Live blog — from Nashville, a grand ol’ debate!
Things should be getting under way at Nashville’s Belmont University in just a few minutes.
For those joining our debate live blog for the first time, everyone is invited — indeed, encouraged — to contribute thoughts by adding their comments to this post.
Pre-debate spin is focusing on “John McCain’s last stand.” The consensus of polls is that Barack Obama is widening his lead, anywhere from 6 to 8 points. McCain needs something tonight to stop the bleeding.
Two trivia questions to get things started:
1. What highly-ranked NCAA Division I basketball team lost to tiny Belmont in December 2003?
2. Name the 1975 movie in which a fictional presidential candidate named Hal Philip Walker played a key role, though he was never on screen. Who directed the movie?
Kevin Horrigan is deputy editor of the editorial page. He writes editorials on local, state and national politics and public policy and also contributes a signed column to the Sunday Commentary Page. "The Old Sport" is a former sports columnist for the Post-Dispatch and for 10 years hosted radio talk shows on KMOX and KTRS in St. Louis. He lives in South St. Louis with his wife, Kate, and a dream of one day starting a professional catfish noodling tour. 
My bright, evenhanded 17 year old daughter says the back and forth between the candidates is annoying, that Obama is doing better than he did at Old Miss, more confident. That McCain is doing about as well as in the first debate. She called the first debate for McCain because he was more aggressive.
Brokow is definitely the worst moderator by far.
Obama is on thin ice in saying McCain will tax health benefits — at least according to recent reports which say McCain will pay for his health care tax credit not by taxing employer plans but by cutting Medicare benefits.
As for the primer questions: 1.) Was it Mizzou? 2.) Was it “The Candidate,” directed by Robert Redford?
Si Vis: Go to the candidates’ websites. Their positions are clear on second amendment rights and reproductive rights. Although I would like to hear Obama say again (he said it this weekend) that he is not interested in taking away guns and that he fully supports the Supreme Court decision that the Second Amendment is an individual right.
Jamie, dont their websites list all most all the other stuff they are talking about? This is nothing new, it just seems some topics are being avoided.
Health care is a huge issue. $5000 a year is a joke when is the last time Mcain has even looked at a medical bill. Is he living in a box, a dark hole. There already are walk in clinics, they can’t meet the need. Buying a plan across state lines doesn’t help if the plan doesn’t have doctors in the area where you live. He obvisously doesn’t know that most employes offer a choice of plans to employees. Is he going to give up/shut down federal plans for all federal employees including himself and go out on the open market, I don’t think so so why should the rest of us who aren’t part of the bureacracy but we fund it take it in the pocketbook again.
Good guesses EJ on the warm up quiz. We will have to wait for a ruling from Kevin Horrigan.
The line “gold-plated, Cadillac insurance” is borrowed from President George W. Bush.
By way of context, the average, non-gold-plated family coverage group health insurance THIS YEAR costs more than $12,600. Pushing people into the individual health insurance market means they won’t have the benefit of group purchasing. That means their premiums will either skyrocket, or they have less coverage as with a Health Savings Account, which is something Sen. McCain supports.
Si, yes, absolutely. You’re right. I thought if you were interested specifically in those topics, you could get the information. But you’re right; everything they’re saying undoubtedly is on their websites.