My take on the debate last night

(This started as a comment in the open thread but soon spun out of control and demanded its own diary.)

The first Democratic debate was held last night in South Carolina at South Carolina State with all the candidates you'd expect.  Brian Williamson of MSNBC moderated.

The post-debate analysis by Tweety and Keith Olberman was at odds with what I saw there on stage.  Maybe it's just me, but I'm curious to see how others  saw it.

Here are my impressions of how the candidates did last night.  It does not necessarily reflect my own leanings (which, before the debate were pretty much divided between Edwards, Obama, and Richardson).

Best performances: Surprisingly, Dodd and Biden. They looked great, sounded strong, and gave pretty good answers to every question asked.  Biden had the line of the night "Yes" and Dodd stumbled a little on the gay marriage question but was otherwise strong.

Edwards and Obama did OK, neither did amazingly.  Edwards waited a beat too long on the moral leader question, and sounded a little too polished at times, but made excellent points.  Obama was uneven, sometimes doing well, sometimes stumbling.  His nervous energy at participating in a big national debate like this was showing.  His best answers were better than Edwards' best answers but not all his answers were good.  They'll both do better in future forums.

Clinton was the most uneven I thought.  She eliminated the gender issue entirely, I thought, which was great. However, she was the most weaselly of the bunch, IMHO, often avoiding the question asked to answer a slightly different one (which is a skill politicians have to have, but I'd have liked to hear some of the answers to the actual questions).  She comes off as a strong potential president but also as a professional politico, which is not a good thing.

Kucinich gave a great performance.  He seemed to be much more credible than I usually give him credit for and than his history would indicate.  He looked weak only in the after-interview where he held hands with his fabulously beautiful but VERY young looking wife, and sat in a chair that made his legs dangle.  Not a good look, and he knew it, which came out in his post-interview as nervous energy.  Not his fault, but he has to be seen as strong and able to stand on his own to have any chance.

Richardson was not good.  His substance was solid. I don't agree with him on everything, but he has good reasons for his positions. Unfortunately, he can't articulate them in the time given, and his answer on supporting Gonzo because he was Latino was really really weak, when it was an opportunity for him to knock one out of the park..

Gravel was a complete mixed bag.  He was the most dynamic of the bunch, and made the best (i.e. most liberal) points.  Unfortunately, he was the only one playing the "you suck" game and came off as a bit of a nutter at times.  I hope his poll numbers go up, so he can force the candidates to stop being quite so polite as these monthly confabs continue.

Brian Williamson was fair to middling. I'm glad they asked the questions about the candidates alleged weaknesses, and I thought it was shameful that no one put their hand up to support Kucinich's bill to impeach Cheney. Some of the other questions were really lame.  I guess that's about what we can expect at best from the media these days.

I thought the weakest performance by everyone asked was on the hedge fund question.  My answer, if I were asked and didn't think they were the worst thing on earth, would have been that hedge funds allow companies and individuals to mitigate risk which allows them to take greater chances with the rest of their money on positive, progressive projects that improve the country and help people.

As for the winner/loser calculus - I personally don't think anybody won since there wasn't much confrontation (with the exception of Gravel).  You?