When One + One = None

Last night's Presidential debate between John McCain and Barack Obama was an eye of the beholder thing for the most part. Reading the blogs this morning one could see this quite readily, with the surprising (maybe I'm just masthead profiling) exception of Chris Cellizza's THE FIX in The Washington Post. The veteran political observer gave points to McCain for his self deprecating tactic of taking the age issue away from Obama and for his stage presence and command of the issues.

As pleasantly surprised as I was to see Senator McCain hold his own against the Ivy League debate team, I was equally surprised to see the "Great Orator" Senator Obama lose hope on at least one occasion when, lacking any substantive response to a McCain posed question, turned to Jim Lehrer and to the eye of this beholder plaintively asked the moderator to "...move on". Irony, thy name is Barack.

Considering that the debate was held in what is still America's most prejudiced and bigoted state, Mississippi, one point I haven't see made anywhere was the subtle playing of the race card by Senator Obama. 

Throughout the debate Senator McCain consistently referred to Senator Obama as Senator Obama, affording him the respect of the title of his office. Conversely, Senator Obama persistently refused to call Senator McCain anything other than John.

This little bit of practiced diminuition of Senator McCain means more than it seems. For those too young to know and for those with short memories, in pre-civil rights days, in courtrooms throughout Mississppi and the rest of the South, blacks were routinely addressed by their first name only. I am certain that this point was not lost on a large number people, black and white. 

On the brighter side, let's hope Americans were watching, listening, taking notes and forming their own opinions, instead of waiting for the post debate analysts to provide them with ready made Monday morning water cooler sound bites.

Right. And George Steinbrenner is this year's Nobel Peace Prize winner.