Interesting point on the facial expressions of John McCain during the debate. I've read many opinions and listened to the discussion at MSNBC on McCain's reasons for refusing to make eye contact with Obama but the most interesting one was at Talking Points with Josh Marshall.
More after the fold.
At Talking Points they have different readers give their opinions of the refusal to make eye contact during the debate last night and this one in particular struck me as just too darn funny to not pass along.
Talkingpointsmemo.com/
And here's another note from TPM Reader TB. I guess I'm really not sure quite how to characterize it ...
I think people really are missing the point about McCain's failure to look at Obama. McCain was afraid of Obama. It was really clear--look at how much McCain blinked in the first half hour. I study monkey behavior--low ranking monkeys don't look at high ranking monkeys. In a physical, instinctive sense, Obama owned McCain tonight and I think the instant polling reflects that.
So McCain may have given away his status as a low-ranking monkey. I'd never even considered monkey rank.
Late Monkey Science Update: In case anyone's wondering, I looked up TPM Reader TB's page at the University he teaches at. And no doubt about it, he appears to be a genuine monkey scientist, or to be more specific a researcher on social cognition and behavior in primates. I'd link to his page. But readers remain anonymous, save for their initials, until they tell us otherwise.
--Josh Marshall
Another reader opinion:
Here's one comment we got from TPM Reader EO ...
As a psychotherapist and someone who treats people with anger management problems, we typically try to educate people that anger is often an emotion that masks other emotions. I think it's significant that McCain didn't make much, if any, eye contact because it suggests one of two things to me; he doesn't want to make eye contact because he is prone to losing control of his emotions if he deals directly with the other person, or, his anger masks fear and the eye contact may increase or substantiate the fear.
I noticed him doing the same thing in the Republican primary debates. The perception observers are likely to have is that he is unwilling to acknowledge the opponent's legitimacy and/or is contemptuous of the opponent.
So my poll has to include some of the reasons that I have read this morning and I would love to hear the opinions of the KOS readers.