The Republicans sounded as if they were reading old copy from Ronald Reagan’s debate book. They reminded us of Senator John McCain’s quip during a visit to The Times when we asked why none of his party’s candidates wanted to be seen as George W. Bush’s heir. “We’re all still trying to be Reagan’s heir,” he said.

On domestic policy, the Republicans offered trickle-down bromides, with the exception of Mr. Paul, who wants to scrap the tax code. The others touted the power of tax cuts to boost the economy, an odd dissonance when Americans see economic woes all around them. They spoke reverently of unregulated business, when Americans know the Bush administration’s failures to regulate are at the root of the mortgage crisis that is driving the economy toward recession and are the reason they have to worry about lead in their children’s toys and poison in pet food.

The Democrats fell over each other proclaiming their opposition to continuing those tax cuts. Unlike the Republicans, who never mentioned it, the Democrats took on the mortgage crisis, saying it demonstrated the need to regulate the banks that made irresponsible loans and the investment firms that profited from them.

Except again for Mr. Paul, the Republicans tried to outbid the others’ commitment to staying the course in Iraq. That included Mike Huckabee, who defended his criticism of Mr. Bush’s foreign policy as “arrogant,” but offered no new ideas on how to manage Mr. Bush’s arrogantly mismanaged war. We hardly expected calls for withdrawal, but none of the five who support the war offered the slightest sense of how to achieve the victory they said they wanted.

The four Democrats debated ideas for ending the war, a service to American voters who overwhelmingly want it to end. Hillary Clinton, struggling for purchase against Barack Obama, who now owns the “change agent” mantle, came to life over this issue. She called for withdrawal but sensibly said it must be done carefully, and that Americans have to accept the consequences.