The First Debate

Obama's most forceful debate yet, this affirmed the idea that he can tackle foreign policy "experts" like McCain with the vigor and aggressiveness that has been missing from Democratic candidates for the last eight years.

Several pundits are exclaiming that McCain won this debate, but I completely disagree. First, let's look at image.

History has shown us how pivotal image is in these televised debates. The first ever televised debate, between Kennedy and Nixon, proved this. Radio listeners, who focused on substance, thought that Nixon won the debate. Television viewers, who saw Nixon's sickly scragginess to Kennedy's perfect, clean shaven pretty boy, approved Kennedy overwhelmingly. In short: image matters, and McCain did not seem to get the memo.

All throughout the debate, McCain was hunched over, squinting, and grumpy. In fact, he never even looked at Obama during the debate, as the ever-uncomplimentary split screens showed. Throughout the evening, McCain repeatedly insisted that Obama was "naive," and that he didn't understand complex foreign affairs. At one point, he stated that Obama did not know the difference between a "tactic" and a "strategy."

On the flip-side, Obama was gracious in comparison, complimenting several of McCain's ideas while deconstructing his arguments with facts and reasoning. In this respect, Obama in a knock-out.

Now, lets move on to substance. From Obama's perspective, this debate could not have gone better. He appears fluent, confident, and aggressive with foreign affairs, forcefully challenging McCain on such heavyweight issues as Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, and the financial crisis. If you doubted Obama's command of foreign issues before this debate, his bold charges of McCain's wrongfulness regarding Iraq, his idiotic opposition to communication with enemies (in which he brilliantly invoked Kissinger's support of the plan--who is a big-time adviser for McCain), and his undying support for the surge.

The worst thing that could have happened would have been uncertainty by Obama and cocky assurance by McCain. Instead, we had Obama defending his ideologies, and using facts and logic to debunk the claims of McCain. With McCain, we had showings of insecurity and a lack of planning (due in no small part to his ridiculous stunt to help with the bail out), and it all added up to a generally underwhelming performance from the next incarnate of movement conservatism.

In short: Obama big time, and I hope more people saw who the real president was on stage tonight.