The Presidential Debates - Round 1

In General

In general, Obama appeared as the better speaker and the more charismatic candidate. That's not news though. McCain appeared more seasoned and experienced. That's not news either. The thing that really struck me was how condescending Obama came off. He constantly called his opponent "John." Yes, that's his name, but you just don't do that in a presidential debate. You do that when you run into each other in the men's room at the Capitol. McCain, in turn, always referred to his opponent as "Senator Obama." Also, Obama continually interrupted both McCain and the moderator. He also made audible comments during much of the time that McCain was talking, saying things like, "That's not true." Truth be told, no one stopped him from doing it, so it may have worked. It amazed me that McCain didn't call him on it. But, to me, it came across as very condescending. At one point, in fact, Obama held up his hand to the moderator as if to say, "You don't talk when I'm talking." It seemed angry.

The Issues
On the issues, I thought it was a fairly even split. There were things I thought Obama could have capitalized on more, and the same goes for McCain. In particular, McCain blew a great opportunity to explain what exactly Obama wants to do on taxes. Obama says that 95 percent of people will get tax cuts. That misleads the public as to what actually would happen. A large number of people who do not currently pay taxes would just get free money under Obama's plan. McCain never pointed that out.

Obama, on the other hand, didn't do enough to link McCain to George W. Bush. Personally, I don't think McCain and Bush are all that similar. However, Obama's best strategy is to make it sound like they are one and the same. He did that a couple of times, but not enough.

Overall
On the whole, I think Obama held his own on the economy. I don't agree with his policies, but he seemed poised and prepared to talk about it. On national security, I think Obama was out of his league. And he should be. There aren't a lot of people out there with more credibility and experience on national security than Senator McCain. In my view, Obama's entire position on the Iraq war misses the point. In 2008, I don't care whether we went into Iraq for the right reasons or not. I care what we're going to do about it now. I want our next president to know how to handle the situation we are in, not spend a bunch of time asking how we got into the situation. Whether you agree with our invasion of Iraq or not, the truth is, we're already there. What do we do now? McCain's debate on this point was superior to Obama's in almost every aspect.

I call Round 1 a close victory for McCain. He could have done better but missed some opportunities to capitalize on what Obama said. Obama kept it close by talking more, getting more face time and being far better in front of a camera.