Will the debate be posted anywhere?  I'd like to watch it.

George Allen is obviously the more polished politician.  While that might not be a good thing, it was helpful to Allen tonight.  I thought Webb's arguments were stronger, but I also know a lot about the issues.  Too often Webb's answers were longer than the single quip that would have won the argument and made the highlight reel.

On the other side Allen did that, by taking the questions and molding his answers around his talking points.  For example, Webb badly lost on his question to Allen about tuition tax credits.  Allen molded his answer to talk about how tax cuts helped Virginians and Webb had no easy to understand response.

I think this debate was a missed opportunity.  Oh well.  

We'll have a full round up of the blodosphere's and the traditional media's takes later at DebateScoop, but our live analysis saw many a missed opportunity for Webb. he was damn near pitiful on Hastert/Foley, for instance, and never countered the repugnant notion that habeus corpus petitions were "firvolous lawsuits."

But that may not matter. This was a "must win" for Allen. For Webb, the goal was to establish that he knew about more issues than Iraq.

Allen did not hit a home run, and Webb was well versed.

As for the obscure islands, that mirrored a "gotcha" Allen sprung on Webb about an obscure place in Virginia in the first debate.

Problem for Allen is that he said he thought China was a big threat and that Allen is on the Senate Foreign Relation Committee -- the islands question exposes Allen's shallow knowledge.

The Webb campaign had briefs ready for the press on the Shikokus.

The best debate performance I have seen (and I have seen many) this season.

Check out my comments in our liveblog thread at DebateScoop (I am Ross Smith).

The Allen-Webb race, like so many others, will hinge on turnout. Evangelicals and other cultural conservatives will be energized by a traditional-marriage amendment to the state constitution on the VA ballot. The macaca/n-word and women-can't-fight issues have pretty much run their course, unless some new bombshell lands; but the perception of Allen as a bully remains widespread. At this point, I think the swing voters will be military and military retiree families, especially those in Hampton Roads (Norfolk, VA Beach, Hampton, Newport News, etc.); Webb must make the sale with these folks to have a chance of winning.

I watched both the Virginia and Montana debates (and i'll sheepishly admit that i followed that up by watching the Iowa CD-1 debate and the first half hour of the PA-10 debate) and I had a few reactions.

1. Allen is the more polished politician and what he lacks in substance he makes up for by answering the majority of questions in better political language.

2. Webb, however, is good for 2-3 really good moments where he speaks forcefully and eloquently about a particular issue.  I found that the case in both this debate and the meet the press debate.

3.  The Shikoku islands thing was smart but it could have been so much better.  Webb, as he has failed to do a number of times, did not hammer Allen about it.  He just through it out there, Allen was struggling with it, clearly didn't know what he was talking about it, but webb didn't follow through and make the sale that his knowledge and Allen's lack of it was an important part of this race.

4.  Conrad Burns is an idiot.

5.  Jon Tester struggled a little but was generally solid and his closing argument was the best thing said by any candidate in that debate or in the Virginia one.  It was succinct, well put, clearly stated, and done using persuasive reasoning.

6.  We should never let third parties debate ever unless they are polling really high like Perot or someone.  The Allen-Webb debate actually got to differences between the candidates.  The Montana debate included a libertarian candidate who, while attacking burns and bush, distracted from tester's message which was more finely attuned than Burns' and would have been disseminated better had the libertarian not been there.  More importantly, the libertarian was a disgrace.  My head was spinning between his arguments for solving the budget crisis by eliminating the departments of education, agriculture, and every other executive department, his claim that scientists had proven global warming was a natural process that should be left alone because its a good thing, and his concluding argument which put forth the theory that Bush was meeting with leaders of Canada and Mexico to bring about a communist pan-american nation with a common currency called the "americo" and a constitution similar to the soviet unions.  None of that was an exagerration.  He really said all of that.  My god.  It was a circus.

Webb "threw" it out there not "through" i'm an idiot.

I noticed that in the linked AP article on Yahoo, Associated Press Writer Bob Lewis stated that macaca is "an obscure racial slur". I thought it was a made-up word? Kudos to the blogs for rewriting the CW on that one.

At the moment, the top item on the CBS News Politics section. See:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/0 9/politics/main2074079.shtml

The Shenkaku Island question was indeed hilarious, and indeed payback for a similar stunt by Allen in the first debate, as noted above.

Here's a rap-up of the debate from the WaPo:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con tent/article/2006/10/09/AR2006100901332. html

I saw the closing remarks, and the most unnerving aspect for me was how much Allen had that same kind of cocky smirk as Bush, while Webb looked and sounded very serious.  

Tester was phenomenal, particularly in his closing comment. His opening statement was surprisingly a bit choppy but he more than recovered.

Webb left points out there. His candidate-to-candidate questions were ridiculously weak. On the minimum wage question he should have framed it differently to put Allen on the defensive regarding a standalone hike in the minimum wage. Instead, he allowed Allen to ramble through talking points that made it appear he and the GOP congress were giddy to raise the minimum wage and had oft voted to do so.

Dina Titus debated Jim Gibbons tonight in the Nevada gov race. Easily the most lopsided debate audience I've ever seen. They chanted, "Dina, Dina..." before and after the debate along with a standing ovation when Dina was announced. Of course, the debate was held at Bally's, within a couple miles of UNLV, where Titus is a professor.

Gibbons is a farce, blandly wobbling through generalities with awkward pauses while looking at his notes throughout. Tonight his theme was California sucks, and in Nevada we don't want to be like California. I'm dead serious. How that was a factor in a Nevada gov debate I have no idea. Dina dominated the debate but I couldn't believe she never slipped in the dagger that California is governed by a Republican, or asked Gibbons if he was endorsing Phil Angelides.

Should be a minor bump for Titus coming out of this debate but she needs to dramatically improve her TV game. Republicans may botch all the issues but they understand the airwaves. I see nothing but Gibbons and Jon Porter (NV-3) ads every weekend while watching the televised sporting events.

Jonathan Singer: "Webb got up and delivered a stinging blog to Allen"

Ah, but which blog? :D

I'm guessing it was Digby's Hullabaloo.  Digby can be pretty stinging, most of the time.

You are mistaken to think that debates swing on the substance of what Webb or any other candidates present in a debate. Most voters are nitwits who cannot comprehend the issues, and unfortunately, style, candidate's blunders (eg, reaction to Jewish family question), and confidently spoken talking points get votes. For example, the Washington Post describes that Allen was smooth in presentation and looked at the camera, while Webb looked down at notes.

I saw the last half of the debate (I recorded the VA and MT debates and will watch all of it some time this week), and I'm not sure Webb seized the oppurtunity to convince voters that he'sready fro primetime.  He doesn't speak that smoothly, and it also seems clear that he's a foreign policy/military affairs specialist who is not quite up to speed on other issues.

Yes, Allen responded with mostly shallow talking points, but he looks like he knows what he's talking about most of the time.  

I couldn't believe Webb took a pass on his time at one point, and he actually let Allen beat him decisively on the Foley issue.  

I sense Virginians are giving Webb a shot at convincing them that he's credible enough to replace Allen, and I don't think he seized the moment last night.