I think the person who is more electable is the one who can make some headway into the damage that has been done over the last 7.25 years. If we don't learn what their plans are on the issues, how will we know?

Everyone of us has misspoken, told a tall tale, hung out with someone or been associated with someone that is less than ethical or has questionable view points. Every single one of us. We all have our skeletons.

I don't see why they wasted SO much time on rehashing these things. Those questioned are asked and answered continually, I want to know what their plans are for the future, not whether a tacky lapel pin makes them a patriot or not.

...because they (the media) have an agenda to press and it doesn't involve reporting the facts surrounding (any) of the candidates.

As a side note, I'm OK with the "George Stupidopolous" thing!

"Do you think Reverend Wright loves this country as much as you do?" has got to be one of the most retarded questions asked at any debate.

"Oh well on a scale of one to ten I guess I would be a ten and I would call him about a-- hmmm... an eight?" How the hell did they expect him to answer that?

45 minutes before anything was asked in the debate that mattered. 45 minutes wasted on pins, preachers, and catering to the sensationalist media attention.

A guy on MSNBC made a good point last night I thought. They're going to spend all this time tearing down Obama, if he gets the nomination, McCain is f**ked, there's not going to be anything left. By the time McCain gets his teeth in him, everyone's going to be tired of hearing about the flag pin, Reverend Wright, and SECRET MUSLIM, and it's going to hurt McCain more to bring it up that it will Obama.

I agree with you here. I hoped that Obama would say something about the ridiculousness of the question, but more or less just tried to stay calm. I was satisfied with Hilary's response. She seemed to shove it off and not make much of an issue of it.

At least that is what I remember. I can't find the clip on youtube.

Believe it or not, their are many honest people in this world, and you should be demanding them as candidates and not trying to give justification to the dishonest ones.

The problem is that, seeing what happens to "anyone" who runs for office, the honest ones want nothing to do with politics.

I think the mods went too far with trying to prove that they are not enamored with the big O.

That being said, people have been losing their friggin' minds over this.

To me the debate on whether the questions on Wright, Ayers, his patriotism, etc were reasonable is a moot one because as dolly pointed out, they have been asked and answered. Let's move on.

Kinda reminds me of the old republican debates. They made sure to ask Ron Paul about all the same kind of irrelevant nonsense they asked Obama last time. He was asked if he thought he had an actual chance in nearly every debate, and they went out of their way to only give him questions that would make him look incompetent.

It is a shoddy way to organize a debate, and I hope someone gets fired over it.

So, yes, the first 45 minutes of the debate were asking opinions about what had happened during the race, things people said, things people have done.

So what? So, they pick on Obama a bit. SO WHAT?

Obama has gotten a free pass from the media up until that night, and it's about time everyone finally learns about all this stuff surrounding him. Because the media, in general, is in love with Obama, it's was time for people to really find out about him.

I'm not going to lie, I was so excited when I heard Charlie Gibson call Obama out on a lie. And it's not the first time Gibson's done it too.

Finally, Obama's getting a fair shake.