October 3, 2008
The Palin-Biden Thing (Ronald Goldfarb)
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) and Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) both won the “debate” last night.
Gov. Palin did what she was there to do: demonstrate that she isn’t as clueless as she appeared to be in her revealing interviews with Katie Couric; and reinvigorate her right-wing enthusiasts. She did both, adequately, evasively and a bit cloyingly. Sen. Biden needed to make no errors or faux pas, and proclaim firmly and gentlemanly the Obama message. He did that excellently.
If there was a loser in the Palin-Biden ”debate,” it was Gwen Ifill, who was awful. Ms. Ifill’s job was to moderate this event, fairly, and to help inform the audience by asking questions and getting answers from the contestants. That she failed to do. Instead, she lobbed out her questions, and sat back while Gov. Palin repeated the pitches she practiced all week, many not at all responsive to the questions. Once she saw she could get away with the tactic, even after Sen. Biden asked for help getting her to answer a question, she did it all night. Gov. Palin even led into one response claiming she’d not answer Ifill’s question because she preferred to say what she rehearsed. Ifill sat watching. No comment.
Thanks, Ms. Ifill, for doing nothing but sitting there. You failed the listeners and viewers — just what the McCain camp hoped would happen when they complained about your partiality. There sure was none of that from you, nor of anything else useful. Tim Russert must be looking down at this mock debate, sadly shaking his head at the failure of his profession.
Visit www.RonaldGoldfarb.com.
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Joe Biden got away with a couple of big whoppers. I wonder who is responsible for that?
Comment by Robert Rosencrans — October 3, 2008 @ 2:55 pm
I posted 14 of Joe Biden's lies on another thread. Coupled with confusing Syria and the Hizbullah as well as misquoting the Constitution I would say to claim that Bide made "no errors or faux pas" is a misstatement of what occurred.
Comment by Igor R. — October 3, 2008 @ 4:32 pm
Can you believe this guy??? Just lie, lie, lie, even when you don't have to.
"BIDEN: Can I respond? Look, all you have to do is go down Union Street with me in Wilmington or go to Katie’s Restaurant or walk into Home Depot with me where I spend a lot of time and you ask anybody in there whether or not the economic and foreign policy of this administration has made them better off in the last eight years."
Maybe Biden doesn’t get around in his neighborhood very often. Curtis Sliwa of WABC called around Wilmington this morning to find Katie’s Restaurant, only to discover that it went out of business — during the Clinton Administration:
Try as he might, Biden just doesn’t come across as a “man of the people”. He looks and acts patrician despite his blue-collar roots. This is a perfect demonstration of that. Sliwa had a lot of fun calling Home Depot locations in the Wilmington area and asking whether or not they’ve seen Biden (they haven’t), but the fact that Katie’s has been closed for 15 years and Biden didn’t know it shows that Biden has no clue about “his neighborhood” or what people go through there.
Comment by Igor R. — October 3, 2008 @ 5:46 pm
I have been checking the fact checkers all day. I guess what I am trying to figure out what was a misstatement what was deceptive and what was a complete untruth.
I don't care that Sarah Palin might of misstated Obamas record on raising taxes because I know that Obama wants to raise taxes.
I do care that Biden can't remember his postion on coal or Obama's position for meeting with Iran's leader without some conditions.
My thought is Biden made these responses knowing he was lying but wanting to win the debate. He knows there is going to be fact checking.
CNN take a tally and says it was even or Biden won.
Check the fact checkers and I think you will agree that Biden is a lying cheat.
Comment by dave — October 3, 2008 @ 5:46 pm
Igor you are still trying to saddle the anti neocon party with the label "liar". Yet we know that you have never allowed that the neocons, the biggest liars of them all, have every lied in their lives!!! Come on Igor.
This is stretching your credibility.
Comment by Gary Anderson — October 3, 2008 @ 6:01 pm
dave, I agree, Biden lied in "cold blood" so to speak. When he misstates the constitution, it's just a joke, like Roosevelt on TV during the great depression. But when he misstates his own well-known positions or Obama's positions he had heard during the primary debates, and these positions are key to influencing the voters, it's nothing less than inexcusable deception. Thanks for putting your finger on the distinction.
Comment by Igor R. — October 3, 2008 @ 8:52 pm
I thought the debate was very good. Gov. Palin, though uninformed, came off better than expected. Joe Biden had a 98% approval rating as to his performance at the debate. He just helped his boss, while Gov Palin helped herself a bit personally; she did nothing for McCain, but how could anybody?
Comment by Joyce — October 3, 2008 @ 9:55 pm
Joyce, when she improves her own reputation she improves people's opinion's of McCain's judgment and also energizes the base that was getting depressed after being disappointed by her.
Comment by Igor R. — October 4, 2008 @ 3:24 pm
Biden had a gaffe nobody noticed. He said that we warned Bush against elections in the West Bank, and Hamas won.
I'm sure this was a simple freudian slip and Biden knows the difference, but because nobody called him on it, it shows how ignorant people are of Israel, the Palestinians and the region.
Palin is still pushing the two-state solution, something neocons love to push because it makes them sound fair, but is actually something that will never happen because the West Bank has been so integrated and dominated by settlements composed of the most vicious right-wing Zionists (supported by the government, that it will never be a sovereign Palestinian State.
Palin also parroted that old Reagan propanganda "government is the problem, not the solution"
Government is collective citizenry. Any patriot knows it is "of the people." The Neocon Reagan Revolution was an attempt to hand over custody of the country from the peoples' government to the corporate/business oligarchy.
Borrowing money from the Communist Chinese to cut taxes was part of the plan, as was trying to get out of debt by cutting social programs.
The People's government has to step in now to solve the mess created by the corporate oligarchy that was supposed to replace government.
Palin's statement is misanthropic.
Comment by Fred from Oregon — October 5, 2008 @ 6:36 am
Fred, people noticed, I heard it mentioned on TV twice. Hizbullah pulling out of Lebanon was mentioned more though. That's Biden for you, that's the foreign policy expert who wanted to cut up Iraq in three pieces and who insists that what's going on there now is following his recommendation. The adult in the room, the mentor. Wow Barack, with mentors like that!
Comment by Igor R. — October 5, 2008 @ 3:00 pm