Obama's Afraid To Debate!

Except they're having one, right now. From the opening statements, I think we're going to see another debate that shows off the best of the Democratic Party. They both sound great so far. As long as the race isn't David Axelrod vs. Mark Penn, or Daily Kos vs. MyDD, this is a very appealing duo of candidates. The race is extremely close in Ohio and Texas now, and this could be a defining moment.

If anything noteworthy happens, I'll update.

... Oh, won't the pundit types be mad, this is a substantive debate! Basically, both candidates look quite impressive. I do want to point out that Obama's answers on immigration have been really, really on-target. We cannot deal with the problems of undocumented workers coming over the border without reducing the economic distance between the United States and Mexico. The mutual benefit of having a Mexico that actually offers good jobs to their own people is incalculable. Obama also signaled his support for the DREAM Act, which would allow people who are in this country through no fault or will of their own, who have basically grown up as Americans, to get a chance to go to college and realize the American dream for themselves. Finally, he stressed the need of all Americans to try and learn another language, because in the "global village" that we live in those skills are paramount.

In a day where the Republican front-runner is defending himself over ties to lobbyists, this offers a window into the best that the Democratic Party has to offer. And it's very appealing.

By the way, Lou Dobbs was on right before this demanding that both candidates answer questions about the NAFTA superhighway that doesn't exist. (Eyes rolling) And this debate is AGAIN sponsored by the clean coal industry. (Eyes rolling) Don't expect any questions on global warming.

...CNN forces themselves into the debate and demands conflict! But Obama has been knocking it out of the park for the last five minutes. The crowd is with him like it's one of his rallies. If Clinton was ever going to cut him down a peg, it'd be right now... "this is the silly season... we shouldn't be spending time tearing each other down, we should be lifting the country up." OK, Clinton is getting harsh now. She calls it "Change you can Xerox." The crowd didn't like that. By the way, I saw a speech of hers today where she used "instead of family values, we should value families." That's from John Kerry's 2004 run. Clinton, sensing that this plagiarism thing isn't going to work, moves over to policy differences. The attacks just aren't going to work unless she wraps them in a policy critique, which is perfectly within the bounds.