V.P. debate

Reactions certainly varied.

Dick Morris:

Confronted with Dick Cheney's obvious competence, incisive parries to his charges and devastating rebuttal of his phony statistics, Edwards looked like the proverbial deer in the headlights...

Cheney looked like a man and Edwards looked like a boy. On the attack, [Edwards] seemed, surprisingly, to be a shallow lightweight, almost transparent in his absence of heft and gravitas. Cheney looked like the authority, the wise one, the arbiter of facts and statistics...

Dick Cheney helped Bush get well from a poor performance. John Edwards made it look like the Democratic ticket was out classed and out gunned.

Andrew Sullivan:

If last Thursday night's debate was an assisted suicide for president Bush, this debate - just concluded - was a car wreck. And Cheney was road-kill. There were times when it was so overwhelming a debate victory for Edwards that I had to look away.

My take: Both candidates did well, and the impact on polls will be minimal. Cheney's calm attitudes and mastery of subtle issues dispelled any "dark lord" image, and Edwards showed enough command of substance to dispell any "eager boy wonder" image.

On substance, I was more in agreement with Cheney than Bush, but I knew that going in.

Some advice for Cheney: The economy is doing great. Don't be defensive about it:

• Fastest rate of growth in decades, faster than any other industrialized economy.
• Phenomenal economic turnaround, despite our inheriting a recession and dealing with the economic consequences of 9/11.
• Unemployment lower now than it was on balance in any recent decade.
• More Americans, and more minorities, own homes now than ever before in our history.
• All Americans who pay taxes paying lower taxes than when we took office.
• Despite what the other side may tell you, the wealthy paying a greater portion of the income tax pie than they did before our tax cuts.
• Inflation under control.
• Interest rates low.

You get the point.

And learn from Edwards how to personalize and use the little guy as an example.