The Breck Girl v The Penguin

To hear the pundits last night, you'd think that Dick GoF*&kYourself Cheney was the best thing since boxed Macaroni & Cheese!

Were these pundits watching the same debate as America and the rest of the planet?

A couple of Snidely Whiplash remarks does not a statesman make, pundits. Even those freakishly Undecideds, the ones hooked up to those reaction meters, delivered a resounding Munch Scream to the lying, sneering president VP!

Support for Kerry-Edwards shot off the top of the chart when Edwards promised to fight offshoring, close the tax loopholes enjoyed by big corporations, create good paying jobs, make health care affordable, give the troops real support (body armor and veterans' benefits), and fully fund education.

Conversely, Cheney-Nixon-Bush dropped into negative meter territory every time The Dick sought to frighten voters into his ballot column.

Fortunately for posterity, the results of instant reaction online polls and the analyses of major newspapers across the nation reflect reality: America still cheers for George Bailey and jeers at Old Man Potter!

WaPo: Cheney vs. Edwards

If this debate mattered in part because Mr. Cheney has been such an integral part of the Bush team, it was also important as a proving ground for his relatively inexperienced opponent. Mr. Edwards has served not quite one term in the Senate, and he has spent much of that time running for higher office. Mr. Cheney was as cutting as a school principal lecturing a delinquent student on the subject of Mr. Edwards's Senate "attendance record." But if the question was whether he has the grounding to assume the presidency if need be, Mr. Edwards delivered a solid performance on both foreign and domestic policy last night. He sought to turn the experience question around by saying, "Mr. Vice President, I don't think the country can take four more years of this kind of experience." LINK

NYT: The Running Mates Debate

Mr. Edwards is normally known for his wide grin and boyish appearance, but he was serious and tough last night. If his main task was to show that he could stand up to the older and more experienced vice president, he did everything he needed to do, especially during the discussion of foreign policy - the area that is supposed to be his weak suit. Mr. Edwards was particularly on point when Mr. Cheney attacked John Kerry as a lawmaker who had consistently voted against military expenditures. Much of the arms spending Mr. Kerry voted against, Mr. Edwards noted, was for the same programs Mr. Cheney had fought to cut when he was secretary of defense. LINK

LATimes: Edwards Woos Another Jury

The Edwards victory was more lopsided when the debate turned to domestic policy. The Bush administration, Edwards noted, is the first since Herbert Hoover's to preside over a net loss of jobs. Beyond an irrelevant paean to education, the vice president had no response. He seemed similarly at a loss when Edwards proceeded, with Clintonian specificity, to eviscerate President Bush's record on other domestic fronts. LINK

Business Week: The Veep Debate: We Won

Going into the debate, Democrats feared that Edwards would suffer from a stature gap, looking young and callow, an immature pretty boy next to the stolid political veteran. No worry there. Edwards, like Kerry five days earlier, looked ready to step into the White House Situation Room. Oddly, the only stature gap that popped up on the shores of Lake Erie was the gap between Cheney's steady performance and the occasionally halting job turned in by President Bush at the University of Miami on Sept. 30. LINK

CBS: And The Winner Is... Edwards

John Edwards continued the Democratic ticket’s winning streak in Tuesday night's vice presidential debate. He was judged the winner by uncommitted voters who watched the debate, just as John Kerry was last week.

Forty-one percent of these uncommitted debate watchers said Edwards won the encounter, while 28 percent chose Vice President Dick Cheney. Another 31 percent thought it was a tie.

--snip--

The North Carolina Senator is better liked than the vice president, with 82 percent of the men and 72 percent of the women saying they would like Edwards personally. Half of both the men and the women said Cheney was likeable. LINK

It's a good thing that James Baker hammered out 32 pages of specific debate rules. Otherwise, John Edwards might have brought the one prop that can bring down the shadow pResident faster than Kryptonite zapping Superman ...