Vice presidential debate does little to transform race
12:40 p.m. Friday, October 3, 2008
The civil tone of Thursday night's vice presidential debate in St. Louis was set early on with John McCain's running mate Sarah Palin asking opponent Joe Biden if she could call him Joe.
Still, neither Palin nor Barack Obama's running mate backed down during their 90-minute exchange.
"The governor did not answer the question on deregulation," Biden said.
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"I may not answer the questions the way that either the moderator or you want to hear, but I'm going to talk directly to the American people," Palin said.
And that was Palin's strategy: Talk straight to voters watching at home.
"Go to a kid's soccer game on Saturday. Turn to any parent there on the sideline and ask them, 'how are you feeling about the economy?' I bet you're going to hear some fear in that parent's voice," Palin said. "Biden's strategy? Tie John McCain to the unpopular presidency of George W. Bush."
"It was two Mondays ago John McCain said that the fundamentals of the economy were strong. That doesn't make John McCain a bad guy, but it does point out he's out-of-touch," Biden said.
For a debate that some expected to be a train-wreck, it was substantive and, at times, personal.
Palin has a son serving in Iraq. Biden's son will soon leave for the war.
"John McCain has been dead wrong on the fundamental issues relating to the conduct of war," Biden said.
"Your plan is a white flag of surrender in Iraq," Palin said.
The long-time senator from Delaware and the folksy governor of Alaska also clashed over energy and the cause of global warming.
"There is something to be said also for man's activities, but also for the cyclical temperature changes on our planet," Palin said.
"If you don't understand what the cause is, it's virtually impossible to come up with a solution," Biden said.
The feeling of many political observers is that the debate was not a game-changer.
That may be a problem for the McCain campaign, which announced it is pulling staff and advertising out of Michigan, conceding a state where polls show Obama leading comfortably.
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