World Forums

Presidential Debates

While Obama *may* be able to handle McCain, which is more important, Biden has his work cut out for him againt Palin.

2 most pissed off people tonight are Biden and Hillary Clinton. You just know Bill ain't getting any tonight.

On the debates ......

The one between Biden and Palin will be fun. It will be entertaining. Biden is known for his sharp tongue and Palin will throw it back. I think the two will jab at each other with smiles on their faces and in the end, have the mutual respect for each other that is often found on the sport field.

I think the debates between McCain and Obama will be on the boring side.

Mate - Peggy Noonan, who cares. She is an elitist bitch and that is why she does not like the Palin pick. The media does not like curve balls and McCain threw a big one at them. So they are pissed. This ridiculous notion they kept bringing up today about the vetting process is a joke. Everyone was predicting Pawlenty. Well guess what. If he was chosen, it would have been in the exact same manner. The final vetting would have taken place on Wednesday and the final decision made Thursday. Remember, the goal was to steal the spotlight from Obama after his speech in the coliseum. Not only did the McCain make that goal, they hit a beautiful shot. So the media got one done over them and considering that they are in the tank for wonder boy, even more reason for them to be pissed.

Washington D.C. is full of phonies. Keith Olbermann, the nation's No.1 Bush Derangement Syndrome sufferer, Ariana Huffington, Greek goat milkmaid, who thinks she's aristocrat, Peggy Noonan, who's been changing her opinions twice before lunch and then some and the whole bunch of multimillion teleprompter witless readers.

We are, however, people of the most humble origins. And proud of it. And already achieved something in our lives without high connections and affirmative action.

We should never forget that and cannot possibly be ashamed of Sarah Palin, regardless of our political convictions. Because she's a true American.

Harry Truman didn't have much foreign experience, but gave Russkies hell just fine. Ronald Reagan didn't graduate from Yale, but will be remembered in Warsaw, Budapest and Prague for ages.

Americans used to dislike true aristocrats. There is no reason they should fall in love all of a sudden with phony ones.

hmmm

Jihad against McCain's pastor ?

http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/4803

that protester

early on when Palin was speaking, they showed a protester being tossed out. Does anybody know what issue she protesting about ?

Linda Chavez

Every one of the Dem commentators tonight has mentioned that Palin gave a good speech. Then they go on to say that that giving a good speech isn’t qualification to be vice president. I guess their point is that the GOP should have nominated her to be president, since clearly the ability to give a good speech is why they chose Obama.

Now That Cuts Too Close to the Bone, Governor Palin
John Podhoretz

Palin says Obama has had time to write two memoirs but not a single piece of legislation.

Brilliant.

Pabs:

Confirms my earlier views. She is an attractive red neck on ice. Wont get many of the Hillary hoped for votes or the moderate independents. But the appeal here is to the GOP base, the rednecks and the other country folks who chant USA and have a fondness for ignoring history and a disdain for the educated.

Not a whole lot on substance but she is exactly what the GOP base wanted. Add fear and 911 to it and you have the GOP election formula.

lol !!!

check it out, somebody actually went ahead and made the website

http://www.vpilf.com

Leonid wrote:Now That Cuts Too Close to the Bone, Governor Palin
John Podhoretz

Palin says Obama has had time to write two memoirs but not a single piece of legislation.

Brilliant.

Except that is is totally false. Obama has actually worked on and passed several pieces of legislation.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080904/ap_ ... PXajxh24cA

PALIN: "There is much to like and admire about our opponent. But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform — not even in the state senate."

THE FACTS: Compared to McCain and his two decades in the Senate, Obama does have a more meager record. But he has worked with Republicans to pass legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year. To demean that accomplishment would be to also demean the work of Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a respected foreign policy voice in the Senate. In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation.


These in flagrante delicto errors are accumulating.

Pabs

Welcome to American politics. We're as sophisticated and as ribald as the Europeans now. We've arrived.

The Daily Telegraph
Sarah Palin gets the spiteful Margaret Thatcher treatment
By Janet Daley


There are few sights more bloodcurdling than the liberal pack in full cry. The viciousness of the attacks on Sarah Palin is a testimony to the degree of panic her appointment has generated in Leftist circles.

It would seem that it is only sexist to trash a woman candidate if she is a Woman Candidate, which is to say a liberal.

It took about 20 minutes after John McCain announced her as his running mate for the attack machine to mobilise: woman candidate (bleep, bleep), no previous warning (nee-naw, nee-naw), exterminate, exterminate.

At first, it was pretty tenuous stuff: her husband had once been caught on a drink-drive charge - when he was 22 years old. You don't say. In blue-collar America, having only one drink-drive offence pretty much qualifies you as a Grade A wimp.

Then the piranhas got hold of a real prize (or so they thought): the 17-year-old daughter of this Christian Evangelical family was pregnant.

Yes, these things happen - and this particular thing happens quite a lot among the working-class American families that Mrs Palin personifies. She and her daughter are being true to their convictions: the girl will have her baby and marry her boyfriend. There will be no abortion or adoption.

The Palin family will offer them love, compassion and support. What's your problem? Christianity (even of the Evangelical sort) does not expect human beings to be faultless: it demands only that they make amends for their transgressions and accept responsibility for them.

The Evangelical churches have made it their particular mission in recent years to support teenage mothers and urge their families to stand by them. So where is the shame in this situation?

Now those who are not of the Palins' religious persuasion may well feel that it is wrong to allow a 17-year-old to marry and start a family. If one of my daughters had become pregnant at the age of 17, would I have advised her to have the baby and marry the father? No, I would not.

Do I respect the decision of another mother and daughter to make that choice based on their own values? Yes, I do. And that - as far as I am concerned - is what it means to be a "liberal". Which brings us to the subject of those hokey old redneck values that the Guardian and the blogosphere find so amusing (or pernicious, depending on their degree of dedication).

I personally am, and always have been, fervently pro-choice on abortion. I do not consider this to be the only sanctified Woman's point of view because I am aware that huge numbers of women disagree with me.

Whenever I touch on the subject, they write in and tell me so, often in eloquent and passionate terms. But according to the official feminist sisterhood (which was taken over by the totalitarian Marxist tendency long ago) you can represent the views of Women only if you accept the tenets of their ideology. Ergo, Mrs Palin is not a Woman Candidate.

She is a renegade, the gender equivalent of an Uncle Tom. In the US, her position is particularly incendiary because it is part of the culture war between metropolitan liberals and provincial America: that vast fly-over country where people (or "folks", as they call themselves) still live by the standards the Palin family embodies. Life is about hard work and hard play.

They hunt with guns from childhood. They talk about sin (and redemption) in ways that embarrass the urban elite, and they regard patriotism as a fundamental part of their moral code. (It is the liberals' ambivalence about patriotism that they detest most.)

Like Margaret Thatcher before her, Mrs Palin is coming in for both barrels of Left-wing contempt: misogyny and snobbery. Where Lady Thatcher was dismissed as a "grocer's daughter" by people who called themselves egalitarian, Mrs Palin is regarded as a small-town nobody by those who claim to represent "ordinary people".

What the metropolitan sophisticates failed to understand in the 1980s when Thatcher won election after election is even more the case in the US: most (and I do mean most) ordinary people actually believe in the basic decencies, the "small-town values", of family, marital fidelity, and personal responsibility. They believe in and honour them - even if they do not manage to uphold them.

Middle America - of which Alaska is spiritually, if not geographically, a part - builds its life around those ideals and regards commonplace moral lapses as part of the eternal struggle to be good.

The life of small-town USA is based on the principles of those Protestant colonial settlers who founded the nation: hard work, self-improvement, personal faith and family devotion. Mrs Palin speaks to and for them in a way that patronising "liberal" elitists find infuriating.

You may not know this, refugee Comarade, aka Midwestern Pardner, but them GP folk, the base, don't read them European rags. Them European and thier liberal ideas.


Save your cut and paste for others.

Falc wrote:Home run baby!!!!

Yes. First inning home-run. Nice cheer-leader speech.

She's got roughly 4 weeks to prepare for the debate. She needs substance in the debate as to how she believes they can and will get things done.

Don't get me wrong, I believe she could actually win the debate.

Falc wrote:Home run baby!!!!

LMFAO! Are you kidding? It was a single at best.

Palin spoke about her family, kissed John McCain's ass, spoke about her very modest accomplishments and trashed Obama. She did absolutely nothing to convince the American public that she is the person to take over the presidency should something happen to McCain. In other words she did nothing out of the norm. She did nothing that wasn't expected. It was actually quite predictable (dare I say it) and boring. For a rookie in front of a very large audience she did fine. It was not outstanding, far from it quite frankly.

Leonid wrote:Newt Gingrich on Sarah Palin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8zXi90E ... re=related

Well Gingrich has always been a loyal party man. He took out his aggressions on the MSNBC reporter and that's fine. But the bottom line is Sarah Palin is NOT experienced enough and she was chosen by the McCain camp as opposed to Obama who was chosen by 18 million voters.

Leo & Bineaz - I came across this comment on a blog .....

For all you thinking that "community ogranizer" is some kind of public servant, here's the truth. It's really nothing more than street-level political thuggery, the lowest level of the corrupt Chicago system. Let's remember it's not feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, etc. It's trying to create political unrest for the sake of intimidation. That's what Obama doesn't want people to understand. He tries to imply it's like working in a soup kitchen or food bank. The reality is something much less noble.

Anything that you might have heard/seen on the local side to shed some light to this comment?

One more thing...

Now sexism is a serious issue in the US and especially with the conservatives and the republican party in general. Did any of you notice some of the buttons the delegates were wearing? I saw "VPILF", "Hottest VP from the coolest state".. I'm sure I missed some.

It makes no difference to me but I find it hysterical that the Republican party puts a blind eye to this. What a bunch of hypocrits.

YOu have to understand, M&M, that Falc is part of the religious GOP base. Not all of the are Evangelicals. Some are Catholics, many Charasmatic and old school Catholics. But I hear you, the GOP is again mongering fera, God and Country to get a shot at all the war money. Did you hear that idiot Romney call Russia the enemy?

Palo - Russia is becoming the enemy again. Becuase of their actions in former Soviet Giorgia, they are being threatened with removal from the E8.

How is Russia responding? The same way they have responded with all threats from western Europe: oil supplies will shrink.

That not only will hurt European nations that rely on Russia for energy, but it will cause the price of oil to rise globally as the demand will go up.

Therefore they are an enemy.

Russia is clearly the enemy. I guess those Marian apparitions in the Fatima scrolls had a point.



Sigh. What an opportunity for the world to move forward, just when a number of major nations are mastering freer trade and economics. A bunch of baboons in the Kremlin get comfortable and cocky and all this promise is in jeopardy.

Maybe humans need to be threatened in order to innovate? It is high time we get off our collective asses and actually increase alternate energy R&D. No, it won't happen by drilling in Alaska, which many estimate as a potential to supply 2% of our domestic oil needs.

We Americans are a stupid lot. Sorry, but we really are. We are the laughing stock of the world. Every culture can impose themselves in the American sell to the highest bidder and Darwinian anything goes system of life. We transfer billions and billions to interests ranging from Islamic fundamentalists to Kremlin oligarchs to even simple groups of immigrants who match the entitlement mentality of the latest American citizenry.

Some of you gloss over the fact that perhaps the biggest wealth transfer in history was fraudulently presided over by a supposedly fiscally Conservative Republican party. Who presided over making available cheap money? Do you all know who is first in line to skim all of this when venture capital, I-Banks security creators and sellers, and analysts peddle products that intrinsically have no worth?

Leo made an interesting point about how quickly the balance of power can change in the modern world. Trust me, it can and will if some fundamental economic, energy, and education issues are not addressed.

I am a foolish reductionist. All of this can be reduced to Americans no longer really being Americans. We're mostly any combination of partisan political loyalists or, increasingly, ethnically and religiously affiliated. Bad news man.

LOL at Palo calling me part of the religious GOP base. The truth is that I am a disgruntled Democrat. I may stay registered as a Democrat only for the purpose of having some say in my state primaries. But for all intent and purpose, I am Independent.

And let me add that there are certain issues that I agree with Obama. I just have no faith that he has any ability in getting things done. There is nothing in his background that shows he can get anything done.

You have a funny concept of protest Falc. Let me get this straight. On the basis of hypothetical crimes of omission committed by your party when it was out of power, your retort is to help keep them out of power...while simultaneously striking a vote for the party that actually committed crimes of commission that you yourself have railed against these past 8 years.

Now that is revolutionary thinking. Somewhere beyond space and time, Lenin is smiling. Brilliant. If this doesn't invoke the term useful idiot, then surely nothing ever will.



It's not too late to rethink and maybe change your mind Falc. Do you really want 8 years of the same old same old? This shit cannot continue. I'm a monkey's uncle if this country is best served by a team consisting of a man who has a good chance of dying in the next 4 years and a woman selected on the basis of sheer demographic appeal.

You are a good guy and a former soldier Falc. Think about this. Again, I have nothing but respect for McCain. He was a hard steel warrior once, something I will always bow before and salute. But come on, the guy is past his prime. And, truth be told, he is a bit of a loose cannon.

Well, I know what does community work mean, but I couldn't understand why Falc is being funny, considering that Mate, a lifetime staunch Republican supporter, expresses his displeasure with the GOP by supporting Obama:)

Aren't there better ways to talk about Iraq, Israel, Gaza, Hamas, weak dollar, energy supplies, Russia, Pakistan, etc. than to pin your hopes on the Chicago South Side community thug?

I wouldn't go so far as to say community organizers are thugs; agitators certainly. And that's been going on for a long time and still continues. Just this week a state representative organized a boycott of the first day of school in Chicago. Instead he got some busses and they went to one of the best HS's in the area to register.

Get this, the HS--New Trier (where Ann Margaret, Charleston Heston and Donald Rumsfeld attended)--were prepared for the influx and added staff to make it a learning experience for its students. SHEESH. None were allowed to attend, however.

Leo

There is a big difference. I am the disaffected Republican for a party that has been in power. But how can a Democrat be disaffected in the context of who has actually ran the show these past 8 years. Come now Leo, you're more sensible than that. Of course, you want to keep Falc in the fold. You bastard!



Hey, I will probably be in Chicago for at least a week in the next month, perhaps even next week. Let's get together with Bineaz. I will be staying on the Lakeshore, so I can meet you guys anywhere in the city.

Divisions within Republican minds.

From last night's Daily Show.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index ... ender-card

LMAO

Mate - Your line about protest, hypothetical crimes of ommision, crimes of commission .... huh???? Have you been drinking Lili juice? I have no clue what you are talking about.

OK, so the Obama camp is going to stick with McCain = Bush and you are just following the talking point. Fine. If that is the goal of the Obama camp, they will lose this election. So much for positive campaigning. Palin strikes back at comments made by Obama himself and all of a suddent it is dirty politics? If you have watched the Republican convention at all this week, you will see that Bush-Cheney are left as a footnote. And while all of us want to forget about the last 8 years and logically going to the other party would make sense, considering how miserably the Democrats have acted while in charge of Congress the last two years somewhat negates that. So while you have some guilt complex for voting for Bush the last two times, I instead am looking at the two candidates and one is definitely superior to the other. Party affiliation has no meaning for me in this election.

Falc

That is some bad spinning. You are seriously comparing a Democratic Congress of the past year to nearly 8 years of almost absolute Republican control?

Mate - Your line about protest, hypothetical crimes of ommision, crimes of commission .... huh???? Have you been drinking Lili juice? I have no clue what you are talking about.

Now you know why I favor Harvard lawyers. They get it.

mate wrote:Leo

There is a big difference. I am the disaffected Republican for a party that has been in power. But how can a Democrat be disaffected in the context of who has actually ran the show these past 8 years. Come now Leo, your are more sensible than that. Of course, you want to keep Falc in the fold. You bastard!

OK, now I know what you are getting at. My disaffection with the Democrats is the process of how they ran their primaries. Clearly the powers within the organization pushed Obama without truly vetting him (just adding some current events humor into the discussion). In the end when Clinton was picking up some steam in the primary elections, the powers made sure that the Super Delegates took care of matters. Now the reaction and smear campaign against Palin has been the icing on the cake.

Bush has been a mistake. I don't want to start a new mistake with Obama. There is nothing that is change about him except that he does not look like the guys on the dollar bills. That alone is not reason for change. Look who he has turned to during his campaign run. The permanent structures within the Democratic party. Kennedy, Kerry and Biden are not change.

What spinning Mate? The Republicans controlled Congress for the first 6 years. Two years ago, the Democrats took control with the promise of shaking things up. Nothing has been shaken. The Democrats are repeating their mistakes of the past, riding on incumbency to keep power. The Republicans did the same thing and lost two years ago. In my district, the incumbent representative lost. He had the local Democratic political machine behind him and still lost. Now the seat will stay in Democratic hands as their is really no Republican base here but it is a telling sign. The approval ratings for Congress are just a little better than the President. There will be some changes this November. The changes may turn out to be a wash as I don't think incumbents from either party have an advantage.

BTW, cute line about Harvard lawyers. Guess who taught me in law school? You are such an elitist bastard!

Falc

Bush has been a mistake. I don't want to start a new mistake with Obama.

I know, you want to ensure that somebody's academic and professional achievements truly are meritorious...and that such a person is backed by the right party with the right cadre. Glad to see you are thinking out of the box and shaking things up. McCain is at the top of his game and has the military experience that Bush doesn't. Palin is academically and executive qualified.



By the way, speaking of elitism, the biggest bullshit in corporate America is this notion of Executive Leadership. You have no idea Falc of how many charlatans I work with who are executive qualified, but whom really are masters only at building internal fiefdoms so as to skim money...as opposed to truly understanding the product and how to build and market it. I have seen many a company destroyed by this type of ticket punching individual. Palin is similarly being touted in one of the most egregious examples of this charlatan mongering that I have ever seen.

These BS artists come from all walks Falc. Harvard. MIT. And us plain folks. But Jesus, at least the Harvard guys with the high GPAs have something to initially bring to the table.



I have seen how to build a successful enterprise. I have been part of some. Get a crew of people who truly have a workable vision, an innovation, and whom are evangelical about what they are doing. Once this crystallizes, then you put operations around it, which is a cookie cutter skill. Then you bring in executive leadership.

Mate - If you haven't figure it out yet, where anyone went to school has no significance to me. The two of us are in agreement about how some leaders are assessed. I saw my fair share of ticket punching in the Army. It probably is the one thing that has left a bad taste in my mouth concering my military experience. Education is important. But that alone is not enough and where someone received that education means nothing to me. It is what that person does with that education. And there are plenty of people with little education that have done amazing things. I am an offspring of parents with 5th grade education from Italy. My parents have a lot more character and integrity than a bunch of idiots I have met from highly regarded institutions. What those people have are wide open doors available to them and as they punch those tickets, they advance beyond their abilities. Palin is the real thing. She was picked for whom she is. The charlatan is your guy. That is just the way I feel.

Check this out if you interested in the achievements of the Community Organizer, Barack Obama ....

http://riverdaughter.wordpress.com/2008 ... organizer/

Falc

I agree with everything you said except this:

Palin is the real thing. She was picked for whom she is. The charlatan is your guy. That is just the way I feel.

My God, did you review Obama's background and how he grew up? He shares a lot in common with us and probably was even more disadvantaged due to a dysfunctional family and its tragedies. You and I had uneducated but hard working and stable parents. Hence, Obama overcoming this and the color of his skin is no small testament to his willpower and talent. Because he managed to excel at the best schools and become a state and national Senator, he is somehow morphed into an elitist...while Sarah Palin who has neither academic achievement nor solid schooling, never mind credible experience, is the real deal?



Checkmate. At least I got you to pony up. You are an official Republican now. Rove loves ya!



Moreover, let's not forget who he was branded a radical Muslim, a Black nationalist, and anti-American during what was actually a long vetting and nomination process. Sorry Falc, but when you want to see and hear evil, you often do. This is the case with you and Obama. So be it.

I made peace with the fact that it will take a few generations for latent racism to die out. I have no doubt in my mind that if Obama were fully Caucasian, people like you would not hesitate. Really, simply compare him to Hillary. You were ready to support her.

Anyways, go with your gut instincts. Most Americans do.

Mate, Mate, Mate ......

No doubt, we are exact opposites in how we see the two young candidates in this race. We can agree to that point I believe.

Barack Obama shares very little with me other than the fact that the two of us graduated from law school in the same year and were admitted to our respective bars on the same date. That is it. His parents were well educated and met in college. His Kenyan father was a foreign exchange student and left his family to study at Harvard, where he received a masters in economics. He was not part of Obama's life. His mom then married an Indonesian and moved there. At age 10, Obama was sent back to Hawaii and raised by his white grandparents. So nothing like the immigrant blue collar roots that we grew up in.

He attended a top prep high school. He then studied at Occidental College for two years and completed his undergraduate degree at Columbia University. Then later went to Harvard Law. While I attended a good Catholic high school, I received my degrees from my state school. I am not sure which fine institution you attended. Would be interested in knowing.

So while Obama may have had hardship due to dysfunctional parents, there is nothing to indicate that he had a rough life. He did not grow up in a typical black American neighborhood and for all intent and purpose is more white than he is black. I have said that over and over again and his skin color means nothing to me. As for his vetting process, he has not gone through any. He ran, the media gave him a pass and the American public knows nothing of him even though he has been in the spotlight for the last two years. You see the results I found concerning his community organization. His legislative career, both with Illinois and Congress is very unremarkable. He talks a good talk. That is it.

You and others may think that Palin's accomplishments are small potatoes because of where she is from. Maybe. But she talks a good talk and gets things done. And that counts a lot for me.

While I attended a good Catholic high school, I received my degrees from my state school. I am not sure which fine institution you attended. Would be interested in knowing.

Fordham University, a fine and elite Jesuit school.



I told you that many years ago. Remember our mutual friend with whom you served in the US Army, a certain Mr. Barrett? By the way, you never did send me his contact information. Anyways, he and I were classmates both at Fordham and in ROTC. I think he is still in the US Army Reserves.

But, I bet you he's voting for Obama as well.



By the way, I wouldn't trade my upbringing for what Obama went through. You have a huge advantage being raised by stable parents with a strong work ethnic and sense of lineage. Period. Obama went to a nice prep school, but I would hardly say he was living high on the hog. By most accounts, his grandparents were middle class.

Oh yeah, forgot about you and Mike. I have not heard from him in years. BTW, no way in hell he would vote for Obama. He was as Republican as you get. I am not sure Fordham is considered elite. A good school but for working class stiffs like you.

Mate

Of course, you want to keep Falc in the fold. You bastard!

Guilty as charged, cause what makes me like Falc is more important, to me at least, than our occasional disagreements, politics including.

The same goes for you, Bineaz, aka North Shore thug, Markino, Mmaggi, Pabs, Felix and Mark. Even Eugene by his long AWOL has made me like him:)

Speaking of which, where are Eugene, Mark and Buzzz? Does anyone know?