redblueamerica.com

Hi Jim:

Just to set the stage, I'll refer you back to the live blog we did the night of the Anderson Cooper debate:

I think there’s a real chance Anderson Coooper could get McCain to snap entirely tonight, by the way. Ben’s right: McCain is tired tonight. And Anderson is pulling a low-rent Russert routine. Just ask the darned questions, man, instead of trying to set up a gotcha moment.

Who wrote that? Oh yeah, me. I'm equal opportunity when it comes to bashing stupid questions from the media.

But to be a little clearer: This isn't -- for me, at least -- about the unfairness of putting candidates on the defensive: I'm all for it, even though it admittedly makes me squirm to watch Obama give poor performances during debates. I think I've already said, several times, that since these topics are issues for some voters, they are fair game.

However...

What the debates are about is this: Who will do a better job of being president? We're not electing a National Cool Older Brother: We're electing a head of government. There's a disconnect, I think, among Republicans and conservatives who have looked at Barack Obama and insisted very loudly that they don't want to elect a cult of personality figure -- and yet also insist very loudly that personality matters when the opponent has a few chinks in their armor. What's more, there's also a disconnect among Republicans who have (again) very loudly insisted that the public doesn't know enough about Obama's supposedly vague positions on the issues, yet praise the bypassing of such efforts to focus instead on the now-iconic lapel pins.

But this is politics, where people (left and right) have their cake and eat it every day.

Still, given that the debates are about (again) determining who would be the best head of government, it's ridiculous to spend not just a third of the debate, but the first third of the debate focusing on those lapel pins. The lapel pins are the priority, then.

The "are you better off" line put the candidates on the defensive, yes, but it was also about something. The question offered the candidates the opportunity to appraise the state of the economy, whether something should be done and what they'd try to do about it. It let people know what the potential next president would -- or wouldn't -- do about their lives.

"Do you think Jeremiah Wright loves this country as much as you do," meanwhile, doesn't even tell us anything about Obama's patriotism.

If the idea is to throw rocks at candidates and see how well they can dodge, well, then maybe this is your version of good debate moderation. If the idea is to figure out who we want leading us the next time Hurricane Katrina hits, well, it leaves a lot to be desired.

At the risk of sounding argumentative -- you know that's not my style, Joel, ;-) ...

What journalists tend to start their news with is what's new. And, sad to say, the stuff George and Charlie spent the first third of the debate with had been kicking around the blogosphere for weeks. But it was "new" to a MSM that never pressed Obama on it.

And, sorry. But when you make a big show about not wearing an American flag on your lapel, then it suddenly appears (right after you take heat for belittling the flag-loving rubes of small-town America), that's bound to get attention (from a PA voter, by the way). And when your campaign is based on "unity," yet you refuse to cut your ties to a poisonously divisive character like Wright or a terrorist like Ayers, you need to answer questions about it.

And the questions that got the left so mad were no less loaded than what was standard-issue in the Republican debates.

For the record, here was Anderson Cooper's first question at the Jan. 30 GOP debate at the Reagan Library.

Tonight, in terms of the economy, are Americans better off than they were eight years ago?

That's quite the loaded question that puts the candidates on the defensive right away.

Here's the second question from that debate by Janet Hook of the LA Times:

Governor Romney, you've spent the last several days warning voters that John McCain as president would follow, quote, "a liberal, Democratic course." But, by most measures, doesn't he have a pretty mainstream conservative record?

That question is not about the "issues," but about what you might call silly, thumb-sucking stuff like who's the most conservative Republican.

Next question, from Cooper:

Governor Huckabee, Rush Limbaugh says if you or Senator McCain were nominated, would be the nominee, you would "destroy the Republican Party."

Yeah. Lots of substance there, huh? The next question asked Romney, in light of his health care plan for Massachusetts, how he could still call himself an "authentic conservative." And who could forget the question from the Snowman on YouTube at one of the debates, or Chris Matthews' hard-left partisan and accusatory questioning in MSNBC's debates.

In light of all that, I just find it hilarious that lefties are ready to storm ABC with torches and pitchforks over a few relevant and long-ignored questions of Obama.

The Obama campaign was built on a simple, compelling idea: Change we can believe in. Obama has presented himself as an outsider (not an uncommon campaign tact), a post-partisan (in the mold of Schwarzenegger and Bloomberg) and, most important, a post-racial candidate.

But was the idea true? How much of the candidate is the man? Put another way, is Obama really change we can believe in.

Fact is, the vast majority of Americans know little about Obama. Although his books are bestsellers, only a fraction of the electorate has read them. But Obama's first book, Dreams of My Father, is a real eye-opener. Add Wright to the narrative, add Ayers to the narrative, add Michelle Obama to the narrative, and you begin to get a more three-dimensional picture of Barack Obama, beyond bromides and slogans about hope and change.

And that is important, Joel, because taking the measure of the man helps shed light on how he's likely to address the vital issues you raise.

Also, we've had a pretty extensive conversation about the issues in this election, and I expect we will hear lots more before November. Heck, I expect we'll hear more about those issues before the end of the week.