3rd (and final) Presidential debate

I really wish the candidates would agree to more debates. The standard 3 really doesn’t cut it for me, and 1 VP debate isn’t enough either.

Barack Obama and John McCain met at Hofstra University last night. I think Bob Schieffer did a pretty good job moderating. He allowed the candidates more responses than the format allowed when a contentious question arose. He also asked good follow-up questions, and pointed out when he wasn’t getting good answers. I don’t know whether it was the moderator or the format, but the candidates interacted with each other more in this debate than in the previous 2.

Best line of the night was from McCain, in response to an Obama comment about how McCain was a bad choice based on the last 8 years of President Bush: “Senator, I’m not President Bush. If you wanted to run against President Bush, you should have run 4 years ago.”

Worst line of the night was from Obama: “100% of John McCain’s ads are negative.”

I mostly agree with the media here on the results of the debate. Obama played it safe, like a boxer way ahead on points in the last round. McCain was very active, delivering pointed jabs while he tried to score a knockout punch. There were a few times where McCain’s facial expressions belied his frustration.

For better or worse, I don’t think there was a game-changing play to make for McCain tonight. I don’t believe there’s any way for Obama to lose unless he screws up monumentally. Hence the reason his strategy for this debate was the right one.