My quick take from the debate (after getting a chance to watch it) is simple. A good debater (Palin) battled a good legislator (Joe Biden). In that case, it was probably a draw. What Palin was able to do last night was essentially reassure base supporters that she isn’t a moron, that their faith is not misplaced. She did not however, in my estimation, change the minds of many independent voters.
Biden’s performace was unfortunately staid for the evening. I understand the strategy heading into the debate. I just would have liked to see a little of that Biden personality. A few punch lines, a little of the character that can be the sugar for all that policy medicine. None the less, if the question in a voter’s mind was “which candidate picked someone capable of being president?” Any fair-minded person would have chosen Biden.
Palin was also the benficiary of incredibly low expectations. There’s something to be said for tanking in a major network interview series. It makes a debate performace full of talking points and lacking any mastery of the subjects at hand seem powerful.
The debate was a draw, and in that, it did not help the McCain/Palin ticket…which is continuing the slide the polls.
Tonight my lovely fiance and I had the rehearsal dinner for our wedding (!) and thusly were not able to watch the infamous VP debate. So my fellow thinkPoppers, as I study up the tape, the comment section awaits for your opinions, takes, etc….
Katie Couric should send Sarah Palin a Christmas Card this year. Palin is the gift that keeps on giving for the CBS evening news. In this latest segment, Couric asks Joe Biden and Sarah Palin (separately) what their takes were on Roe V. Wade. and if there were any other supreme court rulings they disagreed with.
Biden’s answer was crisp if a bit too know-it-all. Palin’s was similiarly floundering to her answer on the job-creation umbrella. I can’t embed, so here’s a link. Watch the whole thing…if this is how the debate goes…it could get pretty ugly pretty fast.
Let me tell you who is NOT getting an invitation to Christmas dinner this year from Sarah Palin. That would be Katie Couric. Palin made a very mild joke at the expense of Joe Biden’s age, she mentioned having heard speeches of his since the”second grade.” Katie Couric asked her if it might be a little odd to make age jokes when her running mate is 72, her answer was astoundingly bad.
Hello my fellow thinkPoppers. I know what you’ve been thinking…you’ve longed for video entries to thinkPOP. You’d like to see the gorgeous faces behind the words and pictures you see daily here on the blog. Well wait no more! The first of what I hope to be many video entries is here. Other than the stuttering, the need to shave and the occasional squeaky voice, I think I did OK. Anyway, the comment section waits.
There may be no other opportunity quite like this this election year. The deepening financial insecurity penetrating the nation is a crisis of yet unknown magnitude. It is also an opportunity that Obama cannot pass up to convince the American people that he can lead not just on hope and rhetoric, but through a crisis playing out in real time.
How does he capitalize? Three things:
1. Don’t capitalize. If it looks like he is campaigning on the back of crisis it will look like opportunism, not leadership.
2. Speak in bold strokes, not in egghead speak. Tell Americans in simple sound-bite friendly terms what you would do from election day on to solve this problem.
3. Be ready on Day 1.
Roll out a Clinton-esque plan immediatey. Simply speaking intelligently on the issue won’t seal the deal, nor will feeling our pain. This is a moment for leadership, far more than the Georgia conflict this is a chance to tell the American people what you would do to help the nation in a moment of crisis. Less talk-more do it!
Just read an excellent article on AdAge that makes an equally excellent point. Though Obama/Biden like to keep pounding us over the head with it, McCain is NOT Bush. He may think like Bush…vote for Bush…eat birthday cake with Bush. But at the end of the day, the campaign isn’t against Bush or Palin. I think supporting both shows a serious lack of judgment on McCain’s part – but that’s not going to be enough to sway independents or undecideds. Here’s great quote from the article that I think sums it all up:
Bill Hillsman, chief creative officer of North Woods Advertising. Hillsman has done advertising for that same old politician Ralph Nader. Hillsman had this to say: “This notion about McCain as being an extension of a third Bush term is strategically wrong, because independents already know that [McCain] is not George W. Bush. He’s run against George W. Bush. … The job that has to be done for Obama to win … is to convince independents that this John McCain is a hell of a lot different from the John McCain in 2000.”
Here’s one I don’t understand…why every pundit in Washington says Joe Biden will need to be very careful in attacking Sarah Palin in their VP debate. To me its the most sexist thing anyone could say about her candidacy.
I thought Sarah Palin was the tough-girl, Moose-Killer, Hockey Mom? If she is ready to be commander in chief and has all this foreign policy experience (after all Alaska is the closest state to Russia), why should Biden have to take it easy? Because it won’t look good if the boy beats up on the girl? Please, Gov. Palin, you can’t have it both ways. If you’re a heartbeat away from the presidency, you better be ready to explain your positions to Joe Biden or anyone else with a brain that can ask intelligent questions. Quite frankly, I hope the intellectual gloves come off and we see her have to defend policy positions so close to the Bush era, there’s hardly a visible difference. If she can convince the electorate the US is doing a good job and should keep on doing it…then she’ll win the debate and deserve…otherwise, this Moose-Killer will be lunch meat.
I’ve like Biden as a candidate for a long time, I am thrilled and shocked that Obama actually picked the guy I wanted take a look at this taken from a post back in our Policythought days….
However, once the dust clears and one of them is the definitive nominee the name under theirs on the ticket should be Senator Joe Biden. Senator Biden has demonstrated consistent cogent understanding on the war in Iraq and the history of the conflicts of the middle east. His proposal of a federalized system of governance was right before and it is right now as an effective way of building a future in Iraq that’s not “Stay for 100 years” and not “Get out in 60 Days.“
Smart pick all around. Biden is a working class hero with incredible loyalty and intelligence. This pick gives Obama a balanced ticket.
Here’s one I don’t understand…why every pundit in Washington says Joe Biden will need to be very careful in attacking Sarah Palin in their VP debate. To me its the most sexist thing anyone could say about her candidacy. 
thinkPOP 