If I ever find Joe the Plumber...

...

Neither Brit Hume nor Juan Williams think McCain did a lot.

Well, he may not have needed to, in reality. I note that the Democrat spinners are all to a man ignoring Joe the Plumber, as well they might.

McCain was wise to bring this whole 'Joe the PLumber" thing up last night because the story is viral in nature, and will do a lot of his work for him. I mean, leave at the side of the road all the large number of questions about his relationships with Ayers, Wright, ACORN, and all the rest that now reside under his bus. Those are important, certainly, but in terms of voters personally identifying with a situation, none of these comes close to Joe the Plumber, and Obama comes out on the losing end of that one.
The reality is that all Joe the Plumber did, was ask a pertinent question of a liberal, a question that stripped away the liberal veneer, exposing the socialist underneath. That’s something the mainstream press has very rarely dared to do. That such a thing so rarely happens is exactly why Obama was caught off guard. That is particularly clear in the video.

Consider closely, please, the rapid rise in popularity of Joe the Plumber for asking serious questions of liberals versus the slow demise of the supposedly mainstream media for their long- term refusal to ask such questions.

I suggest that the very reason Obama was caught off guard by Joe was that he dared to enter an area the press would never go.

And in the end, isn't that what all the argument over this guy is about?

Obama revealed himself in that exchange with Joe to be quite flawed. He was caught off guard and flailed about until he hit on his touchstone: Socialist wealth redistribution. All McCain had to do to exploit that entire meme was raise the subject breifly, and much like water will eventually break up a dam with a crack in it, let nature take it's course.

And look, McCain is not a showstopping debater. Never has been, and that much was clear back in the 2000 cycle and frankly long before that. Thing is, though, we’re not electing a Harvard Debate team, we’re electing a leader. So, to win in terms of winning the election, what McCain had to do during the debate was to reveal the flaws in not only Obama’s policies, but in Obama himself. Not with anything explosive, but by sticking a prybar in the cracks so a little light can shine in over these next 20 days or so. McCain did that, largely by way of bringing Joe the Plumber out.

Sometimes, it's the small explosions that do the most damage, in the end.

In the end I agree with you that this isn't going to change anything, but has a debate ever changed anything.

Ummm. Let's see. Kennedy/Nixon. Reagan "I paid for this microphone".

And I don't care which side of the plate you hit from, redistribution of monies between those that have it and those that don't is goddamn frightening.

I confess I don't understand this "redistribution" argument. If you raise taxes on a small segment of the population in order to give a tax break to a much larger segment of the population, then, the argument goes, you're redistributed income. However, the argument has to be premised on the fact there is already some distribution of monies. If this is so, then, why can't one argue that the smaller segment is able to enjoy it tax rate because of the tax rate(s) of the larger segment? That is to say, why can't one argue that Joe Bigbux is able to keep more of his money because Jane Notsobigbux has to give up more of her's? And isn't that a distribution in the other direction?

I also agree that the idea of Obama with a more than likely veto proof or close to veto proof congress scares me

No one is projecting anything close to veto-proof majorities for either chamber. In any case, veto proof only matters when Congress and the President disagree. Presumably you are talking about a fillibuster proof Senate. Yeah, I wish Congress were likely to end up more conservative as well. But we blew that by electing George Bush. It will be interesting to see if Obama can keep the liberal wing in check or if he will blow Congress like Clinton did in 1994.

LOL me too. I didn't catch it in the last debate.

I also agree that the idea of Obama with a more than likely veto proof or close to veto proof congress scares me-and to some degree I almost wonder if congress members running for reelection wouldn't do well to point that out often.

They did think McCain’s “I’m not George Bush. If you wanted to run against him, you should have run four years ago” was a great line, though, and the most important moment of the night.

Perhaps they did, but I think, strategically and to the detriment of McCain, the most important moment of the night was when he belittled the "woman's health" proviso in abortion legislation.
I think Chris Matthews was right: that will come back to haunt him in these closing weeks.

It's readily apparent that if McCain had a perfect rescue plan on a given situation, his delivery of said plan would make it sound crappy. Opposite, Obama could be pushing a bucket of sh*t for every table...and i'll be damned if "bucket o' sh*t" frozen dinners wouldn't go through the roof.

We are in deep trouble no matter who wins though a President Obama with a Dem congress scares the hell out of me. I could handle some gridlock. And I don't care which side of the plate you hit from, redistribution of monies between those that have it and those that don't is goddamn frightening.

I think this has been the better debate of the three presidential ones.

I actually think on substance McCain did better-although I agree with Kristol that McCain would sort of go on the attack, but not actually make a killing blow.

Obama's smirks and giggles bothered me more than any face McCain made, but he definitely won on style. and when it comes to debates I think most of the voting public likes style over substance.