OPEN THREAD: VP Debate - Biden vs Palin

Coming into the debate, everybody’d been saying that Biden has to be careful not to appear overly aggressive or condescending or he’d come off as a sexist or an elitist insider or whatever. Well… he was what he “had” to be according the people saying that. Was that the right thing to do? Probably. If it was Katie Couric, who is a woman and not a washington insider, she could have gone after Palin.

Three things I took away from the debate:
1. The republicans have done such a great job of setting the expectations so low that anything short of pissing her pants and fainting on stage would have been a “victory”. Now they get to trot that out.
2. The main problem the democrats seem to have is that when they accidentally make a mistake and misstate something (which Biden did a few times) they tend to correct themselves and lose the message. The Republicans don’t get so caught up in that. There were a number of times when Palin blatantly misrepresented something (Obama not voting for troop funding) when Biden had to respond by correcting her (Umm… miss… McCain voted against that same bill). Republicans do a great job of sticking to their sound bite, keeping it clear, and not muddling it with truth in advertising. The Democrats muddle through their sound bites, which are equally untrue, but either using fancy words to hide what they’re really saying or qualify the statement by saying things like “I have always supported XYZ, which McCain has too.”
3. I find it absolutely crazy that pundits were actually having a serious discussion of how Palin’s appealing to middle america with her style. I don’t think her style is going to govern our nation any better, I don’t think her style is going to, you know, help the world get Iran to end their nuclear (pronounced new-CLEAR, by the way) program. If people are actually voting for their presidential candidates based on their style, should Oprah run for the presidency in 2012? What about Rachel Ray? Brad Pitt? Who’s hot right now? Is this really what’s going to help win an election?

They were going for the middle america, christian, sacred marriage votes. Those people want to know that their president/VP are “tolerant” of gays, but not supportive. That way they can say “Hey, I’m not homophobic, I just don’t want to meet a guy introduce another guy as his husband”. It’s hypocritical, but it’s what they want. Those are the votes Palin was going after, not the gays. She couldn’t give a fvck about the gays.

we tried that once, i don’t think that works. maybe it’s that i’m showing my youth here (i’m 33), but for the honest to goodness life of me, i cannot understand how we can treat members of our society in this manner. jeeze, we’re talking about marriage, what’s the problem? is this where the fear of the different dictate unsound judgment, or is it straight phobia?
hardcore had made an interesting comment about this in regards to health care, essentially saying that if gay marriage was “legalized” (because it’s illegal now) that it would be better for the health car industry and allow our rates to go down. (no more seperate status for same sex couples, cuts down on admin costs, etc)
this should be a non-issue already. imo. we have so much more important things to tackle.

….and each time I peruse I start to dislike it even more. However like a car accident, I still look knowing it’s going to be bad.. Like a shot of heroin, you know it’’ll make you sick but you keep plunging it into your arm.

You guys are all drunk on the koolaid. Obama is a fraud an unfortunately he’ll probably be running the show by the time everyone realizes it.

when the Marbury post went ballistically political it was weird, but a post with a political title tells all who enter here what’s what and no one “has” to read anything … at first I agreed with stebay211, but not now – amid the piling on and spew there has also been a good bit of debate and exploration of issues and since there’s not enough political engagement anyway, we shouldn’t shut it down when so many here are engaged

just 2centsworth

this site’s hits (i’d wager) have more than tripled since the starbury thread and it’s activity is through the roof.
but go ahead gsomer’s and keep writing your “let’s trade Al and Wright for the Matrix and DWade” posts. they’re super interesting!

there were indeed things to talk about this summer, FA, the Olympics, etc. but we had a vaccum on the main page that was only sporadically filled by independent posters

there are plenty of topics to examine, Mullin’s future being one – if he goes, what next? etc.