I think we all need to give Bob Schieffer a hearty round of applause.

[Occam Bandage]

This was by far the best moderating job we've seen this year. He asked good, sharp questions, let them talk, and did as well as any man could reasonably do in keeping John McCain in check. His handling of the tenor question forced McCain into an uncomfortable trap re: ACORN and Ayers, and McCain went from cool and on-message to angry and erratic for the rest of the debate.

After Lehrer's impotent "talk to each other" whining, Ifill's hands-off "give me some talking points and I will ask no followups" phoned-in job, and Brokaw's arrogant snippiness, it was looking like this was a disastrous year for debate moderation. I'm glad at least one journalist was able to step up to the plate this year.

[Ramius]

1. With that false equivilancy question, they're BOTH making viscious attacks? I don't think so

[Occam Bandage]

9. If he had said, "McCain, you're a douchebag," McCain could have protested the question

and complained about the media ignoring Obama's negativity instead of responding. By asking both candidates to account for their campaigns, he allowed Obama to play above-it-all and claim he's concerned about issues and not attacks, while making McCain's focus on Obama's campaign sound petty and strange. Moreover, the open-ended nature of the question forced McCain to bring up Ayers in an awkward, shoehorned-in manner. He played it right.

[Touchdown]

2. He gave McSame the last word on every question but one.

Sorry. Can't do that.:thumbsdown:

[WA98070]

16. That ticked me off too.

[patrice]

3. Agreed! 100%!

:applause: Bob Schieffer :applause:

[Amerigo Vespucci]

4. When it comes to Bob, I'm thinking less applause and more "bite me."

Sorry. I calls 'em the way that I sees 'em.

[beac]

14. And when he's done biting you, he can bite me too.

Only Obama's grace kept it from turning into an all-out disaster. BS lost control completely.

Questions were OK, but he did not "moderate" at all.

[Uzybone]

5. He had many flaws

but I agree he was by far the best of the 4 moderators.

[DB1]

6. Obama made him look better than he actually was.

[Desertrose]

7. He let McCain talk all over him & Obama

Maybe it was better than Brokaw & Ifill, but that didn't make him good. I felt he really deferred to McCain or at the very least didn't shut him down when he kept going on & on.

Pissed me off.

[Raschel]

11. I agree. I thought he stunk. He sure didn't "moderate"

[nam78_two]

8. I agree

I thought he was pretty good. I thought the other 3 mods were all really quite bad-relatively speaking ar least Shieffer did a way better job.

[msallied]

10. I have to agree.

With the exception of letting McCain end on nearly every question, he did a very good job of encouraging REAL DIALOG from the candidates and it allowed Barack Obama to really neutralize a lot of the shit that's been floating out there about him. In the same respect, it gave John McCain more rope from which to fashion himself that noose he'll be wearing on November 4th. At least Barack Obama got the final statement in, which I think was very important. By the end, McCain looked absolutely defeated.

[Drunken Irishman]

12. I disagree.

Often, Schieffer allowed McCain to end the discussion without giving Obama a chance for a follow up.

He wasn't terrible, but I felt he could have allowed Obama a chance to respond to some of McCain's charges, since he let McCain do it nearly every time.

[pansypoo53219]

13. indeed.

that one was the best. even if mcWATB was whining about democrats being mean.

[last_texas_dem]

15. I agree

I think Schieffer did a decent job of being a fair moderator. I think some were expecting him to go above and beyond and actually call out McCain for acting like an asshole or something. I think his trying to move things back to the planned topics *did* piss McCain off at least once; once, after McCain had gone into spiel of talking points, Schieffer seemed to pretty quickly try to push things back to the actual question and it sounded as if McCain let out an audible sigh (I'm not 100% sure b/c the camera wasn't on McCain when it happened, but I doubt it was Obama doing the sighing...)

[joop]

17. His questions were spot on

and tried to veer away from the same stuff we've heard a zillion times. For that, I give him props.

[IndyJones]

18. Agreed. He was the best for sure.

[Raine]

19. None from me, I thought he sucked and was the worst

of any of the moderators. Schieffer had no control over the debate, he lost it all to McSAME. Scheieffer continually cut Obama off, always deferred to McSAME and he also didn't ask hardly a thing of any substance. The whole first 15 minutes were about Joe the fucking Plumber! :mad:

edit: typo

[Blondiegrrl]

20. I agree. While he wasn't perfect, he was IMO the best of the three moderators.

I liked his choice of questions, and he generally did a good job of controlling the balance of exchange.

[Johnny2X2X]

21. Trust me

By letting McCain ramble on he wasn't doing him any favors.

The more McCain talked the more unintelligible he sounded. Obama knew this as well, he realized that McCain could say a couple sound bytes, but when he had to elaborate he would ramble on until you'd forgotten whatever valid point he might have made at the start.

A total tank job by McCain. He was awful and Obama just kept letting him be awful.