Upon Digestion

So, Maureen Dowd thinks that Obama had the ball hanging over the middle of the plate, a set hovering one-ball over the net, a flanker on a deep route with the safety stumbled on his ass, and he didn't capitalize.

I'll admit I was surprised a bit by her reaction. There was a flavor of buying the Right's talking points on Obama, as though they should dictate his responses more than his vision. And there was a thirst for baiting partisanism, thinking, I believe, that "we" had the upper hand.

None of that do I support. I think he played his game well, especially considering that this was supposed to be McCain's strong suit debate. That, at worst, Obama played McCain to a standstill should be a victory.

Except...

Did you notice McCain was speaking, at times, a different language? Maybe you read it as confusion or circular logic. But, no. He was speaking a patois AM radio listeners recognize. It is a cadence meant not to communicate in the moment, but to plant phrases in consciousness. Naivete. Fundamental. Experience. The language he speaks parses out differently than, y'know, human speech. It serves a different function, and I believed it served him well.

I'm guessing that is, subliminally, what Dowd was reacting to. She could feel that McCain was somehow scoring points, and wanted her man to do the same.

I still think Obama "won," for what it's worth.

But to really understand what we are up against, check out the comments in response to the proliferation of Palin's pageant video. Chilling, if you dig.