My thoughts on this whole thing -- took me a while to word it correctly and it's boring, but I figured I might as well jump in.
In raising our kids, I thought it would be something special to have ol' Dad do something corny during their birthday parties that they could talk about (and have a few good guffaws over) when they got older. I decided to do some hokey magic tricks.
In the course of my study for this task, I checked out a few magic shops, went to a few meetings of a magic club in my area, and got to know a few folks who did things professionally (two were actually members of the Magic Castle).
Anyway, my expertise at handling things went to the level of actually making a little comedy routine at my ineptness -- such as dropping the cards, getting the rope gag hopelessly tied up in knots, and letting a roll of coins spill out of my sleeve. Then when I got them laughing at this, there were a few gags I pulled off successfully to the amazement of all.
All of this is irrelevent to what went on in the debates, except for some of the things I learned and I used these minor skills to take a look at the start of the debates on the C-SPAN file I downloaded. Herewith are my amateur observations:
1)After the introductions Kerry is late getting on stage; W strides purposfully towards the center of the stage. But seeing Kerry delayed his entrance, it forced W to walk left of center (hidden meaning) and meet Kerry by his podium.
2) After the handshake (which seems that Kerry was holding on to W's hand and seemed to make W break away from) W has a long walk back to his podium; Kerry waves at the audience with a big grin on his face. My take: a deception to have those looking at him focus on his face and big smile acknowledgment of his "fans". He wastes time here apparently glorying in the adulation of the huddled masses of his fans in the audience. However ...
3) Here's where the red flag went up when I viewed this -- some old traits just kicked in when I saw it. After Kerry seems to say a word or two of general thanks to the audience, and giving them a wave, he's giving W time to near his podium. Just about the time that W is giving us a side view, Kerry decides to break off the acceptance of the adulation and decides to go to his perch. This could just be innocent, however, the timing might force many to look in W's direction as he is the one beginning to face the audience, now, and Kerry's back is to the audience -- so, hopefully, people might divert their attention momentarily, to W.
4) Now Kerry is approaching his podium with the podium on his right side back towards audience and Lehrer. (The C-Span camera cuts away to a rear view, which I don't think Kerry was expecting, but whatever.) By this time, however, W is at his podium and almost fully facing the audience. Unless you're a die-hard Kerry fan, you'll probably be looking at W because, due to his hesitation, Kerry is only about 1/4 or so into his turn towards his podium, and his hand is deep within his jacket.
5) OK, back to the action. Just before this, as he (Kerry) is walking back to begin his turn to the podium, his back is towards the audience, his left hand is inside of his jacket. He begins his turn by swinging his left leg around and pivoting on his right foot. His hand is well within his coat by this time. As Kerry continues his swing to the podium, his right hand is still down. (Notice when W went around his podium his left hand came up to rest on the podium and as he came to face the audience his right hand also came up to the podium.)
6) Now W is facing the audience, Kerry is about 1/2 way into his pirouette towards the podium. He's got a big grin on his face and he's looking at W (might be a diversion to get people to look at W -- that's iffy). Kerry keeps grinning and looking at W until he's whipped out whatever it is he's got in his mitt. But whatever it is, he's got it down on the podium a fraction of a second before he takes his eyes off of W. Then he looks down to the podium and appears to be "smoothing" or "arranging" something on the podium. He's still a grinnin' and he mumbles something, his hands still arranging things on the podium.
Anyway, fait accompli. By this time Lehrer is putting his hands out in the prearranged signal for the kids to quiet down, and things progress from there. In my non-professional assessment of this slight-of-hand, Kerry was fair to good. Should have practiced his timing more. I would have made sure that by the time I had "it" out of my jacket, my left hand would have made it below the top of the podium to ensure I didn't "flash" it to the audience. You can always distract by bringing up your right hand to the side of the podium, or distract with eye contact, whatever. Anyway, I think his timing was just a wee bit off. But the bottom line is, I don't think he was expecting that rear camera -- perhaps he saw it, or it's red light, and hesitated just a tad in his motion. Either way, the rear camera would have caught it -- and it did.
I haven't been able to find a front camera view of this entire charade. Perhaps I'd reassess my thinking if I could. But it sure appeared as a fairly well-practiced slight to me.
That's it for me ... this thread is probably closed by now anyway LOL ... </rambling>