Keith Devens .com

WHAT?! Do you honestly think Ifill did a good job?
Come on, someone else back me up.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Pu...rticles/000/000/004/732kepzz.asp?pg=2

Round 18: Without saying the words "Bush" or "Kerry," talk about why you're better than your opponent.
What is happening here? The next question from Ifill might as well be: Describe your plans for handling the Sudan using words of no more than three syllables which do not contain the letter "e". This isn't My Word. Edwards breaks the stupid rule by saying Kerry's name--twice.
Round to Jim Lehrer

Round 19: What's wrong with a little flip-flop every now and then?
Another unbelievable question from Ifill. Edwards lists a great number of Bush-Cheney "flip-flops." The problem here is that this argument runs counter to their main avenue of attack: That Bush is too strong-headed and ideological. Cheney lists the Kerry litany, which is more strategically valuable. They both look punched out.
Round to Cheney

Round 20: How will you bridge the political divide in the next four years?
Ifill directs the question to Edwards. He tells her she's wrong, that it's Cheney's question. She insists she isn't wrong. Fifteen seconds into Edwards's answer, Ifill realizes that she is, in fact, wrong. Just to be clear: The problem with Gwen Ifill isn't that she's politically biased--it's that in her choice of questions and handling of the format, she is very nearly incompetent tonight.

Cheney talks about his Democratic friends from when he was in Congress. In the funniest moment I've seen in a debate, he suggests that Zell Miller's keynote address at the Republican convention was a good example of bipartisanship. Best inside joke ever.
Round to Cheney

Maybe I should have elaborated. Ifill was generally good. Most of the time she asked tough questions, and she was tough on both sides (she showed no bias, as far as I noticed). A minority of her questions were dumb or could have been better. And she did make a mistake on that one question of forgetting who went first towards the end. She's human.