eorge W. Bush didn't close the sale last night. His answers got weaker and thinner as the evening progressed. But the gaffe journalists were watching for - and the other candidates were hoping for - never materialized. Yeah, he ducked the question about gasoline standards, and he clearly didn't like being asked what he reads. But there was only one home run last night, and it was Bush who hit it. No sooner did Steve Forbes accuse him of ''a betrayal'' for being willing to consider raising the Social Security retirement age than Bush pulled out an old Steve Forbes column that called for - raising the Social Security retirement age.
This is why more writers don't run for president.
A little more humor wouldn't have hurt. There was a comical weirdness to hearing Orrin Hatch plead with the other candidates to ''kind of be like Lincoln and Douglas'' by tooling around New Hampshire and Iowa on a bus together, and to his vow to ''win this election for you'' if only 1 million people will send him $36. But the only genuinely funny line of the evening was John McCain's. Not only would he reappoint Alan Greenspan as chairman of the Federal Reserve, McCain said, but ''should Mr. Greenspan die, I'd do like [they did] in the movie `Weekend at Bernie's' - prop him up and put dark glasses on him.''
McCain knew he'd be getting a question about his reputed temper and the rumors that he is unstable, and he had his riposte ready: ''A comment like that really makes me mad,'' he teased, then segued into his now-standard answer on the temper question: ''Do I feel passionately about issues? Absolutely. When I see the Congress ... spend $6 billion on unnecessary, wasteful pork barrel spending ...''
Bottom line? Bush didn't do himself any harm, McCain did himself some good. It's a two-man race for sure now. And it's going to get tighter before it's over.
Jeff Jacoby is a Globe columnist.
