Thoughts on the final debate

I wanted to take a few minutes to offer some final thoughts on last night's debate.

I'm actually glad I took my time to think about it before I did this because it gave me time for some new perspective.

My first reaction to last night's debate was: Dang! McCain did kick some you-know-what! I thought he was on his game, pointed out the flaws in Obama's plans, and really put forth his best effort of the debates so far. I thought he won.

For Obama, I thought he sat back and just took it. I didn't think he did much to make himself look strong. When he had a chance to really blast Palin and explain Ayers and ACORN that he really didn't do as much as he could, ... especially when he had a chance to take down Palin.

I was surprised to see that so many of the experts and voters thought Obama had won. Last night I really didn't think so.

But now I've had 24 hours to think about it... and I don't feel the same way.

I think what happened was two different strategies ... that might work for both candidates and not change things at all.

McCain's strategy, as he said, was to go in and kick some rear. He took it to Obama. He was rough on him. He took every opportunity to make Obama look bad, point out his flaws, the flaws in his plans, and just generally came out tough. But he also showed himself to be confrontational, impatient (by constantly interrupting), and generally angry. I'm not sure those are attractive qualities someone wants to represent our country.

On the other hand, Obama had every opportunity and reason to go right back at him. Every time McCain fired an accusation at him, he could have fired back. When McCain attacked him and Biden, he could have attacked back. He had easy opportunities to do so. But he didn't. Why? To show that he's unflappable, and he was. He never took the bait. Instead, he let McCain keep throwing punches and took the blows. He didn't waste energy in punching back. He went on the defensive. And in doing so, he made McCain look like the attacker, the person who is focusing on things other than the issues, coming across as the person less than genuine.

I didn't see this last night. I didn't get it. But now I do. Obama came off as smart, knowledgeable, someone with a plan, and someone who will not be flummoxed by situatoins. I think it worked well and other people obviously saw it last night as exit polls showed that people thought Obama won the debate.

In any case, it doesn't matter to me. As long as Obama wins in 3 weeks, that's all I'm concerned about. And unless something extraordinary happens in that time, it looks like that's what is going to happen.