Manzanar, California.

Captain Ed is (surprise) confused:

…there are two complaints being heard about Brokaw’s performance. The less-substantive gripe is that Brokaw asked too many of his own questions, supposedly making a mockery of the town-hall format. That format died when everyone agreed to have Brokaw and his team vet the questions and decide which would be asked. A real town hall forum uses spontaneity for its energy. All we got last night were Brokaw’s chosen questions, delivered by his selected writers. Brokaw just outsourced his writing staff. The union should file a complaint of its own.

The question of questions is a stronger accusation. Like Ifill, Brokaw managed to avoid the following topics:

• Abortion
• Gun control
• Judicial nominations
• Immigration

With the current financial crisis, an emphasis on economics was expected. Brokaw did ask about entitlement reform, which hasn’t gotten nearly enough attention. However, the topics above have driven presidential politics for decades and have single-issue constituencies that matter in elections. For the second straight debate, Americans didn’t hear candidate views on any of them.

Yes, these topics have driven Presidential politics for sometime now. That’s kinda been the problem. What about trying out some others; Torture, Habeas Corpus, the Unitary Executive…

Not even close, Sarah.

Just some quick thoughts…

• Does it raise a red flag for anyone that the same people, Senators like Feingold and Sanders, who had the foresight and judgment to vote against things like the authorization for the Iraq War and the Patriot Act, voted against the bailout?
• Does John McCain pulling out of Michigan just mean that his operatives there have disenfranchised enough people through Vote Caging and other dirty tricks that he no longer needs to focus on the state?
• After watching last nights debate can any sane person make an argument that there is any distinction between McCain-Palin and Bush-Cheney? The Vice President has only two duties Constitutionally, break ties in the Senate and take over if the President dies. And that last one is what every American should be giving some serious thought to.