First Presidential Debate

The first presidential debate, which was originally intended to focus on foreign policy and national security, was opened by a question about the current financial crisis by Jim Lehrer, PBS anchor. He asked candidates, Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain, what their position was on the $700 billion federal bailout plan proposed by the Bush administration and how it would affect their administration when they become a president. They both admitted that the congress had to do something in order to fix this crisis. John McCain said he would stop federal spending except for veterans care, national defense, and other vital areas. While Barack Obama admitted that he will have to delay some of his spending plans; by giving priority for early childhood education and improved health care.
Regarding this financial crisis, both candidates tried to show their concerns to those people who could be struggling to find jobs and feed their family because of the crisis on Wall Street.
The foreign-policy part of the debate brought up an aggressive scene, where McCain said America is winning and Obama argued the U.S shouldn’t have started the war in the first place. He said that the U.S has been preoccupied with Iraq while there have been some other parts of the world that are potential treats to the U.S as well as the world, such as Afghanistan.
Both the candidate tried to distinguish themselves from the current president, George W. Bush. McCain blamed the Bush Administration for excessive spending and he promised he would change that. And Obama on the other hand, argued that they are the same and stand for the same policies and principles that George Bush is currently having.
Discussion questions:

Do you really think the $700 billion bailout plan will help the economy to recover?
Which candidate do you think is stronger and why? (I know there are two more debates left, but try to answer on what you have seen so far)
After this election, which America do you think the world wants to see? Obama’s land of opportunity? Or McCain’s military power?

And finally if you are interested to know who won the debate, refer to this link:
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/politics/2008/09/30/schneider.debate.bounce.poll.cnn?iref=videosearch