There are several points I have here:

1. I had NO CLUE throughout the ENTIRE debate what in the hell McCain was talking about! I can't tell you ONE single time that he actually answered the question presented. He was constantly talking about random things, rambling, interrupting, running over time, etc., that I lost track and focus.

2. I was extremely disappointed with the moderation of the debate. While I clearly think that Sen. Obama won, a lot of points went unmade because he was attempting to be respectful of Sen. McCain and the format of the debate. Anyone that THINKS McCain won is going solely off the strength that he basically took over the debate and talked what HE wanted to talk about, with no regard for the questions or regulations of debating.

I think that the moderator should be someone who can actually moderate and keep things on track, specifically pointing out that McCain has gone over time and/or has NOT answered the question. Lord, I wish that Tim Russert were still here with us. We need someone like him to get it regulate!

3. Sarah Palin AIN'T READY for the drama that is Joe Biden! She is going to get chopped up on site! I can't, for the life of me, understand how and why people are fooled by her! I can see right through her LACK of education, experience, wit, talents, personality, charisma.... OK, I'll just stop there! LOL! The chick is just lacking ALL OVER!

Thursday can't get here fast enough!

Don't you know why? She's a BABE! :rolleyes: We all know that 'good-looking' people get the benefit of the doubt. Unfortunately, she has NO substance.

I think that is also one of the reasons why 'some' people have a problem with Obama. They assume that just because he is 'good-looking' that he is an empty suit.

Yes, it IS a double standard. HE is a BLACK MAN and SHE is a WHITE WOMAN. Two totally different standards....

I don't know about S. Korea specifically but I once heard something similar about children in Japan only a generation after WWII.

It's not evolutionary, but as a result of better nutrition. Children were getting more milk and protein in their diets as well as more calories over all.

How real this is, I have no idea.

ETA: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/0...ns/?hp&apage=2

Thanks for the source! Instinctively, anything that comes out of his mouth, I take with a bushel of salt :rolleyes:

I believe it shall be the later - like watching a comedy special. :D

I subscribe to Tory Johnson's Women For Hire blog and she did a story about palin's interview with Katie Couric. Basically she said that if someone performed in a job interview the way Palin performed in her interview with Katie, we would have been tossed out on our arse - and DEFINTIELY not considered a candidate for VP!

Thursday debate controversy: Should Gwen moderate?
 

Ifill's book was no secret
Michael Calderone
Wed Oct 1, 10:44 AM ET

Michelle Malkin and World Net Daily have made a lot of noise today about the fact the Gwen Ifill, the moderator of Thursday's VP debate, has a new book coming on Inauguration day about Barack Obama and the politics of race -- it's now leading on the front of Drudge.

Fox's Greta Van Susteren reports that the McCain campaign didn't know about it.

"I am stunned….the campaign (actually both) should have been told before the campaign agreed to have her moderate. It simply is not fair -- in law, this would create a mistrial."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/200...politico/22742

I love the last line in the article....

Quote:

Legitimate questions, indeed. So why is this coming up less than 36 hours before Palin and Biden hit the stage?

Ok, this is a potential conflict (and I say that as longtime admirer of Ifill's reporting.) ...and a pretty obvious ready-made excuse for the Palin camp if they lose the debate.

If the McCain camp knew of Ifill's book, why wait until now to lodge a complaint? If they didn't know of it, which seems highly implausible, that's bad staff work.

If I'm the Obama campaign, I sit back and let this play out. If a new moderator is chosen at this late date, it potentially throws both candidates into chaos, and it then is a matter of who recovers first and best.

Gwen has made it no secret that this book is coming out. And correct me if I'm wrong, but the book is not coming out until next year. Gwen has also done interviews with the Obamas for Essence.

Whether or not Gwen's the moderator, Palin is still going to look dumb as a doorknob.

Its all about the spin :rolleyes: They HAVE to make it look like McPalin is getting bullied because that endears her to the 'base'. They can have the 'base', Obama will take the middle (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/1..._n_131039.html)

I'm fired up!!!!
 

They were talking about this on the view this morning and I am so sick and tired of all of the excuses that are floating around about Palin. I'm going to underestimate her and say that Joe Biden is about to talk circles around her tonight....based off of what I have seen and read...it does not matter who the moderator is...she does not know what in the hayle she is doing or talking about.

She has illustrated in her own words too many times, in the 30 days that we have even known who she was, what she can bring to the table----nothing. I don't care who may disagree and I'm not going to sugar-coat my opinion...but Palin should not be the republican VP candidate...I KNOW there are more "qualified" women in the republican party that could have been chosen if McCain was so stuck on choosing the "other minority" to make his ticket more appealing.

It just bothers me that society sometimes tend to lean more to superficial things than substance. Yeah she is cute...but that doesn't have a thing to do with my job security or my ability to keep my home, pay my bills, get a job, put gas in my car, drive to work, provide food for my home, save money, or just function as an independent member of society. My life is not a political game and I am tired of these greedy jokers who are more worried about having a title and more money than they can spend rather than understanding that the decisions and choices they make effect more people than just themselves. This is partially why this country is in the situation it is in now....

wheeeeew, I'm so sorry for kind of going off but things have gotten so out of hand and it really pisses me off. Please forgive me for any typos but I had to get that off my chest...lol. I'm sorry but McCain and his camp is a big joke to me and you don't have to be a comedian to see that...

/\/\ There are plenty of people that agree with you. In fact, his choice of Palin actually should be an insult to women everywhere. :mad: It is OBVIOUS that she wasn't chosen because she is competent and can do the job. She was chosen because she is easy on the eyes, a woman, and his camp figured that women will vote for him because he has a woman on the ticket. That's the equivalent of when (as a woman) I go out to look at a new car and the first thing the salesman shows me is the driver's side visor mirror "for checking your make-up".

There are PLENTY of more capable women out there. He should have looked harder.

Ok, so I've figured it out. What Palin does during her interviews (and what she'll probably do tonight during the debate).

Here's her trick:
If anyone (Charlie Gibson, Katie Couric or even tonight, Gwen Ifill) asks her a question about anything in which she will have to be specific, she answers a different question - namely, she rearranges the question the question in her mind to one in which she can just broadly talk about the subject matter in general and then she actually answers the question that she has put together in her own mind. This is probably her and McCain's strategy b/c she is ignorant of everything of substance.

For example, when asked about the policy on preemption, I think she answered as if Charlie had asked her if America needs to defend itself IN GENERAL. She made that question up in her own mind and answered her own question - forget Charlie.

The only problem for her is that Biden is likely to push her to the wall and force her to answer the question that was asked. After all, this is a debate. Tonight, she won't be able to merely have a conversation with herself before the American people as she has been doing.

It's actually pretty swift if you think about it. If one is not listening closely enough to her answer, she uses enough of the related key words to *sound like* she's addressing the question (this flies over the head of the sloooow Americans who either are not paying attention or don't understand the issues anyway, which is many unfortunately) and it's also swift b/c she actually has to be *smart enough* to rearrange the sentence in her mind in real time and answer the new question that she has made up. I think that this is what the camp has her doing. It's actually pretty good when you think about it. Maybe she's not as dumb as everyone thinks - ok, that might be going too far. LOL.

Between Biden and Ifill, I think that she'll have to answer the questions ASKED tonight. I am almost certain that the Obama camp is on to her and her flicted strategy.

SC

Palin's plan is to go after Biden:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/14220

And if that's the case, Biden will go after her. They don't call him Joey the Shark for nothing.

McCain's camp is leaving Michigan. He needs to hang it up after that wonderful speech Obama gave in Grand Rapids this morning.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/200..._OfOBNFONsnwcF

I agree. This is the McBush Camp's overall strategy. Look at his answers to the questions during the debate last Friday. He was clearly taking the question and finding a related question that he knew the answer to and answering the related question, but not the question that was asked. Palin will try the same thing, but it wont work against Biden because he will be less lenient on Palin than Obama was with McSame. I'm SO excited to watch this! I do think that Palin will look better comming out of the debate because she can only go up from where she is and because I think she's been playing dumb.

You are exactly right. She has already done this when asked the first question tonight. She also makes a ploy to tug at "average" american's heart strings. She always begins with some sort of "soccer mom" comment. Nice try, but if you don't know let it go. She also asked first off if she could call Joe Biden by his first name during the debate. It implies that we should feel relaxed with her. She simply sounds decent because she fails to use political jargon that sometimes flies over the heads of Americans, but I think that's only because she doesn't know any big words...lol.

SC, you summed it up well. It's only been 44 minutes into the debate and I swear she has only answered one question directly.

*in my sweet southern accent* Yall.....Joe is READY!!! I am really enjoying myself.....I like how she dances around the answers even though it has nothing to do what she was asked....I think she is reading though...and she looks a bit nervous....Biden looks like he wants to say something reeeeeeal crazy but is holding back....LOL...this is funny.

One more thing...is she calling him "Senator O'Biden"...she should have just called him Joe like he said she could...lol.

while she's at it, accept the correct pronunciation of the word NUCLEAR. bush sounds silly when he says it, so does she:mad:
not to mention, Sen. Biden dusted her on foreign policy...

What is even more hilarious is how Joe Biden looks like he is refraining from just flat out laughing at her and her comments...he keeps :D when she dances around questions.

I think Govenor Palin is what she is claiming...an "average" american who does NOT need to be vice-president...or govenor for that matter, but hey Alaska doesn't have that many people to govern...lol!

LOL. O'BIDEN 08! LOL

She still hasn't answered a question! She is hella nervous. We can tell when she doesnt know the answer because she starts to get all shaky. The question was about mortgages: I got so mad when Biden was talking about giving judges the ability to adjust people's loan interest as well as their principles and then Palin COMPLETELY avoided the question and started talking about Energy that I Threw a goldfish at the TV!!

And if I hear one more reference to her state Alaska and what she has done and not done....I was yelling, "that has no bearing on the question!" Since she is so amped about governing Alaska, she should stay in that role!

Best thing I've heard all night.

/\/\/\/\ OMG I thought it was just me who was tired of Alaska, and how McCain is change, and how she wants to speak to the average American.

BLAH! She is like cotton candy...just all fluff and sugar. :(

If I was a Republican, I'd beat McCain with a bag of nickles for picking this woman.

Gwen did a great job moderating.

I was very impressed with Gwen. She is a highly intelligent woman who was quick to call the bullish answers, and look for the REAL answers.

That same "I got your number look" that Obama had Friday is the same look Biden had tonight.

That chick couldn't answer a question for love or money. She almost sounded like a robot up there.

Who the HECK was she winking at? wtf?

SNL will be GOOD on Saturday. I know they have to provide Tina Fey with ALOT of $$$ to portray Palin.

Biden did the dayum thing!
McCain's health care plan= The ultimate Bridge to nowhere
Then the part when he talked about being a single dad and kinda got choked up made me glad he'll be my next Veep.
The Fox news "Undecided and evenly split" focus group had only one black person in it and they overwhelmingly thought Palin won the debate.

I swear I'd pay her to answer a question. Did anyone else notice that when Palin started saying a bunch of B/S Biden would sigh audibly. He be like *SIGH* "I didn't hear a plan" lol.

I spent a lot of time yelling at the television. *Sigh!*

This woman needs to be stopped. I need Republicans everywhere to come to their senses and realize that they have been dupped. There should be a public outcry against this chick!

RD I am right there with you about this crazy person. STOP PALIN! People are really thinking that she could be a realistic front runner for the President of the United States of America in 2012! She will not be close to good enough to be president in four years! She'll still be a dumbasprin governor like she is now!

God Help America.

Not with instructions could she ever be ready for the Presidential office.

I know it was a jacked up format, but Gwen Ifill (who I respect as a reporter) didn't have her best night. She let Palin run buckwild in terms of not answering what was asked, but rather what she had prepared to say.

Ifill also should have followed up more on some areas -- particularly when Palin discussed some sort of "expanded role" for the vice president?!? I wanted to have her asked for more information on that.

I thought Biden brought it pretty much most of the night. He lapsed into "SenateSpeak" a few times and Ifill should have shut that down, but he seemed more in command of what he was saying.

I think Palin did more to defend her rep (after the last two weeks) than she did to defend McCain. Biden listed a series of open ended questions asking specifically how McCain/Palin would be different the current Bush administration. Amazingly, Palin just let that sit out there, unanswered.

Ok, I'm watching some of the re-air (it's about 1:40 a.m. and why I'm not in bed I don't know) and Gwen did interrupt and redirect a little more than I thought earlier, so props to Ifill on that.

I am sick of Palin's youdling (sp), countryfide, joe-six pack lingo...."Well alrighty then." "Here we go again." "Gotcha." I do not think she did a good job at all. And I am sick of people setting the bar low for her. Mediocracy / Rehearsed script is not acceptable.

Did anyone see the vote that Solidad conducted with CNN's undecided voters after the debate? Ok, what the hell? She asked everyone if they thought that Obama would win: most of them raised their hands.

Then she asked if they would vote for Obama: Only 25% of the people raised their hands. WTF??

Racism at its finest.

All she did was save herself, I don't think she helped McCain. At this point she was losing folks in her own party so she had more on the line than anyone.

SC you hit the nail on the head on how she rephrases the ?? in her head and answers the way she wants to answer regardless of what is asked but didn't she actually say that what she would do that? Something along the lines of 'I'm not gonna answer the questions "the way you want me to" but I'll talk about my record?" What does she have dyslexic hearing or something?

Joey was cool I and I am happy about that. I would love to be a fly on the wall when he was talking to his people off the record about what he thinks about her knowledge of things.

The one thing that was cool was at least they could give each other credit for things that they had done. McCain wouldn't credit Obama for a damn thing.

She didn't sound like an idiot as much as she has lately but they are not exactly known for their brilliance either. When did we get in the habit of rewarding mediocrity?

I was listening to NPR earlier this week and they were conducting a similar poll. One man said that he did believe Obama would win, but he wasn't going to vote for him because (and hold on to your seat) if Obama won then blacks would go crazy since we (blacks) have an axe to grind with "America". :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: :rolleyes:

I was wondering the same thing. I think she took her cues from watching SNL because Tina Fey winked alot in her sketches. I have to admit. The winks did kind of make her "adorable."

Me too. I yelled, "ANSWER THE ******* QUESTIONS ALREADY!!!" *sigh* :mad:

I promise. If this woman becomes the VP, I'm moving to Belize. I've already packed a bag by the door for my moment to flee.

I thought that was a interesting as well...I'm trying to be good but you are absolutely right...mediocracy is NOT acceptable....its funny though who can get away with it. Had this been Obama they would be having a field day...and oh Lawd...dont let one of his kids get pregnant out of wedlock....

My homegirl and I were just talking about how we need to get our passports and move out of the country for a few years if McCain wins....this is just ridiculous....

I wish it was live like the Apollo used to be. I would've had to buy out the produce department so that I'd have enough to throw at her.

Im trying to plan now because once McCain gets in the dollar will be worth less than toilet paper...Oh wait it already is. If Palin is Veep I'm moving to Venezuela.

Frankly, my expectation of her was so low that as long as she showed up, she improved in my book. You could tell that most of her answers were scripted. When she had to veer off her talking points, she threw in Alaska (I cringe every time she says the word!) or some nonsensical phrase or just repeats what she just said. She did have that deer in the headlights look a few times - global warming, Afghanistan, healthcare. This woman should be nowhere near the button.

OTOH, Joey hit it out of the park. He took it to McSame because he was there in the Senate and he KNEW the real deal; Palin had no clue about McSame's voting record! He also refused to cede her the working class or working parent playing field; his moment about his son's was genuine. He did have to pull himself together and restrain himself from calling her a flat out liar after she basically called him one. You remember the exchange about the general in Afghanistan? Apparently she got his name wrong but I will need to see the fact check to see who got the story right because I don't know myself.

ETA: Here is one fact check...http://news.aol.com/political-machin...e-pesky-facts/ ...she DID lie!

All in all, it was worth staying up and having to take a midday nap...