BBC NEWS | World | Americas | World tunes in to Bush-Kerry debate — Here’s an interesting summary of world reportage on the debate.

Events in the hall looked more like a well-rehearsed TV show than a clash between genuinely irreconcilable opponents.

Russian NTV Mir television

But if you want to see a full-frontal blast read this opinion piece that ran on the CBS News site. These folks are going make sure the million dollar booby fine is going to come out of Bush’s hide.

“They can run but they can’t hide,” the great heavyweight champ Joe Louis used to say of his hapless opponents, but up until last night, George W. Bush was doing a pretty fair job of both running and hiding. Indeed, to a considerable degree, he was running ahead because Karl Rove had hidden him from any possible confrontation with critics — and with the truth.

Until last night. Not a moment too soon, Kerry shucked the Senate-speak, abandoned the adverbs, stopped depending on dependent clauses, and, in plain and forceful English, stated how Bush had put the nation at risk and had no plan whatever to extricate us from Iraq. Nobody had talked this way to Bush — in public, anyway — since Bush became president. And Bush did not handle it very well at all.

He blinked. He squirmed. He scowled. He repeated his lines ad nauseam.

Ouch.