Biden Says McCain Suffered "Fatal" Loss in Debate

ABC News' Matthew Jaffe Reports: Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden accused Sen. John McCain on Friday of suffering a "fatal" loss in the first presidential debate against Sen. Barack Obama earlier in the evening in Oxford, Mississippi.

"I think John was on his strongest turf today and he lost," Biden, D-Del., told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. "And I think it's gonna be fatal."

"Hey look, who was right and who was wrong?" Biden asked. "John McCain was dead wrong on the war. John McCain's been dead wrong in Afghanistan. John McCain's been dead wrong in his judgment supporting Bush's shredding national regulations to control Wall Street."

"A good night for my team" was how the senator summed up the Ole Miss showdown to MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, in another of many post-debate interviews Biden conducted from his Milwaukee hotel.

Biden also claimed Obama had used the foreign policy-focused debate to put to rest any doubts about if he was prepared for the presidency.

"Barack Obama passed the Commander-in-Chief test tonight. I think this is over in terms of that issue," he continued. "I think John was on his strongest turf and he argued about the past - he had no suggestions about the future."

Looking ahead to his own debate next week with McCain's running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Biden said he would like to hear his GOP counterpart echo the statements that McCain made at Friday's much-anticipated Mississippi meeting.

"I hope that she makes the same arguments that John McCain made," Biden said to FOX News' Chris Wallace.

But the long-time Delaware lawmaker cautioned that he would not be "condescending" towards Palin the way he believed McCain had been towards Obama in Oxford.

"Are you going to have trouble not being condescending to her and pointing out that you've been to all these places and she hasn't?" Wallace asked Biden.

"No, no, no," said the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee. "I'm not going to do what John did."

The two vice presidential nominees face off in their one and only debate Thursday at Washington University in St. Louis. Preceding the debate, Biden will campaign alongside Obama this weekend in North Carolina, Virginia, and Michigan.