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Friday, October 3, 2008

Morning Sickness


Last night, as I was watching the debates, I realized just how upsetting it would be to wake up in November to find that McCain/Palin would be leading our nation for the next four years. I swear, if she brought a question that she didn't want to answer back to energy or the "Great State of Alaska" one more time, I was going to put a pillow over my face and scream.

I understand that by completely ignoring questions that she didn't know the answer to she was technically being a good debater, but what does that say about how she will be as a Vice President? I don't feel at all confident that she would be capable of holding herself accountable. All the 'darn it alls' and shout outs to the "Joe Six-Packs" of the world do not make up for the fact that she did not answer the majority of the questions to which I would have liked to hear her answer.

One of my personal pet peeves is when someone is not able to answer the "what is your weakness question." You do not respond to 'what is your Achilles' Heel?' with a strength.

I secretly loved that she continually referred to General McClellan (a civil war general) when she meant General McKiernan. Then she tried to contradict Biden by saying "Well, first, McClellan did not say definitively the surge principles would not work in Afghanistan. Certainly, accounting for different conditions in that different country and conditions are certainly different. We have NATO allies helping us for one, and even the geographic differences are huge but the counterinsurgency principles could work in Afghanistan. McClellan didn't say anything opposite of that. The counterinsurgency strategy going into Afghanistan, clearing, holding, rebuilding, the civil society and the infrastructure can work in Afghanistan."

Huh, we'll here's McKiernan's quote from The Washington Post as found on factcheck.org:
"The word I don't use for Afghanistan is 'surge,' " McKiernan stressed, saying that what is required is a "sustained commitment" to a counterinsurgency effort that could last many years and would ultimately require a political, not military, solution."

Maybe she shouldn't be so smug in her challenge to people that they could try to 'stump the candidate' because it looks like they already have. If you haven't seen at least part of the Katie Couric interview with Governor Palin, check it out on YouTube as there are several clips. It's really interesting to see what happens when you take away the comfort of a script.

And now, a word from Matt Damon:






Matty, you can rest assured because I'm talkin' about it!



2 comments:

Maggie Bahnson said...

I agree with you on all points! I hope America saw what we saw last night, or perhaps they were distracted by all her damn winking.

LuLu said...

I liked Michell Norris's comments most. But I am a true Portlander and love my NPR. I think Biden could have been a little bit less nice and really pressed her more on questions. Maybe he didn't want to hurt a pretty lady. It is very surprising how far she has gotten and I am not sure how. Maybe it's like in the SNL skit, it is because she "wanted it the most." Haha!