A feisty McCain, a cool Obama, and appeals to 'Joes' everywhere

But Ayers was fair game: “I don't care about an old washed-up terrorist,” McCain said. “But as Senator [Hillary Rodham] Clinton said in her debates with you, we need to know the full extent of that relationship.”

Obama came ready with a reply on Ayers, who once held a fundraiser for Obama early in his political career and who served on an educational board with Obama. Ayers is now an education professor in Chicago. Obama called Ayers’s radical acts “despicable” and noted that he, Obama, was just a boy at the time and did not know Ayers.

Obama’s ability to keep his cool under fire – and not attack back – “should certainly have an initial positive for Obama,” says Ben Voth, a forensics expert at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. “The question is whether any lingering doubts would creep in later.”

Mr. Voth also says McCain’s “base of supporters were probably satisfied that he did venture into the aggressive waters they wanted him to.”

McCain’s biggest problems are that there are fewer than three weeks until Election Day, and the nation is in a financial crisis. A bad economy is poison to the party that controls the White House, and McCain came right out of the starting gate Wednesday night aiming to show sympathy with the people – and promising action.

“Americans are hurting right now, and they’re angry,” he said, calling his fellow citizens “innocent victims of greed and excess on Wall Street as well as Washington, D.C.”

McCain then returned to a major proposal that he had laid out, with no fanfare, in the last debate, suggesting the federal government buy up shaky mortgages to stabilize the housing market. But his most memorable economic argument of the evening centered on taxes, with “Joe the plumber” as the lead character. Joe Wurzelbacher is a plumber in Toledo, Ohio, who had an extended conversation with Obama a few days ago about the senator’s plan to raise taxes on those making more than $250,000. The conversation was caught on camera, and conservatives have seized on Obama’s comment on how “when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”

McCain repeatedly returned to “Joe the plumber” throughout the 1-1/2 hour debate, turning him into the Everyman who reaches for the American dream, only to see the government raise his taxes when he succeeds.

“Joe, I want to tell you, I'll not only help you buy that business that you worked your whole life ... and I'll keep your taxes low and I'll provide available and affordable healthcare for you and your employees,” McCain said.

Obama replied by turning the focus back to the middle class: “What I want to do is to make sure that the plumber, the nurse, the firefighter, the teacher, the young entrepreneur who doesn't yet have money, I want to give them a tax break now,” he said. “And that requires us to make some important choices.”

Joe the plumber has no doubt now joined the cast of Joes already populating the campaign – alongside the two running mates, Joe Six-Pack (aka Sarah Palin) and Joe Biden.

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