Presidential debate numero dos

I caught part of it on the radio and part of it on T.V. In all I thought it was actually pretty uneventful. Both candidates did fairly pitifully. One person asked a question about the energy crisis and global warming. McCain had a decent answer about a focus on nuclear power. Obama responded with something like uh... wind... solar... 5 million new jobs. For being a big issue, it was an amazing poor answer. The same goes for McCain on Social Security and Medicare. His answer came down to, hey I'll reach across the aisle... I'll pull in the smartest people... I have no plan right now, but give me a shot and I'll have smart people come up with one. Weak at best. Obama ducked the same question, just so that he didn't have to explain that he didn't have an answer. Nice.

Oh, by the way, HATED McCain's mortgage bailout idea. Since when does the government have the power to re-negotiate private contracts?

Ugh. I'm watching the global economy slip into the abyss and Obama is rambling on about expanding the Peace Corps to reduce the burden on our military. Huh?

Really? These are the two best guys for this EXTREMELY important job?

Can we go back to the primaries real quick?

This scene came to mind a couple of times last night. Classic.

Palin v. Biden

Yesterday afternoon I picked up the boys and took them to baseball practice. We were early, so we practiced pop flies. Both of them were really doing better when we finished. Then they had their regular practice and I watched a little bit as I practiced my kidstuf script. It’s only four pages this week, so it isn’t bad at all and my friend Rich is in the skit with me as Chef Bean. It should be great, the kids will love it. In fact the whole show this month is not only very interesting, but don’t right hilarious. I highly advise attending if you can (5pm Sunday night). Brandi had a singing practice that started during kidstuf rehearsal and didn’t finish until later, so I took the boys home and put them to bed at about 8:30. SO, all of that to say that I didn’t get to watch the debate as it happened. My good friend J, was texting me with updates, and from his messages, I was not very encouraged.

However, I did catch most of the debate on CNN’s re-run last night and I have to say I thought it was pretty good. I actually thought Joe Biden was “Good Joe” last night. He didn’t stick his foot in his mouth as he is very prone to doing. His answers were pretty clear and he spoke from experience. Unfortunately Palin didn’t really hammer him on the plethora of mistakes that he has made and continues to make, but that’s okay she didn’t need to. I thought Palin was good, not great, she did duck some questions, something that B and I both noticed. But she was VERY charming. In fact I think by the end of the debate Biden was ready to ask for her number. She showed a lot of confidence, humor and poise. She almost carried some things a little too far. I’m not sure how people are going to take the winking at the camera and the little shake on the “drill, baby, drill” (see video below), but all in all I was definitely pleased. At the end of the debate B asked why they have debates. I said it’s a chance for somebody to really mess up, or somebody to really say something unique, profound or even funny. Really it’s suppose to be about presenting the different positions of the parties, but unfortunately they don’t historically hold much sway in that fashion. You can definitely lose ground in a debate, but you can rarely pull out an election victory from a debate. Other than Palin’s charm, I don’t think much will be remembered from this debate (she’s the only candidate that I have ever seen give a wink to the camera and even a ‘shout out’ to her brother’s third grade class).



***Update : I just watched the clip again. I forgot this is where she called him Senator Obiden. I like it. :)

***Also, as I was watching last night I already started laughing, knowing that the SNL skit this week should be pretty funny.

I thought debate moderators were suppose to be impartial

So how does it look when the debate moderator for the VP debate tomorrow night is about to publish a book with the words 'in the Age of Obama' in the title?

Here she is covering the RNC. No smile. Shaking her head. Obviously disgusted at the energy in the room, at the way Palin landed full on body blows to her book subject, and very thinly veiling her repulsion at having to attend Sarah Palin's first speech where she performed amazingly.



Now watch this promo video for her upcoming book. Do you think it is possible that the selected moderator for this debate has a vested interest in seeing Obama and hence, Biden, win?


The Breakthrough: Gwen Ifill - The most amazing home videos are here

Here they come!!

The debates that is. Just in case you haven't set your calendar or DVR yet. Here are the dates and locations of the debates. All of them start at 9pm ET.

First presidential debate:Friday, September 26University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS
Vice presidential debate:Thursday, October 2Washington University in St. Louis, MO
Second presidential debate:Tuesday, October 7Belmont University, Nashville, TN
Third presidential debate:Wednesday, October 15Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY

ABC Democratic Debate

It was an interesting debate last night, despite what the media may be saying about it this morning. I have to admit that I didn't get to watch the whole thing, but the parts that I saw really impressed me.

Well, let me clarify. The candidates did not impress me at all. I thought Hillary certainly did better than Obama and looked a lot more relaxed and composed than he did. I've noticed when he gets nervous when he doesn't have a teleprompter egging him on and he stands very straight up, chin out, lips pursed... like he's holding in some really substantial gas. She looked really good, very confident, but not as arrogant as he did. Interesting. Anyway, back to my point. I was really impressed with the Charlie Gibson and George Stefanopolis. They actually asked some tough questions and then probed deeper when they got the typical "duck". At one point Charlie would not let Barrack up about his proposed changes to Social Security, which of course would lead to a tax increase, but Obama did not want to admit that. Charlie finally just bluntly said, "that's a tax increase." I saw both candidates squirm quite a bit. Obama a little more than Clinton because he quite frankly can deliver a great speech, but when it comes to answering tough questions, he doesn't know where to turn since his aids can't throw some stuff up on the screen to help him out.

I enjoyed it.

I am very curious, once the democrats finally pick their candidate, how the real debates will go. I would hope that the questioning would be even tougher. I would hope that it would be more substantive so the American people can see the HUGE difference in policies between McCain and the unnamed other guy/gal. On several of the questions last night, someone from a conservative perspective could have opened up a gaping hole in their arguments.

The real debates could be pretty entertaining.

Debate last night

I know all of you had to be glued to the TV last night for the two hour debate on CNN. Fortunately I was too. Surprisingly enough this was the first debate that I have actually watched and I must say that I was not dissappointed. It was a good debate and you saw the plus and minuses of most of the candidates. However, there are some things that need to be observed.

Number one the questions were supposed to be from undecided Republicans, although at least three of the questioners have already been exposed THIS MORNING as openly supporting DEMOCRATIC candidates. I think that CNN needs to up their game. I find it amazing that some diligent bloggers can discover (before the debate was even OVER) that some of these guys are dem plants and CNN couldn't in their days or weeks of planning. The dinosaur media needs to realize that if they want to play this game and not be totally embarassed then they better be as good or better with the NEW media as they are the OLD media.

Secondly I thought that a couple of the candidates did particularly poorly. Romney I thought came off very political... very snake oil salesmanish. I thought he got plugged hard on a couple of questions and I thought the bickering between he and Guiliani hurt them both. Rudy also got hammered on issues where he is week. Rudy is not a conservative at all and I think that was VERY apparent last night. I thought Duncan Hunter did well and I thought Huckabee was great, although he did not get the air time that I thought he should.

Thirdly I though they gave an UNREASONABLE amount of air time to Ron Paul. The guy's a kook. He's not a conservative, he's a libertarian and everyone knows he's kooky, so STOP directing questions to him just because he is the ONLY Republican candidate who would immediately withdraw the troops. Along with support for Israel and any other foreign country. Disband the CIA, IRS(not a bad idea), the Department of Homeland Security, most of the State Department and leave the country in... well chaos. I still cannot figure out why they gave him so much time. Strange.

In all, I had a blast. I know, I'm sick, but I LOVE watching this stuff.