Debate Surprises

Several surprises in the debate last night.

Kerry wasn't orange. Bush's expressions were kind of goofy, like he'd been drawn by a cartoonist. Teresa Heinz Kerry looked like she overslept in the bus: her husband definitely had better hair.

Sometimes when the president responded, I thought he had forgotten the question. Maybe those were dramatic pauses.

When TV showed them on a split screen, Kerry's lecturn appeared lower than Bush's, because the camera lined up their heads as though they are the same height. That was kind of odd, considering that the debate planners put the two men 50 feet apart so Bush wouldn't look shorter.

They held my attention pretty well, except about an hour in, when I clicked my computer over to the Mount St. Helens VolcanoCam.

No one brought up swift boats, purple heart BandAids, or the Texas Air National Guard.

Bush missed a golden opportunity to make one point. If he had worn flipflops, that's all we would have been talking about today.

Brad Messer commentary— KTSA.