I'm more convinced than ever that a McCain presidency (Palin aside -- she's a complete nightmare) would take this country from Very Bad to Poof! before you could say "Damn, the shotgun went off just as you put your face in front of it."
My first reaction was that McCain had the edge, but I think that was driven by the absurdly low expectations he'd managed to set during the previous two weeks with his bizarre waffling on the economy and the "suspension" of his campaign (which turns out to look exactly like an "active" campaign: ads running, surrogates speaking, McCain sulking in his Washington office). That he spoke, on the whole, in rational, energetic, complete sentences, and had a ready grasp of a pretty wide range of dates, statistics, and names, frankly, surprised me. I half-expected a walking corpse.
Then comes the afterburn.
Idée fixe is not principle
In retrospect, McCain came across as didactic, Obama as guided by principles. (Not principles in the sense of good morals -- although that, too -- but in the sense of operating objectives and priorities.)
How does McCain decide what's best for the country? If "The Surge was good," how did he arrive at that conviction beforehand? Whether tactic or strategy, one gets very little idea of what McCain's operating principles are, other than "Must Not Lose."
Obama, on the other hand, did as well as any candidate in my living memory -- better even than Carter or Clinton -- at sketching a clear framework of (yes, progressive) values, expressing them as concrete principles, and connecting them to actual decisions that might pertain in today's world. This is especially admirable as the issues we face are complex, globally interrelated, dangerous, and intractable.
When it comes to climate change, global finance, the energy crisis, the health care mess, or the financial crisis, anyone who claims "I know what to do" -- especially if their "proof" is that they "did" something like it successfully before -- has to be highly suspect. McCain is a hodge-podge of idées fixes, while Obama demonstrated a clear, balanced, optimistic, and nuanced intellect, capable of grasping the problems, and imposing order on a range of solutions within a framework of operating principles.
My only concern with Obama is that as a consensus builder he may move too slowly on some of these most urgent issues (e.g., alternate energy).
The 'disabled veteran' trap?
McCain's famous passion came through most clearly near the end of the debate, when Obama mentioned veterans. I thought for a moment Obama had stepped in a trap. McCain came back, clenched jaw, voice quavering, black eyes flashing: "They know I'll take care of them." Subtext: I'm one of them. Sub-subtext: I'm a disabled veteran, I was a POW, don't you DARE invoke veteran issues TO ME, you whippersnapper.
It was a powerful moment, but afterwards I wondered: how does that play with other constituencies? It seems likely McCain as president would only apply his energy and care to those issues that he happens to feel personally strongly about. Where does that leave the legions of Americans that aren't particularly connected to McCain's personal passions: Women? Children? The poor? Minorities (non-whites, AKA the majority)? Students? The middle class? Where does that leave the environment? Immigrants? Gays? Wherever McCain lacks passion, a McCain administration would spell neglect.
'Maverick' defined
Ultimately, McCain's narrative betrays a shockingly narrow focus -- essentially: "I'm not a quitter, I hate to lose, I love my country, and I'll take on hand-picked underdog positions because they give me an opportunity to be scrappy and because I'm temperamentally unfit to either lead a majority position or merely to be a follower." That's what "maverick" means.
McCain can't live at the heart of majority consensus because it's boring, because he gets lost in the crowd, and because most of today's issues don't present clear win-loss conclusions. If your primary psychic driver is "victory" (or "avoiding defeat"), how do you engage on an issue that is likely to span years or decades, with only incremental, organic progress?
I'm more convinced than ever that a McCain presidency (Palin aside -- she's a complete nightmare) would take this country from Very Bad to Poof! before you could say "Damn, the shotgun went off just as you put your face in front of it."
We're just incredibly fortunate to have a candidate in Obama who presents a REAL alternative, not just a Hail Mary "get us out of this mess."
Edited to add headings