I waited to sleep on my thoughts before posting about the debate. Needless to say, there was much celebrating last night.

John Kerry won the debate hands down, because he stayed on the offense. When President Bush tried to nail Kerry with his vote on the $87 billion supplemental Iraq funding, Kerry built a wall on the criticism by saying he made a mistake when he talked about the war, but the President made a mistake in invading Iraq.

The president's recurring theme? Iraq is "hard work."

Kerry hammered home the fact that Osama bin Laden was cornered in Tora Bora, and instead of having our troops pursue him, Afghan warlords (loyal to nobody but the highest bidder) were sent in to get him. The rest is history.

Several times in the debate, the president seemed frustrated and looked lost in thought as if he was trying to remember what he said in the practice debate. I only remember a couple of moments where Kerry seemed to stumble. In the beginning of the debate, Kerry seemed a little tense but he loosened up as he hit his stride.

For a guy who has a reputation for being "long winded," Kerry's responses were almost always within the time constraints. Going into the debate, I speculated those little lights on the podium would've worked against him.

The priority for any challenger going up against an incumbent president is to pass the does-he-look-like-a-commander-in-chief test. Kerry's previous experience as a prosecutor showed last night. He stayed focused, cool and collected the whole debate and in the end looked more presidential than his opponent.