After last night's second Presidential Debate, the pundits briefly touched on the substance before they launched into their new favorite subject: what John McCain was going for when he referred to Barack Obama as "that one" instead of by his name, or, at the very least, "him."

Some thought it was racial, some thought it was just a general sign of disrespect, and others thought it was a display of McCain's storied temper. Or all three! They hated it. The pundit discussion doesn't always mirror public opinion, and there's no telling how much the average voter watching at home cared about or even noticed "that one." They did, according to a CNN poll, think that Barack Obama was more intelligent, clearer in his views, less negative, more direct, and better suited to handle the economy and Iraq. He won that poll 54 to 30. He won the CBS, FOX, and MSNBC polls as well, but by different margins. With John McCain losing the coveted swing states and about 8 points behind in national polls, he needed to win this one big, obviously. The fact that he didn't means there's a lot more Ayer-ing of dirty laundry ahead.

Last night's debate in Texas was supposed to be a make-or-break thing for the candidates, namely Hillary Clinton, but according to the analysts, it did neither. They both had some shining and weak moments. Barack Obama came out looking stronger in the plagiarism argument after Clinton likened it to "Xeroxing" and drew boos from the crowd, which seemed to be pro-Clinton most of the time. Also, by suggesting that Hillary Clinton is accusing the millions of voters, not to mention newspaper editorial boards, who support Obama of being "delusional" every time she refers to his candidacy as lacking any substance and being strictly about words, he put her in a corner.

CONTINUED »

First of all, was Myrtle Beach serious with this Mount Rushmore/sand castle hybrid in honor of last night's presidential debate? I'm so mad at Obama's eyebrows. Actually, his entire face.

But back to the second-to-last debate of the primary season

Last night's Democratic debate in Philadelphia could have been called the "Why Hillary Clinton Should Never Be President Debate" with Barack Obama and John Edwards (but especially Edwards), realizing that it's now or never, coming down hard on the frontrunner whenever possible. Which, it seems, was almost every time they had the opportunity to speak.

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• Like the Game yesterday, Snoop got out of his weapons possession charges with a slap on the wrist. And Australia thought they were criminals! [E!]

• Republicans are pretty pissed at the candidates who won't go to Tavis Smiley's debate, too. [EUR]

• Five hundred people silently protested BET's portrayal of women outside network head Debra Lee's house recently. In response, she stood on her lawn and did the Beyonce booty bounce. [AP]

• Laura Bush is like, "Look! I have African American art! It's colorful!" [WP]

• George Bush claims that the GOP has a lot to show for itself re: blacks. I wonder if he's talking about his wife's painting. [BS]

*Ring, Ring*

Mitt Romney: Hello?

Tavis Smiley: Governor Romney! I'm glad I finally got you on the phone. You never seem to be around.

Mitt: Oh, Tavis. It's you. I, uh, didn't recognize the number.

Tavis: Oh yeah, I called from my assistant's phone this time.

Mitt: I see.

Tavis: So, you probably know why I'm calling. Everyone says that the GOP doesn't care about black people, and I figured you would jump at the opportunity to show us that's not true at a debate about black issues I'm moderating.

Mitt: Oh, uh..

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• Obama girl doesn't really impress Barack Obama…or his wife and daughters.

• He's very confident about his ability to bring out the black vote as the Democratic nominee. This confident:

"I'm probably the only candidate who having won the nomination can actually redraw the political map," Obama told a Democratic voter skeptical that he could defeat a Republican candidate.

"I guarantee you African-American turnout, if I'm the nominee, goes up 30 percent around the country, minimum," Obama said. "Young people's percentage of the vote goes up 25-30 percent. So we're in a position to put states in play that haven't been in play since LBJ."

• If he has anything to do with it, one day Cuban-Americans will be allowed to go to Cuba to visit their families.

• And he's really tired of debates. But it's only August of '07!

At last night's Logo/HRC presidential forum, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton tried to steer the focus away from gay marriage and toward civil unions, John Edwards flat out said he was against it, Bill Richardson put his foot in his mouth, and Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel, from their luxurious spot at the longshot table, said everyone should marry who they love.

Of course, Barack Obama was asked the annoying question about comparing the black struggle to the gay one, to which he responded, “I’m always very cautious about getting into comparisons of victimology.” As everyone should be!

Really, the battle for the title of world's most oppressed is old, it's unfair, and people on each side of the coin have their own, very unshakable opinions. Beyond the obvious and the general, the two "struggles" are like apples and oranges to me. And even if they weren't, what happens when someone is officially declared the winner of the "World's Most Oppressed" competition? What's the prize?

Nothing I would want.

[QT]

Last night was CNN's experimental YouTube debate, during which candidates sat through requests like, "say something nice about the candidate next to you," serious environmental queries posed by a sock puppet snowman, and the ubiquitous "do you represent your minority well enough" question (see above). I haven't gotten a chance to view the whole thing (Youtube has all the questions and answers here), but since Elisabeth Hasslebeck said on The View this morning that she thought Barack Obama "won", I will have to assume that Sen. Clinton must have done the best job.

The Democratic presidential debate at Howard University last night was blacker than the BET Awards, with the entire panel struggling to prove they are the best candidate for blacks and ending up spouting a lot of meaningless, but nice-sounding, things.
For example:

"You can look at this stage and see an African American, a Latino, a woman contesting for the presidency of the United States," Clinton said. "But there is so much left to be done, and for anyone to assert that race is not a problem in America is to deny the reality in front of our very eyes."

Obama, when it was his turn, said, "We have made enormous progress, but the progress that we have made is not good enough."

Snooze. My enthusiasm for debates, even ones geared solely toward black people, is waning. Call me when there are fewer candidates, and they don't all agree with everything their opponents say.

[WP]

Belatedly realizing their error in partnering with Fox News for a debate, twenty-six members of the Congressional Black Caucus sent letters to Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John Edwards requesting they rethink their decision to skip out on the debate.

Last month, under pressure from liberal activists, Obama, Clinton and Edwards, the front-runners in the Democratic presidential primary, announced that they would skip the debate scheduled for September because they consider Fox biased against Democrats.

Obama in particular has had a rocky relationship with Fox. His campaign froze out the conservative-leaning news network for a few weeks after it erroneously reported that Obama had received schooling at a radical madrassa — a Muslim school — during his youth in Indonesia.

Members of the Black Caucus say that by skipping the Fox debate, Obama and other candidates risk missing a chance to share their views on issues important to minority voters that are often given short shrift at other debates.
“Reconsider,” said CBC Institute Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), summing up the letter to Democratic presidential candidates. “Basically, it would be in your best interests to talk to the communities we represent.”

As is the way with most big political choices, the candidates are damned if they do and damned if they don't. Supporting Fox News by participating in the debate may anger the Democratic party, but, damn. It may look even worse to shun the CBC, even though most of them have already made that choice.

[TheHill]

Scratch what I said yesterday about debates. They are definitely no fun if everyone agrees with everyone else and the only interesting debaters are the ones without a chance in hell of winning. After the jump, I give you the best quote from Obama, of course, as well as the rest of the candidates. I watched so you didn't have to.

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Ah, can you smell it? The sweet perfume of a presidential debate is in the air. Those of you who aren't interested in our nation's (extremely drawn out) presidential election process (shame on you), please indulge me. I was in journalism school during the the first half of the last presidential election, and I will forever romanticize presidential debates and primary elections because they were part of my induction into the world of serious, hard journalism. Even though it was a world I would eventually shun for greener pastures (if you can call blogging that), I still find it all fascinating.

So you can imagine my excitement that tonight is the first serious debate of the election season! Unfortunately there are so many democratic candidates, eight in all, that they will probably have time to say very little during the 90 minute broadcast. Obama joked that he would barely have time to clear his throat. C'est la vie. It's only April of 2007. There will be plenty more where this came from. Watch it on MSNBC at 7pm.

[ABC]