Debate, 2012 Presidential Election | featured news

For candidates who want to prepare for every possible question that could be thrown at them, the format for Tuesday night's presidential debate is slightly terrifying: It is a town hall-style debate, which means that the questions come from uncommitted voters. When political reporters are posing the questions, the candidates usually have a good idea what to expect. But when members of the public get the chance to weigh in, the candidates can sometimes face curve balls that leave them flummoxed.

The Obama campaign appears to be taking nearly every opportunity ahead of the second presidential debate to tell Americans what to expect from President Obama, while the Romney camp has remained essentially mum – a sharp contrast to the days before the first debate when the parallel strategy was to lower expectations.

Losing ground to Republican Mitt Romney on a host of issues, President Barack Obama faces a serious challenge to put his re-election bid back on track when the two men face off on Tuesday in their second debate.

Paul Ryan debating Joe Biden wasn't quite the same television draw as Sarah Palin versus Biden was four years ago. An estimated 51.4 million people watched Ryan, the Republican challenger, debate Vice President Biden, a Democrat, on Thursday night, said Nielsen, the company that measures television audiences.

Vice President Joe Biden came out on top of Thursday night’s vice presidential debate with Republican challenger Paul Ryan, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll. The energetic Biden claimed a seven-point victory – 42 percent to 35 percent – among registered voters, with a similar margin among independents. Nearly a quarter of registered voters and about a third of independents were unsure who did a better job during the debate at Centre College in Danville, Kentucky.

No surprise here: Joe Biden versus Paul Ryan isn't as popular as Joe Biden versus Sarah Palin. Preliminary ratings for Thursday's vice presidential debate showed that about 43 million people tuned in to watch the coverage across six networks -- ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, MSNBC and CNN. (The numbers will be updated later to include viewing figures from other networks such as PBS and Fox Business Network.)

Vice President Joe Biden has mangled a heaping helping of facts over the years. Despite being newer to presidential campaign politics, Republican Rep. Paul Ryan has already earned something of a reputation for taking flying leaps past reality.

The complete transcript of the 2012 vice presidential debate from Danville, Ky.

Vice President Joe Biden and U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan's 90-plus minute debate Thursday reflected the job they seek -- important but not critical, more like a first-round playoff game than the Super Bowl.