This November will be the first time I vote in a presidential election, and since my political views often fall somewhere in the middle, I had hoped the first debate could show me whose policies and plans I agreed with.

However, as usual, during the debate it was impossible to tell which candidate “won” and whose facts were accurate.

Kevin Graham, 1320 KFAN’s program director, tweeted after the debate and summed up my sentiments. He tweeted and said he is tired of all politicians and would analyze the debate like a game.

“Team Romney was running an attacking WVU style offense. Team Obama was on their heels looking like a program that has been struggling . . . And the referee (moderator) was clearly a replacement ref losing complete control of the game!” Graham tweeted.

Although Gov. Mitt Romney was definitely on the offense and drove his platform of creating jobs home and President Obama needed a “be aggressive!” pep talk, I think Graham was right to analyze the debate like a game, because it was.

In (probably) an effort to win presentation points, politicians usually substitute facts for half-truths. And the exaggeration excites us because we don’t know how many people will lose health insurance under Obamacare. Even with the noise ban in Denver, I could feel the audience and myself itching to applaud what seemed like straight logos.

When I read FactCheck.org today, though, I learned many of their “facts” were straight bull, or at least half bull.

Out of the six studies Romney claimed disputed the Tax Policy Center’s criticisms Obama referenced, two were blog items by Romney-backers and none were nonpartisan. And Obama’s argument that the Affordable Care Act had caused slower growth in health care spending is bogus, and the rate is not, like he said, at a 50-year-low.

After the debate, I felt as if Romney had won. He stuck to his five-point plan and repeated it often enough that I could recite it by memory. He delivered concise, articulate arguments that made Obama’s ums seem as unprepared as they sounded. But the majority of corrections on FactCheck.org are from Romney’s “facts.”

Choosing a candidate often feels like choosing between two professors with awful ratings on RateMyProfessors.com, and going with the one who everyone seems to hate less (or at least has a pepper). Obama was more truthful, but, since he’s been president, things don’t seem to have gotten much better.

Debates, and politics in general, are like merry-go-rounds. During the ride there’s a thrill of getting whirled around, seeing your surroundings from all different angles. But when you get off, you’re so dizzy, you didn’t go anywhere, and you kind of just want to throw up.