The Postgame

We'll write a lot more about this tomorrow, but for now, our first impressions on tonight's Worcester 3rd House Democratic debate:

Simply, a win for Stephen DiNatale. He picked it up in the second half, both in energy and substance.

In some areas, we were trying to gauge depth of knowledge. Like with the health care question. Everyone knew the basics, but substantial areas of change/preservation were missing. Duly noted by us.

We wanted someone to take a stand against how the Legislature pushed the vote on gay marriage after election day. DiNatale sort of apologized for the Legislature for it, Whitney ignored it, and LeBlanc didn't really take a stand. Sigh.

In the end, there wasn't a lot of difference, particularly in local aid (more, please) and taxes (don't cut 'em).

They go at it again next week, and the pressure will be on Whitney and LeBlanc. They didn't really chip away at DiNatale's air of inevitability. He was well-prepared and picked it up in the backstretch and won going away, in our view. Twelve days to go.

Your thoughts? You know where to put them.