I might be in the minority here, but I thought the debate was poorly done. Little substance to any of the questions and seemed more like an effort on ABC's behalf to try and grab a soundbite on an issue. I'm thinking that they're going to tackle taxes in-depth, national security, immigration, free trade, mortgage crisis, and other issues. Instead they were asking about pins. If I was a voter in Pennsylvania, I'd have been really pissed.

Obama was stammering the entire night and looked extremely unprepared--especially when discussing Iran and foreign policy in general. Hillary, on the other hand, was extremely well prepared and seemed to exude confidence.

Furthermore, Obama looked ridiculous when he compared Tom Coburn to Bill Ayers. It reminded me of when he compared his grandmother and Geraldine Ferraro to Jeremiah Wright during his Philadelphia "race speech". Is there anyone that this man won't throw under the bus in order to save face or get out of admitting that he made a mistake?

The griping from the left is mostly along the lines of how the Rovian ABC moderators were asking "gotcha" questions rather than questions of substance about Iraq, health care, the economy, etc. - the issues people REALLY care about.

But think about it... The first hour showed that you can't believe a word either of these two says even about innocuous things, so who cares what they say about something that matters if you know they are liars?

So in hindsight the way Gibson and Steph handled it was even more telling than I realized. Great job ABC!

I couldn't think it would get this good. Koskids are now attacking ABC and George Steph. Kinda like two Islamic extremist terrorist factions killing each other in Iraq.

Ask not what I can do for my country, ask what my country can do for me. Washington Elected Elite

A thought hit me today. If we are supposed to give Ayres a pass using the above excuse, can we once and for all ask Obama to state flat-out that any discussions of reparations for slavery are out of the question since that happened 140+ years ago before any person now alive had been born?

And aren't many claims of pedophilia by priests from 40 or so years ago? Let's ask Obama if we can close the book on that issue too while we're at it.