of the “Civic Forum” Rick Warren hosted on Saturday night at Saddleback Church. Mr. Obama really had no chance:

The Obama-McCain evening, being a stepchild of conservative beliefs, was stacked against Obama, or any secularist, Democrat or not. Indeed, it was stacked against anyone who understands the basic reason for separating church and state, which is to keep closed the box of religious divisiveness that Reagan sprang open. As a performance, neither candidate displayed either the unvarnished truth or unblemished integrity. The real message that was meant to come across from Obama was “I really am American,” and from McCain was “I’m really right as Reagan.” Viewer’s notes: Dull pandering to the audience from both sides. Lots of mention of Jesus, sin, faith, prayer. McCain came off as more prepared and polished in his responses. He went for Reagan’s easy folksy confidence, catering to the audience’s craving for moral simplicity. His answer to the question “Is there evil and how to deal with it?” was typical: “Yes, there is evil and we will defeat it.” Obama said, roughly, “Yes there is evil, and we can’t hope to defeat it on our own, but we can be soldiers for the Lord to do what we can.”  (Chris’s note: That is not what he said, Deepak. He said “Evil does exist. I mean, I think we see evil all the time. We see evil in Darfur. We see evil, sadly, on the streets of our cities. . . . It has to be confronted squarely . . . . I think [it] is very important for to us have some humility in how we approach the issue of confronting evil, because a lot of evil’s been perpetrated based on the claim that we were trying to confront evil. . . . in the name of good. . . . [J]ust because we think that our intentions are good, doesn’t always mean that we’re going to be doing good.”)

For McCain, it’s all as simple as what Reaganism carved out almost thirty years ago: Gay marriage is bad, abortion is bad, activist judges are bad. Winning in Iraq is good, getting Osama bin Laden is good, offshore oil drilling is good, and freedom is great. Obama talked about the hard work and sacrifices we need to make in order to overcome energy dependence and academic mediocrity, also the respect we need to accord others on the abortion issue–not quite as stirring as reactionary platitudes. 
In short, McCain appealed to our escapist magical morality, Obama appealed to reason and practicalities. That has been the story throughout the campaign.