I analyzed the Democrat candidates’ ability to answer a question the most recent debate. The goal is the same as it was when I analyzed the Republican candidates in their third debate and the Democrats in their second debate. If you’re looking for the analysis of the YouTube debate, you can find it here.

Who among them is most likely to answer the question asked?

Who prefers giving hollow answers by speaking about a question but never actually answering it?

Who’s given to avoiding the question altogether?

I also don’t evaluate the merits of the candidates’ answers because that’s for you to decide.

Tavis Smiley, the PBS moderator did a hell of a lot better than Wolf Blitzer did in the CNN debates. Some of the questions could have been clearer but he made sure every candidate had a chance to answer each question and kept anyone from monopolizing the air-time. I hope PBS is also moderating a Republican debate.

I reviewed the debate transcript and broke down the candidate’s responses into five categories and valued them accordingly:

• 4 points = clearly answered a direct question
• 3 points = clearly answered a question posed to another candidate
• 2 points = gave an empty answer to a direct question by discussing the subject without answering the question
• 1 point = gave an empty answer to a question posed to another candidate
• 0 points = Didn’t address the question subject at all

I also didn’t give any points for clearly taking a position on a question that nobody asked. And now on to the awards ceremony.

The Straight Talk Award for being the one most likely to give a clear answer to a question goes to…

1. Joe Biden (67% likely)
2. John Edwards & Bill Richardson (tie 60%)
3. Barack Obama, Dennis Kucinich, & Chris Dodd (tie 50%)
4. Mike Gravel (44%)
5. Hillary Clinton (40%)

It would appear Joe Biden broke out from the middle of the pack last time to take the award but you would be wrong. He was actually less forthcoming in than in the previous debate (77% likely). It’s that everybody else was so much more evasive than they were last time. John Edwards tied again for second, as he did in the last debate, for the Straight Talk award. Consistency in his case is a good thing. Hillary Clinton’s consistency was not.

The DC Shuffle Award for the second time in a row goes to Hillary Clinton for being most likely to give an evasive answer than a clear one. I wondered aloud after the last debate whether her first award was just a poor showing or part of a larger trend. Hillary’s starting to appear deliberately slippery. Mike Gravel also gets the award for also being more likely to not answer the question asked. This a complete reversal for Gravel who actually won the Straight Talk award last debate. His answers are beginning to sound like those of a grumpy old man with painful dentures.

The Penn & Teller Award goes to the one who is most likely to give the illusion of answering a question without actually doing so. I call them empty answers. And the winner is:

1. Mike Gravel (44% likely)
2. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, & Dennis Kucinich (tie 40%)

The Buck Stops Here Award for never avoiding a question goes an impressive number of candidates: Nobody. This was the most interesting category this debate because every single candidate failed to discuss, much less answer, the second question.

The second question discussed what they attributed to the fact that black high school dropouts were significantly more likely to be unemployed that white dropouts. This question is clearly about racism in the workplace yet every single candidate failed to understand that. Everyone started speaking about education, how that needed to improve and what they were going to do about it. I think we can all safely assume that most high school dropouts are poorly educated but that wasn’t the subject. All the candidates heard what they wanted to hear and spoke to that instead.

The Put Up or Shut Up Award for never giving an empty answer went unclaimed again. In fact, the percentage of empty answers were about double what they were in the last Democratic debate. The hollow platitudes just keep coming in.

I’m not handing out a Moderator’s Pet Award for who gets asked the most questions because they all were asked the exact same questions. Tavis did a great job here. He also made sure that none of them dominated the airtime and that each got there fair share. Chris Dodd’s website didn’t even bother to produce a Talk Clock because of it.

If you want to know more about any of the candidates, all their websites are here.

The analysis metrics for this debate are here.