I watched a bit of the post-debate spin at FOX News, CBS, and ABC. CBS and ABC couldn’t have been more different from FOX. The spin from commentators was pro-Palin at FOX and pro-Biden at CBS and ABC.
The Frank Luntz focus group results were stunningly strong for Palin.
At CBS, on the other hand, the instant poll of “uncommitted” voters showed 2-to-1 reporting that Biden won.
Once again, we need to integrate newsrooms politically to get truly balanced reporting.
By the way, I thought that, by conventional measures, Biden won the first third fairly clearly, while Palin was even or ahead in the last two thirds of the debate. If I had to pick an overall winner, I would lean slightly toward Biden, though Palin exceeded expectations more clearly than Biden.
So if pundits’ evaluation of the first presidential debate as a near-tie was spun as a win for Obama, then if pundits end up evaluating the vice presidential debate as a near-tie should that be spun as a win for Palin? Or should we stop declaring a winner at all and talk more about what we’ve learned?