So who do you think "won" the debate?

I think it was a draw. It reminded me of the Bush-Dukakis debate in 1988, or the Kennedy-Nixon debate in 1960. In 1988 you had an out-of-touch old guy debating an emotionless robot who did not flinch when asked what he would do if his wife was raped and murdered by Willie Horton. In 1960, the year I was born, so I only know from watching old b/w newsreels, the people who watched it on television saw a young vibrant Jack Kennedy go up against a nervous sweaty Dick Nixon with five-o-clock shadow. Today nobody listens to the debates on radio, and if you missed it on cable you can stream it again online from the CNN website. But overall I do not think there was a clear winner. Both men played to their own constituencies, and nobody said anything that we hadn't heard before. There were no "gotcha" soundbites. If anything I give the edge to Obama for looking more cool and collected, not quite as emotionless as Dukakis in 88, but more like an aloof college professor giving a lecture. McCain made no major mistakes but the guy is 30 years older and looks it.

But something about Obama's manner of speaking reminded me of something. I couldn't quite put my finger on it... until now.

Back in the 1970s when I was a teenager growing up in Cambridge within walking distance of Harvard, there were true communist agitators standing in front of the kiosk in Harvard Square handing out fliers for one cause or another. Sometimes I would take the paper they handed me, rip it up in front of them, and drop it on the ground at their feet. A few times I actually decided to "debate" these guys. One time I was even "recruited" to join their group. They took me to lunch at Ken's Steak House in Central Square, to see if they could convince me to work for them on whatever social issue. It was like a job interview for the high turn-over career field of curbside paper handling- they have to continually hire new bright-eyed naive kids to use them until they get fed up. Let's just say it didn't go well. That was one of the earliest times I can remember when I realized that some people's minds are so twisted that they stand logic on its head.

On Obama's own biography page on Wikipedia, they talk about when he was a "community organizer." The method of "organizing"" the community was to use the "agitation" method taught by Saul Alinsky- try to get people angry enough that they get motivated to do something about their situation. Quoting someone who knew him at the time: "He was a natural, the undisputed master of agitation, who could engage a room full of recruiting targets in a rapid-fire Socratic dialogue, nudging them to admit that they were not living up to their own standards." When I read this it reminded me so much of the "job interview" at Ken's Steak House! That guy must have been a student of Alinsky's too.