After the votes are counted on Election Day, there will be the inevitable talk about the impact of the Presidential debates on the final verdict. Specifically, how did they impact the candidacy of Barack Obama and John McCain? Historians and future candidates will want to know. But were these debates as spontaneous as they seemed at first glance?
Or were talking points firmly in place, embedded as firmly as this YouTube is embedded on this website? Judge for yourself. We post — you decide:
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.