Obama won. The Indies have spoken. Not that anyone will remember in five days.

Let me say three things at the outset about Friday's first presidential debate between John McCain and Barack Obama:

1. Obama won. Anyone who tells you otherwise either wanted him to run laps around McCain (like the gaggle of media types at FishbowlNY, whose neurotic liveblog I finally had to turn off), or else isn't voting for him no way, no how (like CNN contributor Bill Bennett, who concocted a fantasy of McCain tap-dancing on Obama's chest the final 45 minutes). We'll get to my reasons below.

2. Regardless of who you thought won, it's not going to matter in a week. The pollsters at Gallup found little game-changing in 50 years of presidential debates.

3. If Obama had agreed to the 10 town-hall debates that McCain proposed in June, it might have created a permanent poll shift. Given the high quality of Friday's debate, how great would a summer's worth of them have been? (Previously on TV Barn, I ripped into the three myths that Obama used to justify avoiding the town halls.)

More from the fastest 90 minutes on television:

Hooray to going off topic. It's like going to a fight and a hockey game breaks out. (Sorry, I'm in Canada as I write this.) A debate that was supposed to be about foreign policy devoted more than 30 of its 90 minutes to the economy -- just what the country needed, even if the two candidates seemed tight at first.

CNN's "audience reaction" meter: canary or canard? CNN hooked up voters in Ohio to "perception analysis" devices, the same ones used to focus-test TV pilots. On Iraq and Iran, when Obama spoke, the Indies surged in his favor; when McCain talked tough, the Indies nosedived. Russia was different: For the first three minutes, the indies favored McCain; for the next three minutes, they favored Obama; and for the next three minutes, they flatlined, as if to say "enough already!"

You kids get off my understanding of the issues! Is McCain's constant refrain of "you don't understand" the 2008 version of Al Gore's sighing-and-clucking? The indies reacted negatively whenever he lectured Obama, positively when McCain went back to policy and patriotism.

On the other hand: That same audience measurement gadget once resulted in "Seinfeld" being the lowest-tested pilot in NBC history.

Real people 2, stereotypes 0. Obama's professorial style didn't keep him from scoring quick points like, "The problem with a spending freeze is you're using a hatchet where you need a scalpel." Meanwhile, McCain's famous straight talk didn't keep him from lecturing Obama like John Houseman upbraiding his class on "The Paper Chase" about their lack of understanding of the situation in Ukraine.

Jim Lehrer, master moderator. The mild-mannered PBS anchor took a chance by letting his subjects talk. Still, he could get into their grills at times, and didn't hesitate to ask for examples of grandiose claims (like budget programs they'd cut). Unlike the shiny anchors on the other networks, Lehrer does this every night - which may be why he's been asked to do 11 of these debates.

Tightrope acts. John McCain's trick was to balance his reputation as a bipartisan doer with the partisan attacks that the underdog needs to lob. Obama's trick was to seem unthreatening and wise beyond his years while not letting McCain get away with anything. Obama did his job with ease, but McCain's condescension made him seem too mean at times.

He should've checked his Blackberry: McCain addressed Senator Edward Kennedy "in the hospital," wishing him all the best after a seizure earlier in the day. We all wish Teddy the best -- but as was widely reported well before the debate, Kennedy had been discharged and was back in Hyannis Port.

Where's Sarah? Remember when Democrats were mortified at the thought of McCain's wildly popular running mate sitting in the front row at the debate and upstaging Obama? But that was before Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric threw a few brain-teasers her way. She wasn't even available for post-debate analysis -- unlike her counterpart Joe Biden, who was everywhere Friday night and suddenly isn't looking like such an underdog when he squares off with the Guv next week.

Comments

[Stan2008]

Instant poll results.

CBS polled 500 undecided voters.
40% said Obama won
22% said McCain won
38% said it was a tie

http://tinyurl.com/4lenml

CNN's instant poll of 524 voters had Obama winning 51% to 38%.

MediaCurves had a focus group of Independent voters.
61% said Obama won, 39% McCain won

http://mediacurves.com/

The Luntz and GQR focus groups also said Obama won.