Obama spokesman Bill Burton writes:
According to the transcript, mentions of "middle class"
Obama: 4
McCain: ZERO*
* That's a repeat from the first debate. John McCain has now gone through both debates without mentioning the middle class.
True indeed, though to be fair, McCain did mention "middle income" Americans and "working" families.
UPDATE: Sam Stein has a more thorough word count, which broke down roughly into issues vs. "my friends":
"Tuesday night's presidential campaign lasted 90 minutes and touched on a wide-range of topics. So what did each candidate spend his time discussing? A look at the words uttered during the affair underscores that Barack Obama was more focused on economic issues, the middle class, health care, change, and energy. The Illinois Democrat even talked about foreign policy topics such as Iran, Afghanistan and terrorism more than McCain. One area of focus that McCain hit at more: his 'friends.'"
Here is a list compiled by a Democratic source. The following are the number of times each word or phrase was uttered mentioned during the debate:
MIDDLE CLASS
Obama: 4
McCain: 0
"MY FRIENDS"
Obama: 0
McCain: 19
"AFGHANISTAN"
Obama: 7
McCain: 2
"DEFICIT"
Obama: 2
McCain: 0
"HOMEOWNER"
Obama: 3
McCain: 0
"HEALTH CARE"
Obama: 18
McCain: 6
"CHANGE"
Obama: 13
McCain: 4
"ENERGY"
Obama: 20
McCain: 6
"TERROR/IST/ISM"
Obama: 6
McCain: 2
"IRAN"
Obama: 10
McCain: 6
"PAKISTAN"
Obama: 11
McCain: 8
"BIN LADEN"
Obama: 2
McCain: 1
"9/11"
Obama: 2
McCain: 0
"TROOPS"
Obama: 7
McCain: 2
"DEBT"
Obama: 5
McCain: 1
"TRUST"
Obama: 6
McCain 3
"FUNDAMENTAL"
Obama: 9
McCain: 6