Far from shying away from debate, President Jiang had clearly prepared for the pointed exchanges.

And it has led to some of the most pointed exchanges of the Republican campaign so far.

Running through several of the candidates' pointed exchanges yesterday were the strains not just of this primary race, but of New York's volatile electorate.

"Jersey," says Carter breathlessly after a pointed exchange about fossils versus the Bible, "you don't want to be atheist, do you?"

There have been some pointed exchanges during the cross-examination, which began Friday.

Today's votes came after a long night of debate that saw some pointed exchanges on the state of modern politics.

It kept on like that for hours - pointed exchange after pointed exchange, with attempts at peacemaking mixed in.

After a pointed exchange about earnings with Qwest on Business Week's letters page, she said, the same thing happened again.

But few Chinese are apt to learn about this telling moment because the pointed exchange was not mentioned at all in the news coverage here.

But some of the most pointed exchanges over military weapons and strategy also became entangled in parochial concerns.