Tuned In

Debating the Final Debate

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As I write this post, CNN and CBS have just come out with their insta-polls, which gave the debate to Obama by what I believe was the biggest margin of any of the debates. I was surprised, and then I wasn’t.

CBS’s poll gave the debate to Obama by a two-to-one margin. I’m an Obama supporter, and even I didn’t think he was twice as good as McCain. I didn’t, actually, think he did as well against McCain as he did in the first two debates. I thought Obama was reasoned but a little flat, sometimes rambling. McCain was assertive and often controlled the discussion. If anything, I thought McCain might win the post-debate polls. (See here for our debate liveblog from last night, and thanks all of you who showed up and lurked or commented. I especially liked the candidates-as-Lost-characters comparisons.)

But I think this shows the faults of how we “score” debates in the media. We treat them like prizefights. He who lands the most blows, wins. (The most extreme case is CNN, which actually gives six panelists scorecards.) But that’s not what voters in general do, I think. They watch the debates, and—if they’re undecided to begin with—they look to see: which one of these guys is the President?

What it came down to last night: there was one President on stage. One guy who seemed calm and assured, and one guy who was reacting against that guy. If I liked Obama, I thought, Wow, who’s that guy who’s so pissed off at President Obama? And if I liked McCain, I thought, All right, that guy’s really sticking it to President Obama!

Look, I’m not a pundit. Almost three weeks until the election. I don’t know who’s going to win. But these debates have made me wonder whether the truth is this: that voters’ leanings influence the debate results, not the opposite. In this case, the dynamic was that a lot of voters were inclined to vote for the guy who represented the biggest change, and that guy was going to win the debate, regardless.

Maybe it was something else. Maybe it was the split-screen reaction shots. Maybe it was, you know, the actual policy and answers. So you tell me. What did you think of the debate? And what did you think of what everyone else thought of the debate?