Did the debate dash Biden's presidential hopes?

Joe Biden may have witnessed the curtain come down on his presidential ambitions from the comfort of his Washington mansion on Tuesday night.

Although CNN had an extra lectern set aside for the vice-president at the debate venue in Las Vegas, it went unused - and the name of the man-who-might-possibly-want-to-run-for-president was never brought up during the course of the evening's proceedings.

The only reminder of the spectre of a Biden candidacy came during a commercial break prior to the start of the debate, when the Draft Biden organisation - that cast of former staffers and campaign operatives without a current home - ran an advert featuring audio from Mr Biden's 2012 Democratic convention speech accompanied by soulful guitar music and black-and-white photos of Mr Biden, Mr Biden with Barack Obama and the stock images of the "everyday Americans" of political lore.

The advert was largely ignored in the morning-after debate round-ups from pundits and analysts, however, as a consensus quickly formed that the vice-president had missed an opportunity to elbow his way into the race.

Hillary Clinton acquitted herself well on the stage and didn't display the kind of glaring weaknesses that could prompt Mr Biden to launch what would be a campaign unprecedented in modern times for its deadline-toeing tardiness.

"Clinton closed what could have been multiple paths for Biden," writes Politico's Edward-Isaac Dovere. "She wove close to the president repeatedly through the debate, minimizing her policy disagreements and all but claiming his endorsement the first time she brought up his name.

Former Clinton campaign manager David Axelrod says the rationale for a Biden candidacy is rapidly diminishing.

"After Tuesday, the calls on him to save the party from a weak front-runner will be more muted," he writes for CNN. "He is running third in the polls, and nothing that happened in Tuesday's debate likely closed that gap."

Even conservatives, many of whom likely cherished the prospect of a protracted Clinton-Biden face-off, were down on the vice-president's prospects.

Obama adviser David Axelrod says Hillary Clinton's debate performance fails to give Joe Biden a clear opening to run

John Podhoretz writes in the New York Post that Mrs Clinton "may have just put the primary away" thanks to a solid debate performance and the decision by her opponents, including populist challenger Bernie Sanders, to pull their rhetorical punches when addressing the former secretary of state.

"The rest of the Democratic field was so pathetically weak, there's no question that a Biden entry would give her a harder time than she had last night," he writes.

"What he needed was Hillary to stumble, to look shifty, to deepen the worry among Democrats that she will not be able to stand up to Republican attacks on her dishonesty and untrustworthiness," he continues. "That didn't happen, in part because of the astounding decision by Sanders to jump on her bandwagon and say no one cares about her emails."

In the National Review, David French has a message for the vice-president: "If you're going to get in the race, you better do it now, because Hillary's looking inevitable again."

The will-he-won't-he saga for Mr Biden's presidential consideration has gone on for more than two months now, and the self-imposed date for when he would announce his intensions has been repeatedly pushed back, from the end of August, to September, to October.

There's already been a few chirps among left-leaning commentators that Mr Biden should just make up his mind already, rather than leave the Democratic race in an unsettled state.

"The game Joe Biden is playing now, in holding back on making his decision and telling us what he plans to do, just has to end, and fast," Greg Sargent wrote last week in the Washington Post. "At best it's becoming a farcical distraction that is beneath him. At worst it's becoming a serious waste of our time."

Mr Biden's indecision is already drawing not-complimentary comparisons to Mario Cuomo's presidential flirtations in 1991, when cameras were fixed on the airplane the then-New York governor had idling at an Albany airport that would have taken him to a presidential announcement in New Hampshire. Mr Cuomo opted not to run, leaving the Democratic nomination path open to a cast of lesser-known candidates, including Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton.

Vice-President Joe Biden could be waiting to see how Hillary Clinton performs during 22 October testimony before Congressman Trey Gowdy's Benghazi committee

The latest word from the Biden camp has the vice-president making his announcement within a week or so. There's some speculation that he's waiting to see how Mrs Clinton will perform during her 22 October public testimony before Republican Congressman Trey Gowdy and his House committee investigating the Benghazi consulate attacks.

"At this point, Biden might as well wait until after the Benghazi hearing, because his asset is as the guy warming up in the bullpen," writes NBC's Chuck Todd and Mark Murray. "The final word on a Biden candidacy might rest in Trey Gowdy's hands."'

During Tuesday night's debate, Mrs Clinton dismissed the committee as a partisan side-show aimed at damaging her approval ratings. Chances are she will be equally unbowed during her Capitol Hill appearance.

If Mr Biden pushes his decision back too much later, he will be in danger of missing the deadline to have his name appear on some state primary ballots. The cut-off for Georgia is 29 October, with more state filing dates in early November.

The clock is ticking for the vice-president, but if the alarm didn't go off before Tuesday night's Las Vegas debate it may never sound.