OK, I’ve just watched the vice presidential debates… seems a bloggable moment.
Bottom-line reaction? John Edwards missed his opportunity. He hewed too closely to the party line, with “John Kerry and I have a plan…” this and that, falling back on repeating practiced position statements instead of addressing the questions dynamically. It was Cheney’s debate to lose, and I’m afraid he didn’t do it. He pulled off the gravitas well enough.
I did appreciate both candidates’ willingness to violate the rigid strictures agreed upon prior to the debate — it made for a much more engaging personal interaction between the two — but it was, I’m afraid, rather limp otherwise. Gwen Ifill did well to pose some timely questions, ripped from the headlines as it were, but didn’t follow up on some that I thought would be enlightening — and perhaps a bit squirm-inducing — such as asking Edwards to elaborate on his and Kerry’s shared position that “marriage is between a man and a woman.” Why?
As it happened, her question about gay marriage seemed more designed to simply surface Cheney’s difference with Bush before a national audience, which it did. Cheney declined to use his follow-up time, and Ifill didn’t push the issue with a second question to either candidate, so it all fell rather flat. Bottom line is that Cheney won’t elaborate on his philosophical differences with the president and the GOP, and Kerry-Edwards are playing it safe by not going out on a limb and insisting on equal rights for all (though Edwards did a bit of soft-shoeing a bit about partnership benefits).
Wow. Not that anyone should be surprised, but the spin is in, both Democrat and Republican, though the latter don’t have the kindness to provide permalinks. 
