I’m sorry to say that I think McCain cleaned Obama’s clock in this debate. It’s not that Obama didn’t know what he was talking about or anything, but I think McCain typically got in the last word and Obama didn’t hit McCain where he needed to hit him.
I think Obama held his own or perhaps even won the economics part of the debate, but the national security debate was another matter, and let me go through it question by question:
Q: What are the lessons of Iraq?
McCain brought up the surge early and often, starting with this question, and Obama never really responded to McCain’s claim that Obama opposes what McCain and even Obama calls a successful strategy. There has to be some reason why Obama opposed it (well, I know what it is), but Obama never explained it, and as a result just got hit after hit from McCain on that topic.
I think in talking about the costs of the war, Obama scored points, but I think a lot of that stuff is so old by now that I’m uncertain how much it will matter. The only thing that I think might be impactful in regards to starting the Iraq War is McCain’s judgement in supporting it, which he did bring up with his line “McCain wants to pretend the war started in 2007.” However, Obama never responded on the surge, and he didn’t respond on McCain’s attack that he doesn’t know the difference between tactics and strategy.
I’m not sure how Obama could respond to that. McCain has a sort of inherent authority on military matters and you risk looking dumb if you try to claim that McCain doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but perhaps Obama should have implied that at least once.
Q: Do you think more troops should be sent to Afghanistan and how many?
I think the Afghan question may start turning to McCain now too. McCain’s answer to Afghanistan: do a surge (which Obama admits worked in Iraq) in Afghanistan. Obama can say that he supported sending in troops longer, but McCain I think scored points by saying that more troops isn’t enough, that there needs to be a change of strategy as well.
I think Obama might have scored some points in regards to Pakistan, but I’m not sure if it was enough to overcome McCain’s win on Afghanistan.
Q: How much of a threat is Iran?
I think this is where Obama really got routed. McCain pounded on Obama relentlessly for wanting to meet “unconditionally” with Iran, etc., and Obama’s answers just seemed to be backtracking. “Yes unconditionally, but not without preparation.” That just seemed to be parsing words to me. Also, McCain’s jab about “what are you going to say when Iran says they’re going to destroy Israel? No?” was a hit, mainly because Obama didn’t respond. He didn’t get a chance to in that sequence of discussions, but he could have it it first thing on the next question.
Q: How do we deal with Russia
I think this may be one of the few questions that went to Obama, but not because of Russia per se – I think they basically said the same thing in regards to Russia – but because of Obama bringing up that McCain voted against alternative energy so many times in the Senate. I also doubt how effective McCain’s attack on Obama for his “initial statement” on Georgia is going to be.
Q: What is the probability of another 9/11 attack.
I think McCain’s statement about the 9/11 commission was a powerful one…if true. McCain also talked about fighting torture, and instead of pointing out that McCain voted against banning torture, Obama actually praised McCain’s work on the topic.
I think Obama scored quite a few points by tying together Iraq, The War on Terror, and the economy, and by this point McCain’s railing about the surge probably wasn’t going to do any more than what it had already.
Scorecard
So out of five national security questions, I’d say Obama had a slight win in 2, while McCain had a slight win in 1 and a big win in 2. By the way, by my count, McCain got in the last word in all 5 questions.
