90 Minutes After the Debate (47½ Hours Until Tina Fey)

(This post was begun at 11:59 Eastern Daylight Time, and completed at 12:32 EDT. The time of upload is listed below)

Well, it certainly wasn’t a game-changer. By next week, tonight’s vice-presidential debate will be in the past and probably won’t be talked about in this 24-hour news cycle. Neither Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) nor Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) were able to meet the burden of true victory-that not only had they brought their own selves to a higher level, showing that they could be the vice president, but also that their running mates could be president, and that their opponents could not-both were able to meet the burden of guaranteeing that neither would truly lose-in other words, no one was a flop. Here’s the opinion from the Big 3, the Cable 3, along with PBS’ The News Hour(of which moderator Gwen Ifill-who, as usual, did a wonderful job-is a senior correspondent) and Mark Halperin of TIME magazine:

ABC: Both did well
NBC: An even debate, Palin gained title of “better surrogate”, but no effect would come of debate in the long run
(CBS I’ll talk about later)
CNN: Palin did a good job of refuting the CBS interview; Biden “had the best debate performance of his life,” and won the debate overall.
MSNBC: Fairly neutral
Fox News: Neck-and-neck; Palin led part of debate and “passed the test”
The News Hour: Previous interviews with Palin will “disappear”; Biden had solid performance; neutral debate.
M. Halperin’s The Page: Palin and Biden tied; B Grade for both.

Here’s some polling data to go with it:

CBS: Dial poll (tick-poll, as I call it) was Biden’s all night; many undecideds leaned to Biden; most important issue of night (and issue that got highest tick-poll results) was Iraq and Biden’s remarks on it. Poll showed 46-21 Biden victory, with one-third of those polled deeming it a tie.

CNN: Tick-poll focus group had 1 or 2 each solidified for McCain and Obama from tonight’s debate; ½ said they were leaning Obama...Poll results (all with margin of error of +/- 4 %) show that by a margin of 51-36, Biden did the best job; 64 percent saw Biden do better than expectations, 20% saying he met expectations, and 14% saying he was below expectations; 84 percent saw Palin as above expectations, 8% meeting expectations, 7% saying she was below expectations...of those who were “like you”, poll leaned Biden; in terms of “in touch”, 50-44 Biden; those who were a “typical politician”, 70-21 Biden; “bringing change”, 53-42 Biden. Of Palin’s qualifications, originally it was 54-42 saying she was unqualified, after the debate it is now 53-46 saying she is unqualified.

MSNBC: had only one poll, stating it was 46-21 Biden, with 3% deeming it a tie.

Here’s my take, on the debate as a whole:
>Too many times I was yelling at the TV at Governor Palin, telling her either to answer the question, show respect, or pronounce nuclear (that’s NEW-CLEE-AR, not NUKE-YOU-LAR) correctly; by the first half-hour, I had given “Intangibles” to Biden (more on that later).
>While Palin was more on the defensive about Sen. McCain’s record, Biden not only attacked Senator McCain directly, but linked him to policies of Bush and Cheney; the latter was, in my opinion, the prescient attack of the entire debate.
>There was a lot more dialogue compared to the last debate; Palin wanted to be warm and cozy with Biden, asking at the onset if she could call him “Joe,” but often came off as pretentious.
>Then two turning points of the debate were Biden’s slaughter of McCain on Iraq (this was not only my personal turning point, but also the point where tick polls reached near-capacity), and the closing statement, as he brought it all back home, not only in terms of linking, for one last time, McCain’s policies to Bush, but also bringing it home, as he did often tonight, to Scranton and Wilmington. Just before the closing statements, I said to myself, “Joe’s got to bring his back to Scranton, he’s got to bring it back to the train rides,” the latter meaning what he hears with the common worker on his nightly commute back to Delaware, and he did it; the second point was the true clincher.
>Tonight’s “Reagan-o-meter”, the amount of times a Republican candidate references Ronald Reagan, is 3: two name-drops, and a use of a Reagan quote. The last debate, it was 4, so perhaps Sen. McCain thinks higher of Reagan than Gov. Palin.

Here’s my take on the individual issues discussed tonight:

1) The Economy: I thought that Biden owned the discussion on the economy; by diversifying his claims about the economy, he was able to bring out the entire Obama plan, while Palin was stuck running around in circles on tax cuts.

2)Energy and Environment: I originally gave it to Biden whole-hog, but I’m going to ultimately call it a near tie, leaning Biden; Palin kept coming back to energy, and was pretty knowledgeable, but kept coming back all the time to drilling in Alaska, while Biden presented the whole field.

3)Social Issues: This one was a quickie, and it was a flat-footed tie; I really can’t find anything more to discuss other than the fact that they both agree on same-sex marriage and civil rights for same-sex couples; against the first, for the second.

4) Foreign Policy: This one was going to Biden the entire time, featuring the big turning point of the debate.

5) Closing statements: Biden made the best closing statement, bringing his message altogether, and tying it with his main story.

6)Intangibles: Biden looked more vice presidential (whatever that means), he was more dignified, and seemed to have more poise, while Palin seemed like someone picked off the street in terms of her preparedness and ability to stare Biden down.

In all, the victor was Biden, but not in a runaway fashion, nor a ‘game-changing’ result.

On Tuesday, October 7, at Belmont University in Nashville, TN, Senators McCain and Obama will return for the lone ‘town-hall’ debate, moderated by NBC’s Tom Brokaw; on Wednesday, October 15, the final presidential debate, with the emphasis on domestic policy, will take place at Hofstra University on Long Island, NY, moderated by CBS’ Bob Scheiffer. Both of these debates will take place at 9:00 PM ET, and will be on the Big 3, the Cable 3, PBS, C-SPAN, and many, many other networks along with radio broadcasts.

Stay tuned to Notepad for pre- and post-debate analysis and information for the remaining debates.