A Battering but not a Knockout

Last night's Democratic Presidential Debate must have felt like a 12 round boxing match to Senator Hillary Clinton (NY). It was a long two hours for her as the questioners, Brian Williams and Tim Russert of NBC began and ended the debate with leading questions aimed at prodding her closest rivals Sen. Barrack Obama (ill.) and former Sen. John Edwards (S.C.) to attack her positions on the issues and they readily accepted the bait.

It started with Sen. Obama's answer to the first question asked in the evening in which the Senator accused Sen. Clinton of flip flopping her positions on the war in Iraq and being for and then against NAFTA.

Continuing with this line of thought was Sen. Edwards who accused her of double talk on the issues and going from primary election mode to general election mode and expressing concern with her vote on Iran, part of which included the labeling of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. He also accused her of flip flopping on social security concerning lifting the cap on taxable income currently capped at $97,500.

Sen. Chris Dodd (Conn.) focused some of his comments on his concern of her ability to win in the general election pointing out that 50% of the voters in a recent poll said they will not vote for her and also criticized Clinton on her vote on Iran.

Governor Bill Richardson (NM), after pointing out his strength in diplomacy, actually came to Sen. Clinton's defense by saying although he differed with her on many of the issues she should not be attacked personally.

Sen. Clinton came across in the debate as though she was fighting a fight not to lose and never delivered any significant punches of her own to any of her opponents. Yet she held her own throughout the debate deflecting most of the punches. With only minutes to go she was asked a question by Tim Russert concerning the issuance of Drivers Licenses to illegal immigrants.

Mr. Russert pointed out that the NY Governor was proposing issuing these licenses to illegal immigrants and Sen. Clinton had indicated she supported the Governor.

Sen. Dodd jumped on her response and stated that he felt the issuance of a driver's license was a privilege and not a right and he opposed this proposal. After his response Sen. Clinton tried to clarify her position but clearly failed in this effort.

This illegal immigrant issue was also immediately jumped on by the press covering the debate who immediatley following the debate pointed out Republicans were going to make illegal immigration a big issue in the 2008 election.

The best line of the debate goes to Senator Joe Biden who said that outside of being able to use a noun, a verb, and 9/11 in a sentence, former Republican New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani was not qualified for President.

The weirdest question was something like "Do you believe in UFOs or have you seen a UFO" with Congressman Dennis Kucinich (Ohio) answering that he had seen a UFO.

The MSNBC text message poll conducted after the debate asking who won the debate had the following results: Obama-29%, Clinton-21%, Biden-18%, Edwards-17%, Kucinich-7%. Richardson-5%, Dodd-4%.

Now the spin begins as to who won the debate with communication directors of all the candidates and the press issuing their take on the debate.