Polls declare different victors in VP debate
Cheney, Edwards debate wide-ranging issues
 |  Vice President Dick Cheney, Sen. John Edwards and PBS' Gwen Ifill speak during the vice presidential debate in Cleveland. |
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 VIDEO |
 CNN's Judy Woodruff wraps up the vice presidential debate.
 Debate between Cheney and Edwards (Part 1)
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PUNDITS' DEBATE BLOGS |
 Rips and raves from the VP debate
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| DEBATE DATES |  Friday
Second presidential debate: Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri
October 13
Third presidential debate: Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona
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CLEVELAND, Ohio (CNN) -- The spin-makers worked hard Wednesday to declare their respective candidates victors in the vice presidential debate, but snap polls after the forum indicated differing results.
An ABC News snap poll showed that Vice President Dick Cheney came out on top for 43 percent of the registered voters asked.
Thirty-five percent of respondents said Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards won the debate, and 19 percent of those surveyed called it a tie. Thirty-eight percent of the viewers were Republicans, 31 percent Democrats, the rest independents. (Special Report: America Votes 2004, Poll Tracker)
The ABC survey was conducted by telephone among a random-sample panel of 509 registered voters who watched the vice-presidential debate. The results have a 4.5-point error margin.
A CBS News poll specifically focused on uncommitted voters and found 41 percent of respondents said they deemed Edwards the winner, 28 percent chose Cheney, and 31 percent said it was a tie.
CBS based its poll on a "nationally representative sample of 178 debate watchers ... who are either undecided about who to vote for or who have a preference but say they could still change their minds." The margin of error is 7 percentage points.
In a speech Wednesday in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, President Bush praised Cheney's performance and joked about the differences between his running mate's and Edwards' characteristics. (Bush hits Kerry on security, economy)
"America saw two very different versions of our country and two different hairdos. I didn't pick my vice presidential candidate for his hairdo, I picked him for his judgment, his experience," Bush said.
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry called his running mate after the debate to tell him he did a great job.
"The country tonight got a chance to feel the confidence that I have with you and now they have confidence in you," he told Edwards. "They felt the strength, they felt the clarity. You were so strong on the facts. They keep distorting things, and I look forward to going out and just taking on those distortions."
Edwards said Wednesday that neither he nor Cheney "won" the debate.
"The American people won because they got to see the same thing they saw Thursday night (in the presidential debate), which is I sat a few feet from Vice President Cheney and he continues to be unwilling to level with the American people, unwilling to be straight about what's happening in Iraq, unwilling to be straight about no connection between Saddam Hussein and 9/11, and minimal connection between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda," he said.
Officials with both campaigns, unsurprisingly, declared their man the winner.
"John Edwards did tremendously well here. I think that Vice President Cheney came off sort of grumpy and angry. I think that John Edwards was substantive and ranged widely around all kinds of issues. I think it was an interesting discussion, but I think John Edwards came off, by far, the better," said Mary Beth Cahill, who manages the campaign of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.
Marc Racicot, chairman of President Bush's re-election campaign, said the vice president "proved once again that substance will always trump campaign rhetoric."
"Vice President Dick Cheney won tonight because he countered rhetoric with the facts -- calling into question not just the deficiencies of Kerry's record, but calling into question Kerry and Edwards' credibility as candidates and as U.S. senators," Racicot said in a statement on the Bush campaign Web site.
Gergen: A draw
David Gergen, a former White House adviser to Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton, called the forum a draw -- as opposed to last week's presidential debate.
"The vice president ... used argument more skillfully, I must say, than the president. He had his facts, especially on the international side, well in order. He made some ... strong, I thought, pointed comments about the other side," Gergen said Tuesday.
"John Edwards, by contrast, did not have the electricity nor is he as unexpectedly good as John Kerry was. He often ducked the questions in the beginning. I thought he became much more effective on the domestic questions," he added.
And those who -- like the campaigns' representatives -- had reason to show strong biases, did just that.
"I think my dad's performance last night made very clear the challenges that the country faced," said Liz Cheney, the vice president's daughter. "He made very clear the problems with Senator Kerry's record."
"Also, I think he very effectively made the point that you can't expect to sort of talk tough in a 90-minute debate and obscure the record of the last 20 years, where Senator Kerry has really been wrong on every important national security issue facing the nation," she told CNN's "American Morning."
Cate Edwards, John Edwards' daughter, said her father's and John Kerry's records speak for themselves.
"But also that I think my dad mentioned last night, Dick Cheney's record and George Bush's record over the past four years, and Cheney's record over the past 25 years or however long he's been around, really does show that they don't know how to lead, that they are not making the choices that Americans want them to make," she said.
Copyright 2004 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Associated Press contributed to this report.
