McCain Pummels Obama 7-1

After telephoning most of the night to rally fellow Republicans over the financial bail out, attending morning meetings to attempt to shore up differences in the plan, and boarding a plane to Oxford, Mississippi, John McCain still found enough energy to demonstrably dominate tonight's debate with Senator Barack Obama. If Senator McCain's age had ever been a negative factor, his tirelessness over today's rigors effectively display his possession of the stamina required to execute the duties from the oval office. PBS's Jim Lehrer magnificently moderated tonight's event maintaining equal time in the spotlight for both candidates and refocusing and redirecting questions when answers wandered off track.

The debate began amicably as the first round topic focused on the current financial crisis. Senator Obama eloquently orated his stand on the crisis and sounded quite believable even though he rarely addressed specific issues. When the questioning turned to "What will you give up to pay for the financial bail out plan?", Obama's vagaries became more apparent. Senator McCain focused on cutting out wasteful spending in most government agencies and completely eliminating earmark spending. He forayed into Obama's record of requesting over $900 million in "pork barrel spending" during his first three years in office and immediately put the junior senator on the defensive. Mr. Obama became more irritated and agitated as the night progressed.

As the line of questioning turned more directly to the topic of foreign policy, McCain's attacks increased and he repeatedly pointed out the naivety of Senator Obama while bolstering his own level of expertise. Senator Obama stated many times during the evening, "I agree with Senator McCain" while McCain repeatedly claimed "Senator Obama does not understand". Senator McCain drew from many years of foreign relations experience to point out areas where Senator Obama used faulty reasoning or logic to arrive at conclusions on topics such as how he would handle Iraq, Russia and Iran, or whether there could be another 9-11. McCain only dropped his guard once when he slightly squirmed during Obama's statements on negotiations with Iran but Mr. Obama spent the last hour of the debate noticably agitated.

During 8 rounds of specific topics, John McCain clearly won seven. I'm quite surprised that after the last two days in Washington, that he even had the energy to attend. I guess the years of boxing during college paid off, Senator McCain, you sure know how to spar!