Reasoning Reason

Sarah Palin avoided every question; she mispronounced nuclear multiple times; she made many mischaracterizations and failed to make many of the distinctions from the Obama/Biden ticket that she needs to make if she wants a chance of being elected.

Yet she won the debate. She spoke in layman's terms that the average voter will view as speaking with them instead of to them. She was trained to look into the camera to further this effect, while Biden directed his answers at Ifill. Biden could have been perfect and I still don't think he would have won the debate. Palin's bar had been set so low--especially with the recent Couric interviews--that merely surviving until the end would have sufficed.

She far surpassed that. By redirecting each question she successfully used her talking points in a relatively natural manner. Biden repeatedly called her out on not answering the question asked and Palin did a masterful job of evading the trap.

As much as I disagree with Bill Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard, on most issues, I think he has posed the most accurate reaction to the Vice Presidential Debate: "It was match point against Sarah Palin and she kept the set alive."