ANALYSIS:McCain failed to deliver the knock-out blow his campaign needed, while his Democrat rival was sometimes ponderous, writes Denis Staunton
TRAILING IN the polls, with the financial crisis on Wall Street focusing attention on the economy, his weakest issue, John McCain needed a game-changer at the first presidential debate in Mississippi last Friday.
He didn't get it.
McCain had his moments during the 90- minute exchange, notably when he declared that knowledge and experience matter and that Barack Obama didn't have enough of either to be president. However, after a week during which the Republican suspended his campaign and threatened to postpone the debate, he failed to deliver the knock-out blow his campaign needed.
Some of Obama's answers were ponderous, especially when he invoked Senate procedure to justify unpopular votes, but the Democrat was more engaging than his opponent, smiling, speaking directly to the camera and turning to McCain each time he attacked him.
For his part, McCain didn't look at Obama once, even when he was shaking his hand and he insisted on addressing his opponent at Senator Obama, while the Democrat called him John.
The first half of the debate was about the economy and McCain successfully drew the discussion on to his preferred territory of wasteful government spending and tax policy. Obama had to defend his record of seeking pork-barrel spending for his own state and his opposition to cutting corporate tax rates.
Foreign policy was supposed to be McCain's strongest suit, but Obama had the best lines during their exchange on Iraq, reminding his opponent of his poor judgment before the war began.
"John, you like to pretend like the war started in 2007. You talk about the surge. The war started in 2003 and at the time when the war started, you said it was going to be quick and easy," Obama said. "You said we knew where the weapons of mass destruction were. You were wrong.
"You said that we were going to be greeted as liberators. You were wrong. You said that there was no history of violence between Shi'ite and Sunni, and you were wrong."
For all his gifts as a politician, Obama still struggles to connect with Americans on the economic difficulties many of them are going through.
The crisis on Wall Street has, however, brought the economy into the centre of the campaign in a way from which Democrats can only benefit.
The richest 1 per cent of Americans now take in about 20 per cent of the income in the US, compared to about 8 per cent when Ronald Reagan won the presidential election in 1980.
Few Americans believe that the upward distribution of wealth that has characterised Republican rule in Washington has benefited the country as a whole.
All this suggests that Democrats should win by a landslide in November, strengthening their majorities in the Senate and the House of Representatives and reclaiming the White House.
Some polls last week gave Obama a clear lead, but most polling in the key battleground states of Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania suggest that the race is too close to call.
Some of Obama's problems are undoubtedly due to racial prejudice on the part of conservative white Democrats, many of whom obscure their bigotry behind claims that the Illinois senator lacks experience or, in a favourite phrase "doesn't share my values".
Some former supporters of Hillary Clinton, including many Irish-Americans, are refusing to back Obama, often declaring that there is "just something I don't like about him". Few of them say that their reservations are based on race, but even fewer are able to offer a plausible alternative argument for abandoning their long-held political allegiance.
McCain's running mate, Sarah Palin, has had a difficult week, floundering in interviews and reinforcing doubts, even among conservatives, about her readiness to become president if McCain retires or dies before his term in office ends.
Palin must perform well in Thursday's vice-presidential debate with Joe Biden in St Louis if she is to avoid becoming an unhappy distraction from McCain's campaign message.
This was always going to be a tough year for a Republican to win the presidential race, as voters lash out at the failures of the Bush administration. The meltdown on Wall Street dented McCain's prospects even further and Friday's debate in Mississippi did little to change that.
McCain gambled and lost last week on one game-changing moment in Washington; he needs another if he is to have a chance of winning November's election.