Debate III

In VP debate and the second presidential debate, I found the domestic policy half distinctly less interesting. So, I unsurprisingly had a hard paying attention to every word of this debate. In the process of giving some live instant-messenger commentary on the debate, I got into a much more interesting debate of my own about immigration policy with some libertarian pals of mine back at MIT. Therefore, I've no business saying who won. I did pay sufficient attention to know that neither candidate won decisively, and that Bush was much more relaxed than in the past two debates.

Update: The consensus (among my favorite blogs) appears to be that Bush won. To me, neither side won decisively because there were many conflicting claims about policy details thrown about, and often neither guy's case was more convincing than the others based on his words alone. I agreed with Bush most of the time, but how would the sought-after undecided voter decide between the two candidates' claims if they weren't intimately familiar with the details? I'd presume such a decision would be based on who looks and sounds more trustworthy. I don't trust myself to say who that would be because I have such a strong preexisting opinion about the matter.

Another update: A slightly wider survey of online commentary reveals a lot of folks calling it a draw. Alas, the most influential commentators are those on television, and I don't watch them, so don't take my survey too seriously.