Despite the criticism of the town hall format, in many ways the second presidential debate was more substantive than the first session, and dramatically more so than the vice presidential debate last week. (I mean the real one, not the SNL version). Political junkies often say the town hall debate just regurgitates old news, but for many voters who haven't been paying attention and are just starting to think about the candidates, that's useful information. (Even more useful, if we may be so bold, is our Voter's Survival Kit, which points out many of the facts that the candidates skated over in the debate.)

We're also continuing our video commentary in partnership with VoterWatch's Blogging the Debates project. In the embedded video below, you can see our analysis of what the candidates were saying as you watch the debate video. Plus, you can get all our debate-related material, including transcripts of what the candidates said, and much more, at our new Debates 2008 page.