What did all of you think, aside from speaking ability, which both candidates seemed to have in good supply.

While I hold Bush himself in some disdain, I have nothing but respect for Cheney, and I noticed that the entire time Edwards was speaking he was totally thinking 'I could break you.'

I also thought it a particularly human moment (in a good sense) when he went "Gwenn" to which she responded "Mr. Vice President?". Furthermore, his conserving his words, often declining to comment further, was an elegant contrast to the Democratic ticket's seeming long-windedness on their issues, about which they've apparently been criticized, but to which I attach little value. If they think their values require many words to express them fully, go for it.

Cheney didn't defend most of the most damning evidence against his administration. Not only that, but he didn't discuss any of the administration's plans to fix anything. While they both unfortunately spent most of their time attacking the other guy, Edwards did less of this bickering. He pointed out the largest flaws with the current administration, to which Cheney had no defense. He then went on to discuss some of their actual plans for dealing with the most important issues, which were right on the money.

Their system for keeping frivoulous lawsuits out of the courts is long overdue. Education: creating incentives to get good teachers where they need to be. He actually discussed the issues. Did anyone hear any plans of action from Cheney, 'cause I didn't.

Except that throwing money at schools is not going to fix the problems with the education system. That's one of biggest gripes I have with the left. They think spending more will fix things, which is not alwyas the case

I’d say the debate tonight was 50%/50%

Cheney was very aggressive in his responses, which made up for his lack of responses on many questions. Although at times he was plain rude and arrogant, it made him seem certain and assertive in his responses.

Edwards was more laid back, he just kind of smiled and took it all. He seemed to present slightly weaker then Cheney, but it seemed like it was because instead of using snide remarks and very aggressive responses, he just went with the flow, which worked well half the time and bad half the time.

Cheney played it smart by not commenting on gay marriage, but I think Edwards showed better leadership by mentioning it head on.

I'm glad the flip-flopping was taken care of as well. Both parties got smashed with flip-flopping tonight. The entire flip-flopping thing is bullcrap anyway. If you make a decision with information a year ago, then you get new information now, it's perfectly valid to change your opinion based on new information.

Although the debate could of taken place with boxing gloves, I think it was a really good debate. Edwards cornered in Cheney with health care (notice how much he REALLY wanted to talk about it. He brought it up every chance he could) and with Halliburton. Cheney cornered Edwards with his record and with his voting for/against things. While I think Edwards had better topics, Cheney definitely presented himself more assertive.

The first half I thought was pretty much Cheney’s, while the second half was Edwards. Even though in both halves both candidates had very good responses, it just seemed Edwards was stronger on American issues, while Cheney was stronger on international issues.

It's amazing how everyone hears something different from the candidates when listening to the debate. You'd think we all watched something different.

Incentives != tax money necessarily. Did you notice that Edwards mentioned the bloat the current administration has added to the federal givernment, to which Cheney had no response? The answer is to cut the beauracratic BS and get the money where it needs to be.

That's because most people have a bias and can't be objective

And why should we be objective? There's no reason. Our biases make us unique as individuals. If we were all objective, we would cease to have independent personalities and... hey, everything would work very efficiently... but then again, life would be a monotonous tedium that we wouldn't comment on anyway.

Trying to be objective will at least let you make a fair assessment of what happened in the debate. If you go in with your switch on full to the right or left, you are going to completely disregard what the other side is saying or misconstrue what is said. Also, make you look smarter is you can deconstruct the other side intelligently

Yeah, but taking away money will fix it!
Seriously though, every public school teacher I talked to hates NCLB.

Yeah, that's a good point. My sticking point with the act is its philosophical basis, not political or monetary. There's simply nothing good about teaching a child how to pass a test. You have to teach a child to learn.

Dirt. Lots of it. :p

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lolololololol111111!!!!!!!!!!@@@@@@@~~~oneoneonepieoneone3.14

Teachers can only do so much. That sort of thing has to be reinforced on the home front, at the family level for wide spread success to happen. The government isn't going to be albe to the that, no matter who the president is.

I have to agree with Avenger. While the school systems do need a lot of help(trust me, I'm from Indiana) the students are just slipping through the cracks, not learning anything. Parents need to get off their lazy arses and do their jobs.

I didn't get to watch it because I was at work, but the headline on the newspaper this morning was "VP candidates rip eachother's throats out in political deathmatch... err debate" :p

Edwards started off strong for the first 2-3 questions, but after that, Cheney started slamming him and rarely let up throughout the rest of the debate. As an Independent, I can admit that both sides made some interesting points, and that both sides are also wrong on a great deal of issues. I find it humorous to watch Republicans and Democrats struggling to justify their guy's mistakes, while pretending that their guy did everything right. Edwards did much better than I imagined, while Cheney did exactly how I thought he would (the Cheney vs Lieberman debate was much better than the Bush vs Gore debate and even the Bush vs Kerry debate). It seems to me that the biggest problem with these two parties is that they're nominating the wrong people (Kerry and Bush should be running for VP under Edwards and Cheney, as Lieberman should have been running for president back then). One thing that I'm convinced of after these debates, is just how badly we need to get away from this two party monopoly.

Amen to that!

Ah, have to comment on the comments on the educational system.... I don't think the government can do all that much about education compared to what the parents can do. I think the approach is wrong, and that instead of trying to get new books or new buildings, fix the problem at the most basic level, which is the student's parents. People who are truly motivated aren't held back by an old book or classroom. "Oh noes, theis b00k is deh olde. F=MA is different in that new book over thre". Fix the basic problem, apathetic/careless parents, and make them forcibly involved in the educational process... anyway...

The debate was better than Kerry and Bush, that is for sure.

I think cheney came out stronger on this one. Edwards slipped up a few times, whereas cheney seemed cool and collected the whole time.

Cheney was a sledgehammer which came as no real surprise to me, but I was surprised at how well Edwards did. In the first Presidential debate it was a matter of who disappointed me the least - this time around, I was impressed by them both.

Yes, there were the usual factually incorrect statements (ie Edwards' "Bush ordered that Afghan troops be used at Tora Bora" - the White House does not control day-to-day ground operations and hasn't since Vietnam, or Cheney's "I'd never met you before tonight" - ..they had), and the usual shameless attacks. But Cheney sounded as decisive as ever, and I think did a good job of putting Iraq into the larger context of the war on terror, spending a lot more time than Bush did on the importance of democracy and mobile economies. I beamed when he said liberty is the antidote for terror. Calling Edwards on the ticket's lack of diplomatic tact and ignoring Iraqi security casualties also was nice.

The one thing that really struck me was how Cheney seemed to have a much better grip on the facts - Kerry and Edwards both pulled the occasional statistic that seemed to bolster their arguments, but they smacked of being looked up before the debate rather than something they're really familiar with. Cheney has a way of working in facts without straying from a strong, cohesive message, which is why I'd say he won.

I think the two biggest differences between Edwards and Cheney were:

a) Edwards was FULL of buzzwords, something he criticized the president for last goroung. I thought I was going to shoot myself if I heard "we have a plan" or "that's wrong" one more time. Cheney came off natural in almost everything he said, very rarely repeating himself.

b) Edwards looked very visably bothered a few times. Cheney didn't. Edwards also was very untactful - Ie, tearing paper during the middle of one of Cheney's answers, trying to cut Cheney off a few times while it was Cheney's time, flopping around when he heard something he didn't like, and when he wiped his nose across his wrist midsentence.

Also, for people saying Cheney didn't answer the questions, Edwards dodged a LOT. The question about differences between he and Cheney, he said he wanted to go back and finish another answer or respond to a prior question. He had to correct himself multiple times - about 25% of his answers started with "well, lemme first adress what the Vice President just said..." - he spent 60% of his time trying to recover from a fumble, and 40% spouting campaign rhetoric.

I think Cheney won it.

Are you serious? I thought Cheney was going to break out a knife or something, he looked pissed off. Edwards looked like a bump on a log, he just sat there and grinned.

How about "Mr. Edwards has his facts wrong?"

It really reminded me of my sister and I bickering.

"We went to Iraq because of WMD's."
"We didn't find any WMD's."
"I know, but they were there."
"You said we would find some!"
"No I didn't"
"Yes you did!"
"You just said that's why we went there!"
"No I didn't!"
"Mom!! Cheny is looking out my window!"
"Moooommmmm! Edwards is poking me!"
"Stop it you two! Don't make me pull this country over."
Gwen: Fine, you two. Next issue: Israel.
"Before we get to Israel, I'd like to make the point that Bush did this and that and lied or exaggerated about whatnot and Bush looked out my window and stole my poptarts. <ten second bit on Israel>
"Well, before I respond to that, what Edwards said was a complete exaggeration of the truth, and a downright lie. And for the last time, he stole your toaster struddles, not your poptarts!"

Summary of the Vice Presidential Debate.

[edit- Oh, and while both of the candidates were constantly accusing each other of misrepresenting and exaggerating the facts, NPR did an exhaustive study that showed that most of Cheny's facts were exaggerated, and very few of Edward's were. Although, he was downright wrong on the whole poptart issue, but Kerry staff are calling it an 'innocent mistake.'

I just kinda wish that both parties would say something new instead of varying the same BS they've been spouting for months.

Everyone sees what they want to see, seems like.

I thought that Edwards looked more upset than Cheney.

What's amusing is that at one point, Cheney cited factcheck. He said factcheck.com, when it's actually factcheck.org
The funny thing is, factcheck.com is just an advertising website, and to deal with all the hits, they just had the domain redirect to George Soros's site. George Soros is a billionaire who's very anti-Bush and his website is very anti-Bush.

Factcheck.org has an excellent article about the misstatements that both made.
Edwards made some factual misstatements, but Cheney made far more. Including what factcheck said about him.