After an exciting debate Tuesday night, our readers shared their thoughts. As with the past two debates— the first presidential and the vice presidential battles— we asked our readers on Facebook to give their one-word takes on the performances of the two candidates.

Mike Segar, Reuters / Landov

Forget about Barack Obama’s eagerly awaited emergence from his first debate coma: the biggest question about the second candidate confrontation centered on whether Mitt managed to maintain his undeniable momentum.After all, a flurry of pre-debate polls showed Romney as the newly minted frontrunner—especially a Gallup survey that gave him a commanding 50-46 percent lead among likely voters in all twelve swing states, including such purportedly impregnable Democratic bastions as Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and (surprise!) New Mexico.

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With five words, Candy Crowley placed herself at the center of Tuesday’s presidential debate—underscoring her determination to restrain the candidates.It was no surprise to anyone who has followed the CNN anchor’s blunt-spoken style that she would try to set the record straight.

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The president had a good outing Tuesday night in Hempstead, Long Island; Mitt Romney, not so much.But my takeaway from the evening pertains this time more to substance than to style. It's really remarkable to me, and disturbing, how little either candidate had to offer on the great economic challenges faced by middle-class Americans.

Mary Altaffer / AP Photo

To my mind, Obama dominated Romney tonight in every single way: in substance, manner, style, and personal appeal. He came back like a lethal, but restrained predator. He was able to defend his own record, think swiftly on his feet, and his Benghazi answer was superb.

Win McNamee / Getty Images

The second presidential debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney, a town-hall affair at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., was a bizarre orgy of testosterone, lies, and silly anecdotes, with moderator Candy Crowley of CNN presiding over the melee like Michael Vick at a dogfight.

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Two presidential debates and no real mention of our troops, despite the ongoing war in Afghanistan.Here’s why: 68 percent of Americans think the war in Afghanistan is going somewhat or very badly, and the same percentage thinks we should withdraw entirely or start drawing down troops now.

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In a debate that mostly favored Barack Obama, one of the president’s more surprising victories came in the segment on the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi, which took the lives of Ambassador Chris Stevens and Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith.

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The town-hall-style showdown between presidential hopefuls Mitt Romney and Barack Obama was facilitated by voters’ questions and filled with lies. From the three-way debate between the candidates and moderator Candy Crowley over the Obama administration’s handling of the U.

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What’s the best balm for weary Democratic nerves, anxious after a shaky first debate performance from President Obama two weeks ago? Why, beer of course, and so a string of bars on Fourth Avenue in south Park Slope, the bluest of neighborhoods in the bluest of cities in the bluest of states, offered drink specials and promised TVs devoted to tonight’s face-off between Obama and Mitt Romney.

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Well, Fox was calling it a draw, and its anchors started blaming Candy Crowley for how it all went down 32 seconds after it ended. Need to know anything else?Obama won the debate. Won it big. Maybe not as big as Romney won the first one, but big enough to be clear.

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Here is a major difference between liberals and conservatives. After President Obama’s abysmal performance in the first debate, liberals were rending their garments and proclaiming everything lost. After Mitt Romney’s equally bad performance on Tuesday night, many conservatives were either declaring him the winner or blaming his loss on Candy Crowley.

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As President Obama’s top aides watched the second debate on television backstage, there were multiple moments of outright jubilation. It was as if their sighs of relief in Hempstead, N.Y. could be heard in the Hamptons."Folks were just ecstatic,” said one person familiar with the scene.

Mary Altaffer / AP Photo

The big question about the second debate of the presidential campaign—and perhaps the entire presidential campaign itself—is this: is this now a contest between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney or Mitt Romney and himself?If it’s the former, Obama won tonight.

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What a delicious debate that was, and how one wished that Candy Crowley could just wave a magic wand and give us an extra half hour (even if that meant being subjected to a few more of those utterly gormless “uncommitted voters” that they seemed to have in abundance at Hofstra.