1. Jerry Lawler proved he was no circus freak; Robert “Prince Mongo” Hodges proved he was.
2. Carol Chumney and Kenneth Whalum Jr., both of whom can be quite engaging, each, when asked about difficulties with colleagues, gave the game away with downright scratchy, even snarly answers.
3. This contest, insofar as there is one, is going toward a face-off between A C Wharton and Myron Lowery — the highly diverting Chumney-A C scrap notwithstanding.
4. Wanda Halbert sounded a bit canned, but at least she was prepared — unlike poor sweet Sharon Webb.
5. Charles Carpenter proved serious but unexciting, not a bad combination for someone already in office but difficult for a candidate having to make up a lot of ground just to get there.
6. A little bit of Mongo goes a very long way. He lawyered up with Leslie Ballin to force his way in; A C was tempted to drop out because of it but stayed in.
7. The WMC-TV folks worked hard; they and the League of Women Voters designed a format with enough variance to crack any walnut.
8. Channel 5’s brass promised that Mongo’s “turd” remark would stay in the replays, unbleeped. Good for them.
9. All the candidates revealed something important about themselves, for better and for worse.
10. Twitter got a workout and proved itself again, but, for all the tweeted hoots and howls, there was a good deal of intelligence buried in the crevices of the questions and answers, requiring a second or even a third hearing to fully grasp — one reason why your visitor (a panelist for the evening) will deliver a more elaborate judgment a little later. (Not that much later.)
10a. (Ignore everything you’ve just read. It could all be overhauled upon further review).
