Your Morning Sift

Good Saturday morning.

The SoFla blogosphere was full of opinion about last night's debate so, as a result, it dominates this morning's Sift.

A- Debate impressions from around the SoFla blogosphere:

• Bark Bark Woof Woof:
  

The first debate is over, and while I don't think I need to reiterate every moment of it, I would say that it came out pretty much as I expected: fairly even. No one landed a knock-out, there was no "There you go again" (Reagan) or "Poland is free" (Ford) moment, and both survived to debate another day.

• Incertus:
  

Okay, so the pundits are saying that it was a tie, and that since this was supposed to be McCain's strong subject and he's behind in the polls, he didn't do well enough. I thought McCain fell flat on his face in small ways a number of times...

• Reidblog:
  

But by coming across as the bigger man -- literally and figuratively -- and by being both knowledgeable and congenial, (maybe he would win Miss Congeniality) Obama simply looked more presidential than John McCain, who for his part, looked tightly wound, surly, and even angry. McCain appeared to take Obama's criticisms personally, while Obama literally laughed McCain's off. And as the MSNBC team all pointed out tonight, McCain refused ... for the entire length of the debate ... to look at his opponent. McCain's physical, visible, obvious contempt for Barack Obama came through the screen like 3D.

• Eye on Miami:

John McCain wore the wrong tie. One should not wear stripes on TV. Everyone knows that. Stripes and patterns tend to create a moiré pattern on TV and that distracts the viewer.

Barack Obama had to walk a fine line. If he went on the attack he could appear to be an aggressive black guy and a lot of Americans are afraid of aggressive black guys. Many Democrats on the radio complained he was too polite. I think Obama's demeanor was on target. He came off smart and so did McCain as he rattled off a bunch of names of foreign leaders (he could have made them up as I really couldn't follow that many names in a row especially since I was so distracted by the tie). I would suppose he was trying to be anti-Bush (who couldn't pronounce anything).

• Superbee's Philosophy:
  

Listening to John McCain talk makes me want to do the Charleston...

to the rhythm of a telegraphic (or Marconigram) pulse.

And he makes me want to put my feet up by the pickle barrel and trade stories about early frosts having a detrimental effect on peaches that are shipped by the new Pennsylvania Railroad Cooling Cars.

That man is O.L.D.

And not like charmingly so.

• Burnettiquette:

Just finished watching the first presidential debate. I'm callin' it a draw, 'cause McCain didn't come off as too curmudgeonly...in my opinion, of course, and he held his own during money talk by hammering Obama on earmarks. On the flip side, Obama didn't let himself get bullied on foreign affairs issues and even parried McCain well when McCain criticized him as reckless for threatening to go into the Stans uninvited in pursuit of terror suspects.

• Babalu:

Gomez: The consensus seems to be that neither side scored a knockout or a knockdown. I tend to agree, they both did lousy.

Moneo: My opinion on tonight? Advantage: McCain.

I think he did really well. Some of his answers I had problems with, but that's no surprise since he wasn't my first choice -- hell, he wasn't my fourth choice! He held his own against an occasionally defensive and rather stiff Obama who had to play catch up.

B- For the voyeur in everyone, Eye on Miami has copies of a couple emails that Alberto Carvalho, the new superintendent of Miami-Dade Schools, had with a Herald reporter.

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