MAVERICK'S NEW PRISON WIFE?:

McCain as the Alpha Male (David S. Broder, September 28, 2008, Washington Post)

It was a small thing, but I counted six times that Obama said that McCain was "absolutely right" about a point he had made. No McCain sentences began with a similar acknowledgment of his opponent's wisdom, even though the two agreed on Iran, Russia and the U.S. financial crisis far more than they disagreed.

That suggests an imbalance in the deference quotient between the younger man and the veteran senator -- an impression reinforced by Obama's frequent glances in McCain's direction and McCain's studied indifference to his rival.

Whether viewers caught the verbal and body-language signs that Obama seemed to accept McCain as the alpha male on the stage in Mississippi, I do not know.

Just consider the gender of the parties the two respectively lead.

Posted by Orrin Judd at September 28, 2008 6:49 AM