DailyKos argues that Obama won the most important part of the debate: winning in the minds of independent and undecided voters.

Pundits give way too much credence to the idea that the aggressor in a debate wins. Partisans like aggression, but that is not what independent voters are looking for this year. They want Josiah Bartlett, not Col. Nathan Jessup. In addition to the “Obama won the insta-polls” idea (see Mark Blumenthal for Debate Reaction: What’s a Win?), the LA Times/Bloomberg, Gallup and R2K improvements suggest Obama did himself some good; for those who need to see the numbers, they are there for Obama and not McCain.

As evidence, it quotes the LA Times/Bloomberg poll:

Obama was seen as more “presidential” by 46% of the debate watchers, compared with 33% for McCain.

The difference is even more pronounced among debate watchers who were not firmly committed to a candidate: 44% said they believed Obama looked more presidential, whereas 16% gave McCain the advantage.