Debate day reading list for the second Obama-McCain verbal battle
The second presidential debate is fast approaching. We'll be live blogging the town-hall style forum here, beginning at 5:30 p.m. PST, like we did the first faceoff between John McCain and Barack Obama and the encounter between the vice presidential nominees.
Until then, here's a short list of some of the most interesting debate-related stories from all over the Internet:
Town-hall debates are supposed to be about the voters. So we first present you with two up-close looks at voters in swing states. The New Yorker's George Packer wrote about disaffected voters in Ohio, and our own Peter Wallsten wrote about small-town Virginians.
Wallsten also took note of the increasingly negative turn of the campaign -- and what that means for tonight.
Slate magazine discussed the potential benefits and pitfalls of the town-hall-style debate, while Politico examined how they have shaped past elections. Politico's conclusion: Talking points are rarely effective in this kind of forum.
The New York Times, by the way, reported that at least 6 million questions have been submitted to be asked at the debate.
Rolling Stone is out with a scathing profile of McCain (no surprise about that slant). Meanwhile, our own Dan Morain and Bob Drogin recently profiled the man behind McCain -- chief strategist Steve Schmidt.
An finally, here's an interesting piece on Google search trends during last week's vice presidential debate. Did you know that the most popular search during the debate was "maverick?" Or that the number of Google queries about Joe Biden jumped by a factor of more than 70? The searches for Sarah Palin, who had been very much in the public eye before the debate, increased only by a factor of 6.
Want to know the buzzwords of tonight's debate? You'll have to stay tuned . . .
Andrew Malcolm's immigrant parents repeatedly stressed the importance of active participation in a democracy. Early lessons included learning the alphabetical list of states by watching televised roll calls of national political conventions. That childhood exposure led to a lifelong fascination with politics, including 40-plus years of covering them and a brief stint practicing them as press secretary to Laura Bush in 1999-2000. A veteran foreign and national correspondent, Malcolm served on the Times Editorial Board and was a Pulitzer finalist in 2004. He is the author of 10 nonfiction books and father of four.
Johanna Neuman is a veteran Washington correspondent for both The Los Angeles Times and USA Today, having covered presidents and politics as far back as Ronald Reagan. A former president of the White House Correspondents Assn., she authored a book on media and foreign policy, “Lights, Camera, Wars.” Most recently she was co-author of the 
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Who is William Ayers?
William Ayers was a radical who opposed a stupid war in a far away land where John McCain flew 23 bombing runs before he was shot down. Wonder how many innocent civilians died on the ground in those bombing runs. Any one wondered?It was a stupid war which ended in humiliation of American armed forces with over 50,000 troops dead and more than a million Vietnamese dead.
This is the same John McCain who along with the Bush administration threw dust into the eyes of the American people and asked us to launch a war based on fabricated intelligence. Remember Colin Powell showing fabricated intelligence of WMDs at UN which were never found?This is the same John McCain who would want us to be in Iraq for a 100 years, and would happily bomb bomb Iran.By God, the worst hell is reserved for those who value non American lives cheaper than American lives. Pray for your redemption before the day of judgement you conservative thugs who have stolen America. Your time has come to an end. Nov 4 th is the day of judgement. The Republican thugs will be thrown out of the White House.
Posted by: JSmith | October 07, 2008 at 05:09 PM
Well, if either of these guys want my vote, they'll have to back off with the mudslinging. I haven't totally made up my mind yet which candidate I think will do the least amount of further damage to our country, so for me it's a "wait and see" situation tonight! Personal insults will most certainly lose my vote.
Posted by: JJ | October 07, 2008 at 05:23 PM
The last thin g in the world Mccain would do is "listen" to the LA Times give him advice. he understatnds as most Americans, that LA Times, NY Times and most newspapers have been in the tank for Obama since day one.
This will come back to haunt newspapers in readership for a very long time. If McCain loses, we don't buy your papers. If McCain wins, we don't buy your papers.
Anyway you look at it, large newspapers are going extinct - mostly because of their bias and political manipulations.
Coastal regions have a name for newspapers: FISHWRAPPERS.
Posted by: larry clifton | October 07, 2008 at 05:26 PM
Why would America REWARD complete Republican failure ?
We wont.
Posted by: PulSamsara | October 07, 2008 at 05:51 PM
Why are there NO 3rd party candidates on stage
asking and answering questions????
WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY ??????!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Jaime Yarbrough | October 07, 2008 at 06:05 PM
Obama represent the poor, the workers, the societism/communism, the idealism, and he can't keep clear of terrorism.
Mccain represent the rich, the bourgeois, the capitalism, the realism, and he can't keep clear of bushism.
Who can represent the world? Obama, of course.
Who can represent the USA? Mccain, of course.
Who should we choose as the president of USA? Mccain, of course!
Posted by: fortune | October 07, 2008 at 06:06 PM
There go the Obama camp so quickly jumping on the race card! Obama knows how to play the "victim game!" That's why I will not vote for him! There will be 4 years of playing the race card! Just like the rapper Ludacris raps, "paint the White house black!"
Posted by: steve rodriguez | October 07, 2008 at 09:47 PM