A Pair of Jacks: This'll get called a tie, but in reality, both men lost. Neither did what he had to do. Bush needs to learn that repeating himself is not an argument. Kerry needs desperately to connect with people, not do his lame-ass Pompey-the-Senator act. Bush got in some good hits, but in the midst of an incoherent, rambling argument. Kerry made some good policy points, but buried them in his fourth subclause of the eighth run-on sentence of his tenth monotone paragraph.

You gotta love how Kerry praised the foreign policy of . . . Ronald Wilson Reagan, whom he said he would try to emulate. Kerry spent his first Senate term fighting against everything Reagan did. Somebody call him on it, please.

Final thoughts? A draw, but a lame one. Most Americans switched this off about 30 minutes in, so anything that came up after that just went to the pundits. I'm starting to think that both of these candidates are part of a marketing conspiracy to turn us all into glazed-over tapioca.

The Newcastle was good, at least.