6:09 McCain is very nervous. Obama supporter Tom Brokaw just fired a question at McCain which Brokaw knew would favor Obama: Brokaw knew McCain's answer to his question "who should be Treasury Secretary" would be an Obama supporter, i.e. Warren Buffet. Pathetic.
Brokaw should take himself off the stage and out of this debate. He's the third left leaning Democrat moderator we've had in a row. A disgrace.
6:14 McCain goes after Obama and the Democrats on Fannie and Freddie.
6:15 Obama LIES and B*LLSH*TS about the causes of the financial crisis. How disgusting.
6:16 Uncommitted voters -- always among the least informed of all voters -- are being metered on CNN, and these voters are eating up Obama's b*llsh*t explanation of the "causes" of the financial crisis.
6:19 The uncommitted voters asking the questions at this forum themselves don't seem at all well informed. Representative of undecideds, but not a good source of factually accurate and substantively informed questions But low brow questions may be exactly at the right level for voters still making up their minds.
6:28 The "uncommitted" women metered at CNN seem to love Obama no matter what he says. Hmmm.
6:29 McCain is not scoring against Obama. The election is a referendum on Obama, and McCain has lost his focus on this fact. Palin keeps on message on this point. McCain has no discipline, and few instinctive political gifts, and he fails to keep on message.
Too busy to blog. I'll post more comments on the debate later.
UPDATE: In her own live blogging, Michelle Malkin nails a lot of what I would have said about this debate.
UPDATE II: I'm with Andy McCarthy:
We have a disaster here -- which is what you should expect when you delegate a non-conservative to make the conservative (nay, the American) case. We can parse it eight ways to Sunday, but I think the commentary is missing the big picture.
Here's what Obama needed to do tonight: Convince the country that he was an utterly safe, conventional, centrist politician who may have leftward leanings but will do the right thing when the crunch comes.
Now, as the night went along, did you get the impression that Obama comes from the radical Left? Did you sense that he funded Leftist causes to the tune of tens of millions of dollars? Would you have guessed that he's pals with a guy who brags about bombing the Pentagon? Would you have guessed that he helped underwrite raging anti-Semites? Would you come away thinking, "Gee, he's proposing to transfer nearly a trillion dollars of wealth to third-world dictators through the UN"?
Nope. McCain didn't want to go there. So Obama comes off as just your average Center-Left politician. Gonna raise your taxes a little, gonna negotiate reasonably with America's enemies; gonna rely on our very talented federal courts to fight terrorists and solve most of America's problems; gonna legalize millions of hard-working illegal immigrants.
McCain? He comes off as Center-Right .. or maybe Center-Left ... but, either way, deeply respectful of Obama despite their policy quibbles.
Great. Memo to McCain Campaign: Someone is either a terrorist sympathizer or he isn't; someone is either disqualified as a terrorist sympathizer or he's qualified for public office. You helped portray Obama as a clealy qualified presidential candidate who would fight terrorists.
If that's what the public thinks, good luck trying to win this thing.
With due respect, I think tonight was a disaster for our side. I'm dumbfounded that no one else seems to think so. Obama did everything he needed to do, McCain did nothing he needed to do. What am I missing?
UPDATE III: Undecided voters polled by CBS News pick Obama as the winner of tonights debate, especially on the economy.