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So, the debates.

Jill

Everyone is talking about how Sarah Palin did well. And she did do well — for Sarah Palin. But that isn’t saying much. It reminds me of the day after the first Bush-Kerry debate — expectations were so incredibly low for the Republican candidate’s performance that when they didn’t set the stage on fire, it was considered a blinding success.

So no, Palin didn’t choke, and didn’t do a repeat of her horrendous Katie Couric interview. But she didn’t seem too big on actually answering the questions, and that tends to annoy people — especially political moderates and independents who don’t have their minds made up and want to hear actual substance (and it looks like independents did prefer Joe Biden). Plus her entire presentation could have just been summed up with, “Allow me to refer you to my talking points.”

A lot of people have been arguing that the focus on Palin is over-emphasized, because at the end of the day, voters are looking at the top of the ticket, not the VP. But every election has its quirks, and I think in this one, Palin is significant (I don’t think Biden really is, though). I don’t think Palin is getting a whole lot of people to switch over from the Obama camp to the McCain side, but I do think that she’ll get out a fair number of voters who, if McCain had picked many other of his top VP choices, would have stayed home on election day. And I think her debate performance matters to those folks.

You can watch the debate here, either in full or by topic (kind of a handy tool). Or if you want the Cliff Notes version, here’s the debate in 10 easy minutes:

What did you all think? Did anyone else want to throw something at the TV when they were talking about same-sex marriage and “tradition”?

50 thoughts on So, the debates.

  2. 1. She avoided responding to Biden’s question about whether deregulation would have the same effect on Healthcare that it had on Wall Street.

    2. She got serious when Gwen Ifill asked about Nuclear Weapons. Her whole face changed, She looked visibly shaken. It seemed like she just realized the republican party could wield earth-destroying power and kill or maim thousands of people — through her.

    A few minutes later, she wiped a finger under the rim of her glasses (an itch? a tear?), and after that, she mentioned the word Humanitarian for the first time. As a Christian, you can be a conservative, even a Republican, but you can’t be a tool for just anybody. I hope her values give her some backbone.

    3. She doesn’t believe that McCain will have to cut funds from any of his programs to make up for the Wall Street Bailout. As if his budget is still perfectly balanced despite the nation’s trillion dollar emergency.

  3. Did anyone else want to throw something at the TV when they were talking about same-sex marriage and “tradition”?

    Yes. And my girlfriend went on a 10 minute rant this morning via Gchat about it. Sigh.

    I thought Palin was unimpressive. No, she didn’t completely choke, but her winking, coupled with the repetition of “you betcha” and “darn right” and her tendency to make her attacks on Biden and Obama seem self-deprecating (“Oh, it’s clear I really am a Washington outsider and just don’t understand how you all do things around here”) make it really difficult for me to see her as anything but exploitative. She uses the stereotypes of women as submissive, simpering little things to make her points, but it undermines her credibility for me.

    Sadly, I’m not the average American voter, and I’m sure that her tactics work elsewhere. Ugh.

  4. Did anyone else want to throw something at the TV when they were talking about same-sex marriage and “tradition”?

    Yes, and I was so disappointed with Bidens answer, I expect no different from my best friend is gay Palin. The woman completely irritated me with her refusal to answer questions, the false smile from the tightly clenched mouth. I was also upset with her portrayal of herself as middle class. How many governors of a state or Middle Class…phuuuleeze.

  5. The same-sex marriage thing pissed me the fuck off. It didn’t surprise me, though.

    But other than that, I really did think that Biden did phenomenally. It’s a shame that you’re right about the overall lack of VP influence over the debate, because he was great and had me applauding at the TV multiple times. He really had the “attack without being snarky or exasperated” thing down.

    The line about lighting the stage on fire made me laugh . . . because it’s totally true. For both Palin and Bush.

  6. There were two things that made me want to throw stuff at the TV

    1) NUCULAR? nucular? I swear to G-d republicans are consciously adopting it to try to make it an acceptable usage so that George W. Bush looks smarter in retrospect

    2) She went on and on about the need to regulate Wall St and then went straight on to tax cuts and government-bashing. You can’t have it both ways. If you want the government to regulate Wall St you’re going to have to give them the money and person-power to do it.

  7. as hard as it was, i decided to try to give her the benefit of the doubt, i don’t know why…someone just shoot me. i made it to the first wink, you know the one, totally directed to the camera, ie the males in the audience… i had to resist the urge to puke. i guess she has used that particular flirty female wink to get over on men and get as far as she has…. i won’t go on about the non-substance of her answers. it was the same ole same ole to me. what in the hell was she doing when she was holed up at mccain’s ranch? i thought she was being schooled? apparently not.

  8. The ONLY time I screamed at the TV (I did very well!) was the whole, “Marriage has traditionally been about one man and one woman!”

    “Except in the Bible, dipshits, when it’s just as often one man and many women!”

    Seriously. It’s so disingenuous, the movement of the phrase “a man and a woman” to “one man and one woman” implying that gay marriage = polygamy. But I’ve given up hope on Americans retaining enough cultural memory to realize the changes that have taken place in marriage since the introduction of Protestantism, let alone since Biblical times.

  9. Noo Ku Lar? Is that how she says it? I’m lousy at phonetic spelling but I can spell and say the word nuclear. I swear I can’t understand women who could consider voting for this pair. Anyway, if you’re at work and can’t watch the debate the transcript is up at my blog. Man it’s long, prepare yourself.

  10. Did anyone else want to throw something at the TV when they were talking about same-sex marriage and “tradition”?

    In my best Northern accent, you betcha!

    I was at the gym watching it in CC while on the treadmill, and I almost fell off during that part. I was beyond upset.

    Though, I thought that her refusal to admit they agreed on it was amusing. There were slight differences in their points, but they were almost arguing the same thing. She wouldn’t admit they agreed.

  11. Here’s my issue with Palin (and the same goes with McCain). Listening to her voice makes me want to pick up a cheese grater and rub it hard and fast against my cheek until I reach bone. When she saying things like “makin’” and “you betcha” I get horrible anxiety flashbacks to our amazingly ‘articulate’ current president and how not just us, but the entire world makes fun of how stupid he really is. Calendars are made with his stupid quotes. Talking dolls have been marketed… and I don’t think America can take another shaming like that.

    Now I get she is trying to drag in the soccer mom and “Joe six-pack”, and keep in mind this is coming from a Minnesotan, land of “you betcha”, but I appreciate and take seriously anyone – man or woman – who can formulate an intelligent sentence and who knows the difference between “borrow” and “loan” grammatically.

    Watching her ‘politics’ makes me feel like they dressed up my mom real nice and gave her some big fancy words to use to make the nation listen. I cannot take anything she says seriously… And she is at a major risk of becoming our president if anything happens to McCain – and his sounds bites are just as grating to me…

    Oh… right… here’s your soapbox back… *^_^*

  12. ouyangdan, they don’t agree. Biden said that committed gay couples in civil unions should equal rights with straight couples. Palin was forced to sign a bill granting equal benefits to same-sex couples because the Alaska Supreme Court held that the Alaska Constitution required it. But she personally that gay couples should have equal rights. All she said was that gay couples should be permitted to live together as a matter of tolerance, not that they should be guaranteed equal rights:

    Here’s what they said:

    [Biden]: And so we do support it. We do support making sure that committed couples in a same-sex marriage are guaranteed the same constitutional benefits as it relates to their property rights, their rights of visitation, their rights to insurance, their rights of ownership as heterosexual couples do.

    IFILL: Governor, would you support expanding that beyond Alaska to the rest of the nation?

    PALIN: Well, not if it goes closer and closer towards redefining the traditional definition of marriage between one man and one woman. And unfortunately that’s sometimes where those steps lead.

    But I also want to clarify, if there’s any kind of suggestion at all from my answer that I would be anything but tolerant of adults in America choosing their partners, choosing relationships that they deem best for themselves, you know, I am tolerant and I have a very diverse family and group of friends and even within that group you would see some who may not agree with me on this issue, some very dear friends who don’t agree with me on this issue.

    But in that tolerance also, no one would ever propose, not in a McCain-Palin administration, to do anything to prohibit, say, visitations in a hospital or contracts being signed, negotiated between parties.

    But I will tell Americans straight up that I don’t support defining marriage as anything but between one man and one woman, and I think through nuances we can go round and round about what that actually means.

    But I’m being as straight up with Americans as I can in my non- support for anything but a traditional definition of marriage.

  13. I was angry at the LGBT question. It is appalling at how LGBT people can be used to drive a wedge between the people of this nation.

    Biden did well throughout the debate. As for Palin, she ducked a question about deregulation, much in the same way she didn’t answer questions the audience asked of her (that clip was played extensively on the September 18 edition of the Michael Baisden Show).

    I am going to give Americans some Real Straight Talk right here right now: I vehemently oppose discrimination against LGBT people, and that includes denying LGBT people the right to marry the person of their choosing.

  14. Before the debate pundits warned that Senator Biden could be in some unspecified danger, “debating a woman,” but he handled that challenge beautifully – there was a photo I saw in the news with Biden’s hand on the shoulder of Palin’s daughter after the debate, and it looked just the way a father would clasp the shoulder of a son. Nice.

  15. What did you guys think about Biden’s loss of composure when discussing the death of his wife and daughter?

    A poster over on Feministing suggested that a woman would never have gotten away with choking up during a debate, and on some level that was my first thought too. Crying in public IS much dicier for a woman than for a man.

    But my feeling is that if Palin had suffered the same circumstances as Joe Biden – the death of a child and spouse – and had gotten teary talking about it, I truly don’t believe that would have been held against her. Especially not if she had otherwise demonstrated the mastery of the issues Biden did. And if Biden had completely cold-shouldered his way past a mother’s grief, the way Palin did to him, I’m positive he would have received tremendous blowback. Which Palin kind of deserves for doing it to him, but I’m not holding my breath…

    Additionally, what did you think of the context of Biden’s tears – the “I object to the idea that just because I am a man, I don’t know what it’s like to wonder if your child will make it” – by asserting a fierce pride in his identity as a caretaker and a one-time single parent, and challenging the idea that only one gender had claim to that territory, I thought that was a powerful and unusual thing to hear from a male politician.

  16. Mary — it certainly did pull at my heartstrings. I agree with both of your points: as a general rule, a woman would not be cut slack for getting choked up during a debate, but under these circumstances I think she would have gotten a pass (and in fact would probably be given shit if she did maintain full composure). I found Biden’s statement about parenting to also be moving — I thought it showed a true love for his children and pride in what he had done for them, but without discounting or disrespecting the fact that women are usually the ones who act as primary caretakers.

    And I very much thought that Palin’s response was repulsive. It wasn’t only that she completely ignored what he had said and offered no compassion, it was that when they cut to her she went off talking about something completely different with a shit-eating grin on her face. That really pissed me off. And yes, I would have wanted to throw something at Biden’s head just as much if the situation was reversed.

  17. Bloix, I know what they said, it was at the end of that whole thing, when asked directly, if either of them supported gay marriage, they said no, almost in unison. Their respective views on other aspects of the same topic, yes, are very different, w/ Biden (and Obama) very much supporting giving same sex couples equal benefits. That has been no secret. I am also painfully aware of what happened w/ the Alaska constitution. Palin pulls no wool over my eyes at all. When asked directly, though, if they supported gay marriage, Palin babbled all over the topic and talked about her diverse family, Biden talked about it being a religious institution, but when Ifil pushed, they both agreed that no, they do not support gay marriage. You are right, they don’t agree on the equal benefits (and Palin is so unaware of what that entails). I was commenting on the later part of that question, and I apologize if I was unclear. Neither of them support gay marriage, and even the analysts on NPR (where I finished listening) were upset b/c she wouldn’t admit that they had agreed. I believe the moderator said “so you both agree”, and moved on.
    Thanks for making me clarify though, I can see how I was confusing (and it is still early where I am).

  18. The New York Times piece linked to at the beginning of this post is really getting on my nerves. This sentence in particular baffles me:

    “The debate wasn’t so much between Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Ms. Palin as it was between the dueling images of the Alaska governor: the fuzzy-minded amateur parodied — with her own words — by Tina Fey on “Saturday Night Live” or the gun-toting hockey mom who blazed into history at the Republican convention.”

    How does it make sense to suggest that these are two different, “dueling” images? Did anyone watch the interview with Katie Couric and think, “But that’s not the Sarah Palin I saw at the Republican Convention”? Either it disturbs you that Palin is a fuzzy-minded amateur gun-toting “hockey mom” who knows how to read a speech but is helpless without one–or it doesn’t. Right? Surely these are not distinct personae.

  19. Mary, absolutely. Great comment.

    Kat:

    When she saying things like “makin’” and “you betcha” I get horrible anxiety flashbacks to our amazingly ‘articulate’ current president and how not just us, but the entire world makes fun of how stupid he really is. Calendars are made with his stupid quotes. Talking dolls have been marketed… and I don’t think America can take another shaming like that.

    Amen and amen. Can I get a witness?

    All that chronic cutesy beauty-pageant winking and “Can I call you Joe?” as well as blowing kisses, “doggone it”–well, I could also see the heavy influence of THREE’S COMPANY!

    Ohhh, Hillary, we hardly knew ye. (((sobs)))

  20. Prin, do you mind if we stay off the sexist attacks of Palin? She’s given us plenty to criticize without that.
    By the way, I’ve seen that same wink coming from numerous male speakers too. I don’t see it as a “flirty” wink, but as a “look at how popular I am, you know you want to be my friend” kind of wink.

  21. ach, the formatting didn’t quite work, I was trying to quote this line:
    “i guess she has used that particular flirty female wink to get over on men and get as far as she has…”

  23. Palin went easy on Biden. He said:

    It’s evidence of the fact that the economic policies of the last eight years have been the worst economic policies we’ve ever had. As a consequence, you’ve seen what’s happened on Wall Street.

    If you need any more proof positive of how bad the economic theories have been, this excessive deregulation, the failure to oversee what was going on, letting Wall Street run wild, I don’t think you needed any more evidence than what you see now

    But as the New York Times reported in September 2003:

    The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago . . .

    The plan is an acknowledgment by the administration that oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — which together have issued more than $1.5 trillion in outstanding debt — is broken. A report by outside investigators in July concluded that Freddie Mac manipulated its accounting to mislead investors, and critics have said Fannie Mae does not adequately hedge against rising interest rates.

    Among the groups denouncing the proposal today were the National Association of Home Builders and Congressional Democrats who fear that tighter regulation of the companies could sharply reduce their commitment to financing low-income and affordable housing.

    “These two entities — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — are not facing any kind of financial crisis,” said Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. ”The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.”

    Snopes highlighted this issue today; it’s going to become a rather major issue in the days to come.

    Twenty-two other misstatements Biden made can be found here.
    Among them: He thought that Article I of the Constitution defines the role of the Vice President, rather than the legislature. Pretty embarrassing for someone whose been in the legislature for 36 years and was chairman of the judiciary committee.

  24. Thanks to Bloix for posting the transcript of the discussion on same sex marriage. I agree with your interpretation. When I first watched it last night, I thought it was clear Biden was trying to make a distinction between the legal definition of same sex marriage and same sex marriage defined by religious institutions. He was completely for the legal rights of same sex couples, but against defining marriage in general, which he thinks should be left to religious institutions, no? This seems reasonable enough considering his job lies in the law – whether or not a religious institution recognizes a couple as married is irrelevant to his position as VP.

    I think Biden failed to articulate the point and I’m not sure Ifill understood the distinction – I’m certain Palin didn’t (no surprise there).

    Speaking of Palin, is anyone else having a difficult time recalling points Palin said? (Granted, other than the bit about the teacher’s reward is in heaven.) I have a theory that her words are easily forgotten (when she doesn’t make a massive blunder), because they have very little, if any, substance. Philip Gourevitch wrote a great article in the New Yorker a couple of weeks ago on Palin. He described Palin’s manner of speech to a tee, I quote: “Palin, who studied journalism in college and worked for a time as a sportscaster, has an informal manner of speech, simultaneously chatty and urgent, and she reinforces her words with winks and nods and wrinklings of her nose that seem meant to telegraph intimacy and ease” [. . .] “She sounded the same when we met, high-spirited, irrepressible, and not in the least self-conscious. On the contrary, she is supremely self-confident, in the way of someone who believes that there is nothing she can’t talk her way into, or out of, or around or through. There was never a hesitation before speaking, or between phrases, no time for thought or reflection. The words kept coming—engaging, lulling, distracting—a commanding flow, but without weight. Yet, for all the cozy colloquialism, she cannot be called relaxed. She’s on—full on.”

  25. Daisy,
    I didn’t mean to imply it was male politicians that I saw, just numerous male speakers. Trust me, I hated the winking… found it very unprofessional in a debate of this caliber… but I don’t see that as having anything to do with being a woman.

  26. I was relieved that someone I know who leans toward republican (and loves Palin as a governor) thought that Sarah Palin did miserably.

  27. Democrats will vote for the Democrat. Republicans will vote for the Republican. That’s how it has always been.
    John McCain and Joe Biden are politicians. They know their numbers, and they know Washington.
    What is different about this election is culture. Where is America going, culturally?
    This is where Barack Obama and Sarah Palin come in.
    Some say race is a factor against Obama, but I say it is the opposite: Obama has been propelled upwards by his skin color. The positive ‘racism’ (Black-Americans supporting him, White-Americans feeling guilty about the legacy of slavery) far outweighs the few remaining pockets of negative racism (traditional bigotry) that still exist in our country.
    Whereas Black-Americans account for 12 percent of America, women number about 51 percent.
    This is where America’s reaction to Sarah Palin gets interesting. It is not only sexism at play, but regionalism too. Keep in mind that America’s reaction could be vastly different from the media’s reaction, which tries to intervene in how America thinks and observes for itself.
    For the last decade, American women have been trying to become either the fifth ‘Manhattanite’ cast member of ‘Sex and the City’ or a ‘Desperate Housewife’ on Wisteria Lane. The White male executives who created, packaged and marketed these female stereotypes have made plenty of money as women across America spent time and money trying to become ‘Carrie Bradshaw’. But somehow, these wanna-be’s never lived it up as glamorously.
    Sarah Palin is all about God, Family, Country and Shot-Guns. She is a completely New American Woman. She was not constructed by a Public Relations agency in either New York City or Los Angeles. She is not a Hollywood creation. Sarah Palin is simply a product of American small-town wholesomeness: happy childhood, hard work, self-discipline and a bright, and almost chirpy, outlook on life.
    Sarah is not the high-maintenance, drama-seeking, bulimia-suffering fragile caricature of a working woman as peddled by TV.
    Her husband, Todd Palin, is not a neurotic metro-sexual obsessing over the price of organic arugula, or whining about his commitment phobias to his shrink. He is a man’s man, and frankly, a woman’s man: just your regular American guy—wholesome and uncomplicated.
    Sarah and Todd are American ‘retro’, but it is retro made cool all over again. They are a brand of Americana that has been tested and true—genuine, confident and mature.
    Something happened to the Obama brand on the way to the election. It is as if the fashion gods decided that “Didn’t you know? No one wears Obama after Labour Day.”
    Once exotic and different, the Obama brand has been turned into something weird and creepy. “Obama’s Witnesses,” “Obama’s Blue-Shirts,” “The Obama Youth Fraternity League”…Plus, after the initial swooning over him, most people still think that there’s something “off” about Obama; as if he’s hollow, or hiding something.
    Today, the Obama brand has become decidedly “uncool”. That’s why people tuned out from watching him debate McCain.
    On the other hand, Americans are discovering that they are intrigued by Sarah Palin. The TV pundits may want to spin things their way, but the surest measure of who won the Vice-Presidential Debate is that, at the end, the vast majority of viewers walked away from their TV sets and said to themselves, “I’d like to see more of Sarah Palin—unfiltered and uncut.”
    The Obama camp may be celebrating too early. There are still plenty of people out there that haven’t made up their mind, and Obama’s triumphalism may begin to sound like arrogance, and he’s already been accused of that.
    This is indeed a culturally interesting time to be an American.

  28. On the LGBT question, the thing that bugged me was when Biden said that the issue of what the couple’s union should be called, and the ceremony, was a matter for their religion, and that it shouldn’t have a legal status as “marriage”. I desperately wanted the follow-up to be, “shouldn’t the same principle apply to heterosexual marriage? If it’s to be equal rights?” That is, rendering all “marriages”, regardless of genders of the participants, as “civil unions” is the logical conclusion of what Biden said, and then the term “marriage” becomes purely a matter of custom or convenience.

    Might have punched a hole in the Democratic ticket’s chances but, darn it, it was frustrating!

  29. Biden’s waffling on that issue cemented my belief that I’m better off giving money to Arizona United rather than the Democrats.

  31. @Cara: she had the same shit-eating grin when the camera panned to her after Biden finished talking about genocide in Darfur. Then she let loose with some sarcastic comments. I could not believe my eyes.

  32. I switched to hard liquor around the time of the first wink, so thanks to everyone here for refreshing my memory on the finer points of the debate, some of which I didn’t catch because I was yelling obscenities at the TV.

    Oy vey.

  34. RE: Comment #27, Mike’s comment in support of Sarah Palin.

    It should be noted that “Mike” in comment #27 is a GOP spambot who today posted the exact same comment, verbatim, in Octogalore’s blog “Astarte’s Circus.”

    Mike’s spambot-comment was refuted there in detail.

  35. Did anyone else want to throw something at the TV when they were talking about same-sex marriage and “tradition”?

    I’m too realistic for that. Even if Obama and/or Biden actually did support gay marriage, saying so would immediately kill any chance of their winning the election.

    I suppose you can hope that they’re lying, but, even if that’s the case, I doubt they could do anything legislatively. Maybe in a decade or two.

  36. Both of the idiots running for office, Obama and McCain, are too mainstream for me. I haven’t owned a television for 13 years, I don’t listen to Britney Spears and Beyonce and Amy Winehouse, and I don’t read Stephen King and John Grisham. So why should I vote for a Republican or Democrat? I’m not going to vote for the one I dislike the least to keep the other out of office.

    Now is a great time to show that Americans want a true multi-party political system. Besides, I couldn’t keep a straight face if I dropped a ballot for either Knucklehead A or Knucklehead B. Might as well drop in the Backstreet Boys’ Greatest Hits and turn the volume all the way up.

  39. the same-sex exchange was sad, but the even sadder (yet humorous) exchange was the “who loves israel more” back and forth.

    “Israel is our strongest and best ally in the Middle East.”
    “We will support Israel.”
    “No one in the United States Senate has been a better friend to Israel than Joe Biden”
    “I’m so encouraged to know that we both love Israel, and I think that is a good thing to get to agree on, Senator Biden.”

    and it was especially nice to see biden condemn free elections in the ME because the radicals would win.

    but hey, at least israel unites these two parties. that’s gotta be good for something….

  40. Guys

    This is preaching to the Choir. Remember the left talks to the left and the right talks to the right. There is a very Small Margin that is the deciding fulcrum on which that last few elections have pivoted.
    Facts in general do not matter unless they achieve that desired stickiness to stay stuck to the headlines, all others quietly sink. Outrage is useless unless it makes its way out of the partisan spheres.
    Watch which aspects of this make it to the larger non partisan echochamber of the dull masses. Like it or not most just do not care. Which particular flea of fact will actually cause the cow to come out of its stupor, I don’t know and neither do you. Does the left score or the right, its all such a skill rather than a science.

    Enjoy the last month of Nailbiting.

  41. Giving a corny shout out to third graders was real amateur hour.

    WTF is this? A high school class president election?

  42. I wanted to throw something because I had “values” on my Palin Bingo card and she didn’t say that particular word.

    I’d be all for having an incompetent idiot on the GOP ticket if I were fairly certain it would cause the to lose. “Better than expected” doesn’t cut it when you’re faced with a real situation. I hope my surgeon doesn’t merely do better than expected.

  43. Want to throw something at the TV? Hell, I threw quite a few things at the screen, usually during the sections about “tolerance” and “equal rights”. Urrrrrgh.

  44. I have never commented here before (although I read the posts frequently), but Mike’s comment infuriated me. Forgive me for my grammar and spelling errors because English is not my first language and I am really angry right now.

    @ Mike

    I really, really hate when people like you transform these serious debates into popularity contests. This is about people who lost their jobs, who died in a war that was not neccessary, and about the economic future and political stability of the entire world. It is about facts, not fashion.

    If you want a popularity contest, there are plenty of places to find them, but the presidential and vicepresidential debates are not. This is serious stuff, and it has influence in countries other than the US. If you are going to vote for the McCain-Palin ticket, you should do it because you agree with their policies, not because they represent a stereotype that seems more “authentic” to you than those portrayed on TV. People like you, Mike, may be rich and do not care about nothing but these stupid popularity contests, but my brother lost his job here in Spain for what happened in Wall Street and is waiting for a second child. And I do not want to tell him that for some people in the US all comes down to be a “Joe Sixpack” or a “Hockey Mom”, not about serious politics.

    And I mean no offense to Americans, just to people like Mike.

  45. Pingback: late night update and more Palin « Chutney Soul

  46. (1) — “John McCain is a man who knows how to win wars”
    (a) the “war” John McCain was in was Vietnam, and the US certainly did *not* win that one
    (b) a would have little confidence that McCain’s military record shows he has the experience to “win” a war?
    -I- fourth (?) from the *bottom* of his class at the service academy
    -II- crashed 5 fighter planes

    (2) McCain’s “health care” plan would give a tax deduction to buy insurance
    — I *already* get a tax deduction for my part of the health insurance I get through my employer, as my portion of the premium is taken from before-tax earnings.

  47. Steve -what makes you think that everyone who reads here is automatically left? The discussion runs that way, sure, but even in comments we have the occasional dissenter or moderate/undecided. Plus the long term effects. I counted myself as pretty darned moderate – a classical swing voter – until several months after I started reading Feministe, Pandagon, and related sites. Over time I have become more and more feminist and progressive, and it’s largely due to those two sites. So preaching to the choir isn’t all that’s happening here.

  48. Also, John McCain has apparently forgotten how to win elections. Why should we assume he still knows how to win wars? He knows all about producing short-term results (what might you call that? A rush? A swell? A billlowing? There’s a word here I’m not quite getting to) but, evidently, little about building the base of support needed for long-term on the ground success.

    Now, what we need to build lasting peace and security is a candidate who knows how to make on-the-ground community-supported change, how to organize vast networks of volunteers to support and work for an inspiring but unlikely outcome. Can we get someone like that? Cause I think he’d do real well in a general election against John McCain.

  49. “Forgive me for my grammar and spelling errors because English is not my first language and I am really angry right now.”

    Angry Spaniard: you’ll be pleased to know that the only mistakes I found in your post were that “vicepresidential” should have been hyphenated, and “US” is actually U.S.

    You actually have a better grasp on writing English than most domestic college students I’ve read. We can thank our awesome pubic school system here in the U.S. for that, too. Hoo-rah!

  50. “John McCain is a man who knows how to win wars”

    the “war” John McCain was in was Vietnam, and the US certainly did *not* win that one

    Craig, thanks for pointing that out… I went a little crazy when she said that. Are they rewriting history now too?

    We didn’t win in Vietnam and we are now replaying the whole interminable “how the hell do we get out of here?” scenario in Iraq. Only the phrase “peace with honor” is missing, but only because Nixon used it first.

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