Vice Presidential Debate

[Mark F. Barnes]

Like I said before, the defining moment for the entire debate, was the fact when she uttered the words, "Take more personal responsibility for your financial decisions". She is the first politician of any kind I've heard ring that most true point clear. All the rest are trying to place blame everywhere else, and never addressing that bottom line.

Remember those words........."Take more personal responsibility for your financial decisions".

I do have to call BS on Joe's statement on taking "10 years to get one drop of Oil from any wells drilled today on the ANWAR." This I can tell you with absolute first hand certainty, I have written an excess of 40 Well Plan Prognosis' and AFE's. From Spud to Production it will take a maximum of 18 months on even the most problematic wells. That's day one of drilling to in the production pipeline. 10 years is horse-crap, 100%. That is rhetoric because he has no clue. I have overseen many wells on the north slope and know the timeline by heart. Most wells actually average 8-10 months total.

I am researching some of these voting records that were disputed, the archives are long, but I am pretty sure he was not factual on at least 4 of them.

[sarahiki]

1.) Disappointed in his response about gay marriage. He's going to speak at HRC in DC this weekend! That'll go over well. Luckily, I am not an HRC fan, at all. When I hear those kind of responses from Democrats... I don't want to vote for them either, but they are definitely better than the Republican alternatives.

I thought that was an interesting response. I am all for gay marriage (why not... who am I to decide who should or shouldn't be married, after all), but I actually didn't mind his answer. I thought he was drawing a clear and useful distinction between civil matters and religious matters. For all civil purposes, he would allow gay couples the same rights as straight couples. But he is saying it's not up to government to define "marriage." If they're willing to back that up, and not STAND IN THE WAY of a church that marries gays, then fine. And I think they can do that... just keep saying it's not up to government to decide who is married (in the eyes of god). If you are in a long-term committed relationship, you deserve the same priveleges.

Seems fair. Am I wrong?

[Jeebus]

Probably Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh... I know the thought of a black man in the White House has them terrified.

How disgustingly racist of you.

To silence your racist accusation, either one of them are foaming at the mouth for Colin Powell to be president. Someone who, by the way, is literally twice as "black" as Obama is.

[HtownWxBoy]

I thought that was an interesting response. I am all for gay marriage (why not... who am I to decide who should or shouldn't be married, after all), but I actually didn't mind his answer. I thought he was drawing a clear and useful distinction between civil matters and religious matters. For all civil purposes, he would allow gay couples the same rights as straight couples. But he is saying it's not up to government to define "marriage." If they're willing to back that up, and not STAND IN THE WAY of a church that marries gays, then fine. And I think they can do that... just keep saying it's not up to government to decide who is married (in the eyes of god). If you are in a long-term committed relationship, you deserve the same priveleges.

Seems fair. Am I wrong?

As a gay I totally agree... I don't care what they call it I would just like to be able to have the same rights granted to straight married couples. That's just my opinion of course.

How disgustingly racist of you.

To silence your racist accusation, either one of them are foaming at the mouth for Colin Powell to be president. Someone who, by the way, is literally twice as "black" as Obama is.

*yawn*

[Mark F. Barnes]

Transcript is up if anyone wants it.........

See attachment

[Jeebus]

Wanda Sykes was right... if Palin gets into office - those kids are going to be carted off into day care, other care takers ASAP. Mommy has to work - just like all the other moms in America.

I'm pretty sure dad will be available.

*yawn*

Touche.

[westguy]

Like I said before, the defining moment for the entire debate, was the fact when she uttered the words, "Take more personal responsibility for your financial decisions". She is the first politician of any kind I've heard ring that most true point clear. All the rest are trying to place blame everywhere else, and never addressing that bottom line.

Remember those words........."Take more personal responsibility for your financial decisions".

I definitely heard her also blame lenders and politicians somewhere in the words she poured out. It's not unlike her to contradict herself in the very next breath.

[CoolBuddy06]

She didn't answer most of the questions, she just polished her talking points with facts. But for having improved so much in fluency, I will give her this one.

[RedScare]

Depending on how one defines "winning" the debate, Palin won or she didn't. After the Couric interview, anything above stone silence would be considered a win for Palin. She easily passed that test.

As for winning head-to-head, it frankly was not even close. Biden showed his wealth of knowledge on the subjects discussed, regardless whether one agrees with his position. Palin often veered toward the McCain talking points, or many times, off into an entirely different subject, rather than answer the question. She even told Ifill early in the debate that she would not answer the question asked, but instead the one she wanted to talk about. On that basis, she was beaten handily.

Of course, we all know that presidential or VP debates aren't scored the way they are in school. So, I would imagine the Obama campaign is very pleased that Biden made no major gaffes, and also did not make a victim out of Palin. The McCain campaign must be relieved that Palin was still standing at the end, and answered every question, no matter what she said. I doubt either candidate moved the polls in any direction.

EDIT: Sorry, double post.

[CoolBuddy06]

Depending on how one defines "winning" the debate, Palin won or she didn't. After the Couric interview, anything above stone silence would be considered a win for Palin. She easily passed that test.

As for winning head-to-head, it frankly was not even close. Biden showed his wealth of knowledge on the subjects discussed, regardless whether one agrees with his position. Palin often veered toward the McCain talking points, or many times, off into an entirely different subject, rather than answer the question. She even told Ifill early in the debate that she would not answer the question asked, but instead the one she wanted to talk about. On that basis, she was beaten handily.

Of course, we all know that presidential or VP debates aren't scored the way they are in school. So, I would imagine the Obama campaign is very pleased that Biden made no major gaffes, and also did not make a victim out of Palin. The McCain campaign must be relieved that Palin was still standing at the end, and answered every question, no matter what she said. I doubt either candidate moved the polls in any direction.

Depending on how one defines "winning" the debate, Palin won or she didn't. After the Couric interview, anything above stone silence would be considered a win for Palin. She easily passed that test.

As for winning head-to-head, it frankly was not even close. Biden showed his wealth of knowledge on the subjects discussed, regardless whether one agrees with his position. Palin often veered toward the McCain talking points, or many times, off into an entirely different subject, rather than answer the question. She even told Ifill early in the debate that she would not answer the question asked, but instead the one she wanted to talk about. On that basis, she was beaten handily.

Of course, we all know that presidential or VP debates aren't scored the way they are in school. So, I would imagine the Obama campaign is very pleased that Biden made no major gaffes, and also did not make a victim out of Palin. The McCain campaign must be relieved that Palin was still standing at the end, and answered every question, no matter what she said. I doubt either candidate moved the polls in any direction.

Couldn't agree more, Red.

[HtownWxBoy]

Depending on how one defines "winning" the debate, Palin won or she didn't. After the Couric interview, anything above stone silence would be considered a win for Palin. She easily passed that test.

As for winning head-to-head, it frankly was not even close. Biden showed his wealth of knowledge on the subjects discussed, regardless whether one agrees with his position. Palin often veered toward the McCain talking points, or many times, off into an entirely different subject, rather than answer the question. She even told Ifill early in the debate that she would not answer the question asked, but instead the one she wanted to talk about. On that basis, she was beaten handily.

Of course, we all know that presidential or VP debates aren't scored the way they are in school. So, I would imagine the Obama campaign is very pleased that Biden made no major gaffes, and also did not make a victim out of Palin. The McCain campaign must be relieved that Palin was still standing at the end, and answered every question, no matter what she said. I doubt either candidate moved the polls in any direction.

Depending on how one defines "winning" the debate, Palin won or she didn't. After the Couric interview, anything above stone silence would be considered a win for Palin. She easily passed that test.

As for winning head-to-head, it frankly was not even close. Biden showed his wealth of knowledge on the subjects discussed, regardless whether one agrees with his position. Palin often veered toward the McCain talking points, or many times, off into an entirely different subject, rather than answer the question. She even told Ifill early in the debate that she would not answer the question asked, but instead the one she wanted to talk about. On that basis, she was beaten handily.

Of course, we all know that presidential or VP debates aren't scored the way they are in school. So, I would imagine the Obama campaign is very pleased that Biden made no major gaffes, and also did not make a victim out of Palin. The McCain campaign must be relieved that Palin was still standing at the end, and answered every question, no matter what she said. I doubt either candidate moved the polls in any direction.

Biden won the debate, but that was expected. Palin succeeded in that she did well considering all that has gone wrong over the past few weeks. Nobody expected her to "win" the debate, it was just whether she could do well against Biden. I think they both did what their campaigns hoped they would.

[Mark F. Barnes]

I definitely heard her also blame lenders and politicians somewhere in the words she poured out. It's not unlike her to contradict herself in the very next breath.

There's blame to go around for everyone.....

What she said was not a contradiction in any way whatsoever, but she brought forth the final piece of the puzzle, and had the gall to say it out loud, what no other politicians has had the balls or intestinal fortitude to say. There is a lot of factors to blame in the crisis, but bottom line nobody held a gun to anyone's head to take on that loan they new good and well they couldn't afford. Nobody held a gun to their heads to falsify documentation, to give the appearance that they could afford that loan. Every bit of that falls under personal responsibility. If you believe any different well I guess that's your opinion.

Now the fact that these Mortgage brokers and lenders don't verify those documents or bend credit score criteria, just to get that commission, is directly the fault of the Lender and or Mortgage Broker.

And the bigger banks that failed to follow up on the investigation of the borrowers, and when they sell off this bad paper by camouflaging them in with a package deal with good paper.

And then all the way back to Fannie and Freddie for buying up all this bad paper, knowing good and well they had markers in congress they could pull in to insure they were bailed out.

And finally all those Politicians that took that money and promised favors, knowing full good and well that this house of cards was going to fall sooner or later, since they were warned by three different people over the last 10 years.

Did I leave anybody out?

[webdude]

I wish Palin would answer questions though instead of trying to match scripted talking points to questions. Many times it just seem weird when the scripted points totally didn't match up to what was being asked, even though it was delivered nicely.

[memebag]

I haven't watched to whole thing yet, but Palin is doing much better than I expected. That's really all she has to do, I think.

I find it hard to watch her now, though. She looks too much like Tina Fey.

[westguy]

What she said was not a contradiction in any way whatsoever, but she brought forth the final piece of the puzzle, and had the gall to say it out loud, what no other politicians has had the balls or intestinal fortitude to say. There is a lot of factors to blame in the crisis, but bottom line nobody held a gun to anyone's head to take on that loan they new good and well they couldn't afford. Nobody held a gun to their heads to falsify documentation, to give the appearance that they could afford that loan. Every bit of that falls under personal responsibility. If you believe any different well I guess that's your opinion.

If you're not taking personal responsibility, who is to blame? Predatory lenders? They share blame, but she did say who was and who wasn't at fault. This is just word salad.

[pineda]

A few observations:

They (Palin & Biden) both had notes, and did refer to them, big deal, I expected that.

Both were respectful and truthful and stuck to their campaign's talking points, I expected that, too.

The moderator, Gwen Ifill, did a very good job, much better than other talking heads have, didn't know what to expect.

I believe Palin more than held her own against a lifetime Washington insider, and I was very proud of her tonight.

Funniest part of the night to me was when Palin once mentioned Wasilla, Biden tried to out "small town" her with references to Scranton, Wilmington, Katie's Cafe, kitchen table, gas station and Home Depot. Or when he referred to himself in the third person several time, reminded me of a Seinfeld episode I saw once. That was kinda weird, who does that, anyway?

Overall hands-down clear victory winner tonight: Sarah Palin, but I'm sure you all expected that!

[Mark F. Barnes]

If you're not taking personal responsibility, who is to blame? Predatory lenders? They share blame, but she did say who was and who wasn't at fault. This is just word salad.

I guess you watched a different debate than I, I thought she laid blame just like I broke it down.

PALIN: Darn right it was the predator lenders, who tried to talk Americans into thinking that it was smart to buy a $300,000 house if we could only afford a $100,000 house. There was deception there, and there was greed and there is corruption on Wall Street. And we need to stop that.

Again, John McCain and I, that commitment that we have made, and we're going to follow through on that, getting rid of that corruption.

PALIN: One thing that Americans do at this time, also, though, is let's commit ourselves just every day American people, Joe Six Pack, hockey moms across the nation, I think we need to band together and say never again. Never will we be exploited and taken advantage of again by those who are managing our money and loaning us these dollars. We need to make sure that we demand from the federal government strict oversight of those entities in charge of our investments and our savings and we need also to not get ourselves in debt. Let's do what our parents told us before we probably even got that first credit card. Don't live outside of our means. We need to make sure that as individuals we're taking personal responsibility through all of this. It's not the American peoples fault that the economy is hurting like it is, but we have an opportunity to learn a heck of a lot of good lessons through this and say never again will we be taken advantage of.

Am I missing something,

[sifuwong]

Certainly, she redeemed herself, but the voter will look at the issues which is what it comes down to. Biden had it covered in the debate as expected. When it comes time to vote, people will remember what Biden kept saying, "John McCain voted against...", "John McCain was not a maverick on issues that count...."John McCain has no end to the war...", etc, etc. He was just hammering McCain.

[westguy]

Am I missing something,

Yes.

[memebag]

Or when he referred to himself in the third person several time, reminded me of a Seinfeld episode I saw once. That was kinda weird, who does that, anyway?

Bob Dole.

[Mark F. Barnes]

Yes.

Please explain your point in more than one word sentences.

[RedScare]

I guess you watched a different debate than I, I thought she laid blame just like I broke it down.

Am I missing something,

OK, she said it. In fact, she said it often, constantly repeating the mantra of "greed and corruption on Wall Street". Problem is, rich Wall Street fat cats are associated with Republicans. Every time she talked of greed and corruption on Wall Street, I thought, "yeah, that's why we need your party out of the White House". Plus, polls show McCain's popularity plummeting in the wake of his bailout debacle last week. I do not understand the decision of Palin and the McCain campaign to highlight his worst issue. The more they highlight it, the more it highlights his inability to fix it.

Strange tactic.

[westguy]

Please explain your point in more than one word sentences.

Personal responsibility is one of the elements of this economic situation...

[RedScare]

Joe did exceptionally well, he stumbled only once when she countered him on what Mcclelland said today, Joe had no comeback.

There was actually a very good reason that Joe had no comeback....There is NO McClellan. None. Nada. The commander's name is Gen. McKiernan. Biden let Palin's gaffe slide, so as not to appear picking on her.

The more important part to Joe's silence is that he was absolutely correct, and Palin got it absolutely wrong. Biden let THAT slide too. I thought those were good moves on Biden's part, knowing that the fact checkers would prove him right after the debate.

For the record, Gen. McKiernan's remarks:

McKiernan: "I do think there's a role for traditional tribal authorities and tribal structure in Afghanistan, in the rural areas especially, to play in a community-based sense of security, of connection with the government, and of environmental considerations. But I think that has to be led, that tribal engagement, it has to be led by the Afghan government. I specifically tell my chain of command in ISAF [international Security Assistance Force, the name for NATO's mission in Afghanistan] that I don't want the military to be engaging the tribes to do that. It has to be through the Afghan government to do that. But of course, there's danger in that. There's always, "Is this particular tribe, is it being reached out to for all the right reasons?" That has to be watched very closely."

McKiernan: "First of all, please don't think that I'm saying there's no room for tribal engagement in Afghanistan, because I think it's very necessary. But I think it's much more complex environment of tribal linkages, and intertribal complexity than there is in Iraq. It's not as simple as taking the Sunni Awakening and doing the Pashtun Awakening in Afghanistan. It's much more complex than that."

[Mark F. Barnes]

Personal responsibility is one of the elements of this economic situation...

Jesus H Christ, who is arguing that point? Not I. Red and myself were having this conversation a year ago, about people getting in over there heads, falsifying loan documents. I even mention someone I personally knew that was living in Waldon in a house that he got a loan on complete BS documentation, and he tried to use me as a reference of employment, and I told Grandmark Mortgage I had no clue what he was talking about, and they still loaned him 650K on that house. He's since defaulted on the loan and is back renting in Conroe.

[Mark F. Barnes]

There was actually a very good reason that Joe had no comeback....There is NO McClellan. None. Nada. The commander's name is Gen. McKiernan. Biden let Palin's gaffe slide, so as not to appear picking on her.

The more important part to Joe's silence is that he was absolutely correct, and Palin got it absolutely wrong. Biden let THAT slide too. I thought those were good moves on Biden's part, knowing that the fact checkers would prove him right after the debate.

For the record, Gen. McKiernan's remarks:

"Our strategy of approaching counterinsurgency operations is a valid strategy here," McKeirnan said. "Our problem is we don't have enough resources to do it with." The general added that he was referring not only to insufficient military forces but also shortcomings in Afghan governance and a shortage of international economic aid.

LINK

Good article, because it addresses the accusations of civilian daths thing also.

Good catch on her getting the wrong name.

[KinkaidAlum]

Well we all know Joe Biden had nothing to prove, except maybe that he could control himself, and not get off on a binge. Joe did exceptionally well, he stumbled only once when she countered him on what Mcclelland said today, Joe had no comeback. And the human part of Joe came out when it came to talking about the single parent thing. Not sure where he pulled the part out of where anyone insinuated that he didn't understand that position, and he had to pause to gather his emotions, but he rallied well after that.

Palin stumbled several times, and it seems she had to harp on the "putting his campaign on hold" crap three times, which she should have been coached to not even go there. But she held her own, but her threshold was pretty low to start with. She had more substance than I am sure a lot of people were expecting. The fact that she stood up and said everybody needed to take some personal responsibility in what is going on with the financial crisis. Whether is as Fannie or Freddie, people still bit off more than they could chew by choice. Mostly bad choices. I think she scored a home run with that line. Personal responsibility is huge.

No matter how good she did in this debate or not, does not change her limited experience. It may show she's a quick study, and not a total ditz. But at least it wasn't some orchestrated BS speech. She had notes, as well did Joe. She seemed to do well.

The Moderator did exceptionally well, kept control of the debate, and stuck to the format. She did a lot better than the Presidential Mod did. I was pleasantly surprised, she should do the next one, I don't care what book she's got out.

I agree with almost everything you said except for your first paragraph.

Maybe Biden didn't have a comeback for Palin's comments about General McClelland's words about Afghanistan two days ago because he didn't know who that was. The General's name is David McKKiernan

Edit-ooops. 15 minutes too late.

That said, my take is that if you leaned Republican or liked Palin's style, you'd be pleased with her performance. She didn't set the stage on fire and she made no major errors. Sure, calling the General by the wrong name is bad, but honestly, how many viewers caught that live? I certainly didn't. It took a Fact Check on MSNBC for me to learn about the error.

On the flip side, if you didn't like Palin before the event and were worried about her qualifications to potentially lead this country, you are probably more inclined to dislike her now. Her ending bit about expanding the Congressional powers of the vice president was flat out scary and showed a real interesting interpretation of the Constitution that I have never heard before.

As for Biden, he was boring. That said, boring but loaded with knowledge is what I want in a VP. He was well prepared and firm but didn't cross the line that men can cross by becoming patronizing. That was a smart play on his part because Palin's bar was set way too low to be worried about her. Focusing on McCain was a safe strategy.

[infinite_jim]

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/03/deb...poll/index.html

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2008/10/02/po...ry4497035.shtml

http://www.polls.newsvine.com/_question/20...idential-debate?

http://elections.foxnews.com/

(scroll to bottom)

[N Judah]

things i noticed:

-- her overuse of the word "Maverick." Does anybody really still believe this? At that point I was actually rooting for her to use it since I knew it could only hurt their campaign

-- Biden's decision, when asked the single issue question, to talk about Supreme Court nominees or Robert Bork or something like that, was a missed opportunity

-- Palin reeks of the nihilism I typically associate with GWBush. I could easily see her mocking a death row inmate and then doing that stupid smirk-wink thing. She's (to use Tina Fey's word) "adorable" when she doesn't try to be, but in the debate she came off way too contrived, like somebody who is only being nice when they want something.

-- I doubt she really knows anything about Sudan.

-- Palin's cheap shots came off utterly weak, but probably appealed to lots of people.

-- if the bar for Palin hadn't been set so absolutely low this past week I would have had to give it to Biden but as it stands I think it was a tie.

Edit: And I almost forgot the strange education stream-of-consciousness interspersed with random interjections of the phrase "No Child Left Behind."

[RedScare]

LINK

Good article, because it addresses the accusations of civilian daths thing also.

Good catch on her getting the wrong name.

Yes, and it was also a good catch that he said this is not a surge...

Bush said in making his troop announcement last week that there was under way a "quiet surge" of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, but McKiernan said he preferred not to think of the reinforcements as a surge because that would imply that the additional military power was being employed temporarily. He said he needs extra combat power, in addition to nonmilitary resources, that can be counted on for the long term.

Assuming that Palin was using John McCain's definition of the "surge", McKiernan said that would not work in Afghanistan. Biden was correct.