I will have more to say, likely tomorrow, on the contrast between the candidates as illustrated during MSNBC's Special: "McCain and Obama--Forum on the American Presidency" hosted by Rick Warren at Saddleback Church.  If you have two hours to spare and have not seen the special, click the link above because the interview-style "debate" gives a good sense of the candidates' positions and abilities.

What I want to focus on in today's blog, however, is the inexcusable bias presented during the five-minute, post-debate wrap up by MSNBC correspondent David Shuster and his two conservative commentators, Pat Buchanan and Michelle Bernard.

By way of background, David Shuster was with Fox News from 1996 to 2002 and was their lead correspondent on McCain's "Straight Talk Express" during the 2000 campaign.  Shuster's background doesn't necessarily make him biased, but it does help explain a post-debate "analysis" that began with Shuster saying:

"John McCain, of course, came across as very energetic, passionate--even seemed very comfortable in the format.  Barack Obama by contrast in his hour perhaps thoughtful, intellectual...um, maybe even more deliberate."

I've searched the internet for video of Shuster's introduction because it's even more clear that he's cheerleading for McCain and denigrating Obama when one hears the manner in which he says, "intellectual."

Pat Buchanan, by contrast, found Obama "tortured and almost tentative...like a college sophomore who had not studied theology and was now facing his orals." 

Shuster noted a few minutes later that McCain received 3 applause interruptions for every Obama applause line.  (Now there's an intellectual argument, eh?)  Of course, neither Shuster nor his conservative pundit guests bothered to contextualize the audience.  The forum took place at a conservative, evangelical church in the heart of Orange County, a Republican stronghold.  McCain got more applause than Obama because he was talking to his base while Obama was talking across the aisle.

Then Michelle Bernard joined in the love fest for McCain saying he was "comfortable" and "at ease."  "A real contrast," she added, "with Barack Obama.  With Barack Obama tonight you really saw a lot of gray areas...whereas with John McCain things were either black or white."

Shuster went on to say, "I thought the contrast was so clear.  For example, John McCain was asked what to do about evil and he simply said, 'Defeat it' and left it at that whereas Barack Obama gave this sort of winding intellectual answer."

There's that word again.

So tell me, when did being intellectual become a negative quality in a president?  Dictionary.com describes intellectual as "appealing to or engaging the intellect...possessing or showing mental capacity, especially to a high degree." 

Oh no.  We don't want that!

Seriously, a grown man said that we should DEFEAT evil.  Really?  How is McCain going to do that?  Does he have a cape and secret powers of which we are unaware?  Is he Super-McCain?  If not, how does he merit praise for his simplistic, even naive, statment?

Because McCain is not Super McCain.  He's going to defeat evil the old fashioned-way (which is to say not really) by defining it narrowly (in this case as "radical Islamic extremism') and then by announcing victory (presumably on some aircraft carrier to be named later).

Obama's answer to the question?  We are not able to erase evil from the world, that's God's job.  But evil has to be confronted.  We are responsible to do so on an individual basis.  And we are to do so humbly, mindful that much evil has been perpetrated in the name of good.

Give me the intellectual man, who acknowledges his humanity and his limits, who answers with thoughtful nuance and genuine hope.  I'll take him any day over the glib good old boy who promises no new taxes, wealth for everyone, and declares himself able to defeat evil.  (Why does the refrain, "meet the new boss...same as the old boss" run through my brain when I cover McCain's positions?)

So...two thumbs up to Pastor Warren for putting together and pulling off this forum.

Two thumbs down to MSNBC for biased coverage.

Let's hope people listened to the forum and the issues, not the post-forum punditry.

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