Yes, Senator

Brokaw follows up asking McCain who he’d appoint secretary of the Treasury. McCain doesn’t say except that it would have to be someone Americans can identify with. He mentions Warren Buffett, who’s pretty great, but that he himself likes Meg Whitman more. Obama says that Buffett would be a pretty good choice, but that there are others out there. Both men are already much improved from the first debate.

Round to McCain

Round 2: What in the bailout package is actually going to help People Just Like Us?

McCain says that the “bailout” is actually a “rescue” because the greed and stupidity of Wall Street and government had begun to hurt Main Street. He then says that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were the sparks that started the sub-prime conflagration and that Obama and his Democratic “cronies” defended Fannie and Freddie from GOP attempts to reform them. He points out that Obama was the second greatest recipient of Fannie and Freddie money in history.

Obama says that what the crisis means to People Just Like You is a frozen credit market. He then says that Fannie and Freddie weren’t the problem–McCain’s deregulation was mania. Also, he wrote a letter to the Treasury predicting doom. Perhaps you’ve heard about this before.

On follow-up, Brokaw asks Obama if things will get worse before they get better. Obama says no, that he thinks the economy will be good. Which sounds an awful lot like “the fundamentals are sound.”

McCain he says it depends on what we do.

Round to McCain

Round 3: How can we trust either of you when both parties got us into this crisis?

Obama says he understands the frustration and cynicism. But that it’s important to remember how good things were during the Clinton years. Only he doesn’t say the word “Clinton.” Somewhere in Chappaqua, a dog is kicked. Hard.

McCain also understands the cynicism and mistrust. He says the financial crisis requires bipartisanship and that he’s lived it while Obama has never bucked his own party, ever. He then lists Obama votes for pork and spending, including a “$3 million overhead projector” for a Chicago museum. It’s a disciplined, devastating passage.

Brokaw asks about priorities: Health care, energy, and entitlement reform–place them in order of importance. McCain says we should do all three simultaneously. Obama says we will have to prioritize and that at the top of the list will be energy, then health care, then education. “Education” wasn’t on Brokaw’s list, but Barack Obama doesn’t like being penned in by the Old Politics and the Washington status quo.

Round to McCain

Round 4: What sacrifices will you ask us to make?

McCain says he’ll ask Americans to understand that there are government programs that have to be eliminated. He says that not only will silly pork projects have to go, but some good projects, too. He’s now recommending the spending freeze (minus defense, entitlements, and veterans affairs) that he flirted with in the first debate.

Obama says that “a lot of you remember the tragedy of 9/11.” (Really? Only “a lot” of people remember that?) He then hits Bush for his call to go shopping post-9/11 and says that Americans are hungry for leadership that tells people, for example, what light bulbs to use and how to insulate their homes. And he says that he’s noticed that young people are particularly interested in serving. Yes, we’ve seen that.

In a telling moment, Brokaw asks how the candidates would break the bad financial habits to which Americans have become addicted. Obama begins his answer by saying “It starts with Washington.” Doesn’t it always.

McCain says that nailing down Obama’s tax proposals is like “nailing Jell-O to a wall.” He then likens Obama to Herbert Hoover and notes that eventually Obama will get to protectionism. It’s another disciplined set-piece.

Round to McCain

Round 5: What will you do about reforming Social Security and Medicare?

Obama tries to interrupt Brokaw as he asks the question, but Big T lays down the law. Like a good sport, Obama slips away from talk about entitlement reform to defend his tax plan and try to reassure people that he really won’t raise middle-class taxes. He rambles and bumbles.

McCain gets up laughing and says, “I’ll answer the question.” He argues that reforming big issues has been done before and that the key is to work in a bipartisan manner, the way Congress did with base closings. Hitting Obama for the disconnect between rhetoric and record, he notes that Obama ran for the Senate pledging to bring a middle-income tax cut but never proposed any such legislation.

Round to McCain

Round 6: What would you do on environmental issues?

McCain says that these are tough economic times, but that we can’t give The Children a damaged planet. He touts his climate-change believer bona fides and then says that one of the keys is nuclear power, which Obama opposes.

Obama calls climate change “one of the biggest challenges of our time,” but also a really big opportunity to drive us into the future the way the computer did. He says the computer was developed by the Defense Department. Which doesn’t seem exactly right.

Round to McCain

Round 7: Should health care be treated as a commodity?

Obama says that health care is one of the biggest issues people raise with him as he travels around this great country and that we have a moral imperative to deal with it. He then gives a rough outline of his plan. If you like this plan, his answer works for you.

McCain says he wants to put medical records online and to impose other efficiencies on the market. But the key, he says, is understanding that Obama will have government-imposed mandates on health care. From there he meanders before making a hair-transplant joke. This is the type of joshing good friends can get away with in the Senate. Isn’t that right, Sen. Biden?

Round to Obama

Round 8: How will the economic crisis effect our ability to act as a global “peace-maker”?

McCain says that despite all the justifiable criticisms, America is the greatest force for good in the history of the world. He then goes on the attack about how the experience and judgment in a commander-in-chief is vital.

Obama begins with a sigh and then launches into a set-piece about how McCain says he doesn’t understand things and that maybe there are some things he doesn’t understand–like how John McCain has been so wrong about Iraq. He then says that we’re spending too much money on Iraq when the Iraqis are actually running a surplus. At least he makes a nod toward answering the question.

If the question had ended there, Obama would have won this round. But then Brokaw asks the candidates to define their foreign policy doctrines for use of force when national security issues are not at stake. Obama stumbles in a way that might be useable in an ad before saying that there is a lot of cruelty in the world and that America can’t be in all places at all times.

McCain goes after Obama for wanting to abandon Iraq, creating a wider war. He then says that the United States must do whatever it can to prevent genocide, but that we also must understand the limits of American power and have “a cool hand at the tiller,” pointing to problematic interventions in Lebanon and Somalia.

Round to McCain

Round 9: Should the U.S. respect Pakistani sovereignty with regard to pursuing terrorists?

Obama says that our problems in Pakistan were in part created by the war in Iraq, because it diverted resources from Afghanistan. Further, we can no longer “coddle” the dictator in Pakistan and we must change our policies with relation to the Pakistani government. And yes, he would violate Pakistani sovereignty to go after bin Laden.

McCain criticizes Obama for bragging about being willing to go into Pakistan. He then talks about American failure in post-Soviet Afghanistan and the importance of U.S.-Pakistani relations.

Obama requests a follow-up, thinking that it will change people’s opinion of his position if he restates it. He’s not helping.

Brokaw follows-up asking about recent developments in Afghanistan. Obama says he’ll start by pulling out of Iraq–responsibly!–and redeploying to Afghanistan. He also says he’ll work with the Karzai government, but that he’s already put Karzai on notice. McCain says that Gen. Petraeus has taken ownership of Afghanistan and changes will ensure–including doubling the size of the Afghan military forces. He says that counterinsurgency will be a key to Afghanistan, too–which Obama still won’t admit worked in Iraq.

Round to McCain

Round 10: How can we pressure Russia effectively without another Cold War?

McCain says there won’t be another Cold War, but that Russia’s behavior is outside the norms of civilized nations. And that he knew Putin was trouble from the start. He makes the case for supporting Georgia and Ukraine by way of sending a message to Russia, as well as using other bits of soft power.

Obama says that Russia is one of the central issues the next president will have to deal with, but that we can’t just provide moral support to the former Soviet satellites. And that we have to anticipate these problems. You see, he says he put out a statement about trouble brewing in Georgia back in April. Sort of like the sub-prime warning he sent to the Treasury.

Round to McCain

Round 11: What if Iran attacks Israel? Would you commit U.S. troops or wait for the U.N.?

The questioner is a retired Navy chief. McCain has a great moment thanking him for his service and saying that everything he ever learned about leadership he learned from a chief petty officer. He notes that Russia and China would likely block meaningful action by the U.N. Security Council. He then says simply that America can never allow a second holocaust.

Obama says that Iran cannot be allowed to achieve nuclear status and that he “will do everything required” to prevent it from happening. It’s funny watching the euphemisms he comes up with for military action. Obama then says that it’s important to use all of the avenues available, including direct talks with our enemies.

It seems instructive that Obama thinks it’s very important to talk tough about how you’ll violate and set straight America’s putative allies while maintaining the most-accommodating pose possible toward enemies.

Round to McCain

Round 12: What don’t you know and how will you learn it?

Obama says it’s never the challenges you expect that get you–it’s the challenges you don’t expect. Then he lists his biography and asks whether or not we’ll pass the same American dream he’s lived on to our children. Obviously, Obama knows everything he needs to know already. Which is part of what his supporters love about him.

McCain says that he doesn’t know what a lot of us don’t know–what’s going to happen at home and abroad. In other words, the known unknowns. Then he talks about what he does know about life and America. It’s a great riff.

Round to McCain

I have the debate scored 11-1. Is that even possible? Again, I think this count overstates the outcome. McCain had a very good night and clearly got the better of Obama on nearly every exchange, but Obama wasn’t bad himself. Nothing here is likely to haunt him. If anything, the debate may be remembered for a moment in the first question where McCain proposed what seems like a giant government maneuver to buy out bad mortgages.

If this is a serious and well-thought out plan, it could become a bold, signature proposal for McCain, giving him something to run with for the next four weeks. If it was just a throw-away trial balloon, it could become a sign of a campaign not in control of its message.

Jonathan V. Last is a staff writer at THE WEEKLY STANDARD.