How to know who won the Obama-McCain debate

By
Amaury Cruz                                                                    Read Spanish Version

According
to my scorecard, Obama came out swinging but got caught off guard by
McCain’s feistiness. Obama allowed McCain to concentrate the debate
on topics that supposedly favor McCain: tax policy and earmarks.
McCain kept Obama on the defensive throughout the discussion on the
economy, but Obama parried the blows and did a rope-a-dope that made
him look more presidential in contrast with the aggressive,
mean-spirited and condescending attitude of his opponent.

McCain’s
grumpiness and stiffness, plus his typical discombobulated phrases,
did not make him endearing. Of course, in the eyes of the meanies out
there, I’m sure being mean and pugnacious, and not recognizing the
dignity of your opponent by never looking at him, counts toward being
“tough.” Everyone has to pretend to be tough and be dedicated to
winning, not a higher principle as they tell us. If you are a
politician and you do not pretend to be tough, you will be laughed
off the ballot by the meanies. Somehow, the meanies of the world
always manage to control the political discourse and reduce it to its
lowest common denominator.

At
the end, one of the questions of the night was, why the heck did
Obama keep agreeing with McCain or saying “he’s absolutely
right”?” To convey the impression that he, Obama, was more
reasonable than McCain by recognizing McCain’s correct assessments
in certain matters? Either that was the calculus or there was no
calculus. I don’t know which is worse. Whatever the reason, it was
a mistake to say it so often. Once it would have been all right. But
beyond that it didn’t make sense. Obama said it about ten times.
Maybe it reflected a kind of reflexive humility and compassion toward
the opponent that is in sharp contrast to McCain’s pronounced
dissing of Obama. But it’s a reflex that needs to be controlled in
a debate. Obama’s generosity has already been exploited in an
anti-Obama ad and jokes that maybe he should be McCain’s
vice-president.

Curiously,
in the segment on the economy, where McCain was supposed to be weak,
his passionate certitude and emphatic demeanor, always accompanied by
well-rehearsed and expressive gestures of his hands, eyebrows and
face, made him seem in charge and to know what he was talking about,
even when grammar, logic or coherence departed him. It matters not
how the words read on a transcript; the way he delivered them
projected conviction and touched upon a number of hot button issues.
As he has been doing in 26 years of politicking and debating, McCain
perhaps scored more points in a debate. Obama wasted several openings
where McCain was vulnerable for uttering glaring non-sequiturs, such
as wrapping himself in the mantle of “not Miss Congeniality” (yet
again!) instead of responding to the argument advanced by Obama that
$300 billion in tax cuts to wealthy corporations was a lot more
significant than $18 billion in earmarks.

Again
counter to expectations, in the segment on world affairs, Obama
proved himself extremely knowledgeable and in command of the
overarching, strategic purposes of American foreign policy. In fact,
Obama scored points when he accused McCain of not having that
strategic vision. If the typical viewers have any brains, they would
have concluded, as the voters did after the J.F.K-Nixon debate., that
even if Kennedy didn’t have as much experience as his opponent, he
had enough and, perhaps more important, more than enough
understanding and capacity for action. Obama lost an opportunity,
however, to neutralize the foil that he refuses to acknowledge the
surge has been a success. It was frustrating that he did not to cite
the Awakening Councils, the stand down of the Mahdi army, and putting
insurgents on the U.S. payroll as factors that contribute to lower
levels of violence, while the surge has failed to bring about its
ultimate purpose of political reconciliation.

McCain
came through as an angry curmudgeon just itching to go to war at the
drop of a hat. He also continued to stumble with terms or ideas, and
had trouble pronouncing words like “paternity” or “oversee”
(he made up the verb “to oversight”) and the name “Ahmadinejad.”
At the third attempt to pronounce the latter, he finally got it; it
was painful to watch. Here is the guy who is supposed to know more
than anyone else on the planet about foreign relations, and he can’t
pronounce the name of a foreign leader he reviles. Ouch! Fox made
mince meat of Hillary when she stumbled with “Medvedev.” Frogs
will grow hair before Fox does the same to McCain, however.

Obama
demonstrated the presidential demeanor that people supposedly wanted
to see. He was cool and collected, spoke more clearly than usual, and
did not take any of the baits McCain threw at him in the form of
repeatedly accusing Obama of “not understanding” one thing or
another or being “naive.” It was jarring to hear that accusation
and then listen to Obama embark on a learned narrative about foreign
affairs which demonstrated an understanding not just on a par, but
superior to McCain’s. But how many people, I asked myself, would
undertake any kind of analysis rather than react on the cues they
have been programmed to take from constant exposure to television and
other brainwashing? A couple of days later Fox finally figured to
diminish Obama’s smoothness as a debater’s trick, saying he had
merely book knowledge and had just memorized stuff. How would that
fly?

So
I wasn’t sure what the final score would be in the minds of the
voters until the polls began to demonstrate that the American people
are fed up with the kind of politics that we have suffered for the
past eight years and which McCain personified by his conduct in the
debate. Obama 40 to McCain 22, read one of the polls. But the
evidence that persuaded me Obama won was seeing Sean Hannity and Karl
Rove dissecting the debate and wondering what McCain should have said
here or done there, or how Obama had struck and McCain did not have
the proper response (which Hannity then would provide). Seeing these
folks worried and looking desperately for ways to spin their version
of events is conclusive proof that Obama won.

These
and other high priests of radical Republicanism have set forth to do
what priests have always done: try to preserve the status quo in
favor of the rich and powerful. Their devotion to ideology is what
has gotten the U.S. in its big messes at home and abroad. Obama
referred more than once to the perils of ideology — the extreme
right Republican ideology. This ideology is perhaps more bankrupt now
than any of the financial institutions that have gone under. Give
that round to Obama.

Soon
after this writing appears, another interesting debate will occur:
Biden v. Palin. Too bad our deadline will not allow me to comment on
that. It would have been fun, unless Palin/McCain managed to find a
way to slip out of it.

Amaury
Cruz is a Miami attorney.