As noted in last night’s “Red Meat,” if you entered last night’s debate knowing nothing about the two candidates, you might think that Obama was the Republican, or at the very least, the fiscally conservative, hawkish, pro-drilling one.

Obama said:

“You’ll hear Sen. McCain say, well, he’s proposing a whole bunch of new spending, but actually I’m cutting more than I’m spending so that it will be a net spending cut.”
“I want to go line by line through every item in the federal budget and eliminate programs that don’t work and make sure that those that do work, work better and cheaper.”
“I believe in the need for increased oil production. We’re going to have to explore new ways to get more oil, and that includes offshore drilling.”
“If you make less than a quarter of a million dollars a year, you will not see a single dime of your taxes go up. If you make $200,000 a year or less, your taxes will go down.”
“We cannot allow Iran to get a nuclear weapon. It would be a game-changer in the region. Not only would it threaten Israel, our strongest ally in the region and one of our strongest allies in the world, but it would also create a possibility of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of terrorists… we will never take military options off the table. And it is important that we don’t provide veto power to the United Nations or anyone else in acting in our interests.”

Meanwhile, the Republican candidate was declaring:

“As president of the United States, Alan, I would order the secretary of the treasury to immediately buy up the bad home loan mortgages in America and renegotiate at the new value of those homes — at the diminished value of those homes and let people be able to make those — be able to make those payments and stay in their homes. Is it expensive? Yes. But we all know, my friends, until we stabilize home values in America, we’re never going to start turning around and creating jobs and fixing our economy.”

On the other hand, we did get a smoker telling us about the benefits of preventative health care.