I thought Khan was very good and very bad.
I thought Kenney was very slick. If you polled people on who the professional politician was after watching that debate I think they'd pick Kenney hands down. He's the most polished of the group. Negative debate factor though was his exasperations from the sidelines.
Notley did not sound authoritative enough. Meak? Her attacks outside of the education critic subjects were not landing like I think she thought they would. I think Khan did a better job of attacking Kenney and part of that is he did it with a bit less frequency.
Mandel seemed very much at ease. From my seat, way too at ease. Policies sounded fine enough, but he was vulnerable to attack and I think specifically being nailed by Khan about turning down opioid assistance money from the Federal government landed like a howitzer in that room. He was shellshocked.
As a format I actually thought it was pretty good. There was cross talk but I think it was tolerable and within the confines of civility. Didn't like how Notley continued to talk through the moderator intervention to get her point in, especially when it's just completing a line from your comms strategy, but otherwise I thought there was enough restraint from the candidates and effective moderation from the moderator.
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