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The Vice Presidential Debate: Sarah Palin Faces Her Biggest Challenge

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One issue which has intrigued us no end has been the build-up to the election of the President of the United States. We have had Barack Obama, a Black man nominated by the Democratic Party.  Before that he had to overcome Senator Hillary Clinton, a woman who many agree has the pedigree to do the job. On the Republican side we have seen the emergence of a political neophyte in Sarah Palin selected by Senator John McCain to be his running mate.

It was a selection which fitted the public perception of McCain that he is truly a maverick; the BU household suggests that it shows he is a high stakes gambler.

In less than 24 hours the world will witness the Vice Presidential Debate 2008 between Senator Joe Biden and Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska. While Joe Biden is known as the gaffe machine, Sarah Palin has  quickly attracted the reputation of providing answers to questions which lead to nowhere – see the video above.  In Biden’s defense his gaffes are usually based on his abrupt answers and tendency to be verbose. On the flipside, Palin’s answers to many questions in her handful of interviews have been idiotic.

Against this background the Vice Presidential Debate is being eagerly awaited by Americans and World Citizens. We say World Citizens because whether mainstream America is aware, what happens in their domestic politics will have geopolitical implications. They are some who are trying to muddy the pristine reputation of Gwen Ifill, the Black PBS moderator of the upcoming debate. The fact that she will be under the microscope to protect her good reputation as a journalist should make her a good moderator.

One bit of advice BU can give to the veteran Biden is not to be sucked to the level of Palin. She obviously does not have the political dept to adequately win a economic and foreign policy debate; she will have to rely on hyperbole and emotional arguments. Her only chance to create a favourable impression will be to stay focus on attacking Obama to deflect attention from herself.

Will Gwen Ifill’s questions allow Palin that luxury?

Previous BU Sara Palin blogs

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64 responses to “The Vice Presidential Debate: Sarah Palin Faces Her Biggest Challenge”

  1. Sapidillo Avatar
    Sapidillo

    If the bar was not set at a low for Palin, I think she might have come out with much less kudos. Maybe if all those interviews with she and Katie were not aired before the debate, people would have expected her to be dynamite based on the repeated verbiage she spouts while on the stump and mainly at the convention. Having said that, maybe she would not have got the amount of practice sessions she was given.

    Although many people were impressed with her performance, which apparently is mainly the base, her debating techniques did not move the needle for McCain; however, it did not move for Obama either.

    We’ll have to see what Obama is coming with on Tuesday night and if McCain will have the chance to clean up the rug with him, or Obama would make McCain loose his temper for all to see.

  2. EyeSpy Avatar
    EyeSpy

    ALL Candidates stretch the truth and embellish whenever they get an opportunity to do so. They will twist and turn comments made either by themselves or their opponents.

    It’s called PoliTRICKS!!

  3. Micro Mock Engineer Avatar
    Micro Mock Engineer

    David,

    My concern is twofold:

    1) as ‘legendary’ as Biden is for his many many ‘gaffes’, in stark contrast to their treatment of Palin, the press virtually never reports them.

    2) Biden’s ‘gaffes’ concern me more than Palin’s, as in his case they don’t represent a lack of knowledge on the subject in question, but his genuine opinion (as the case with his remarks about Obama) or a deliberate attempt to mislead i.e. telling lies with an air of authority… here are a few from the debate:
    – when Palin charged that Obama indicated that he would be prepared to meet with Ahmadinejad without precondition, Biden responded: “That’s just simply not true about Barack Obama. He did not say he’d sit down with Ahmadinejad.” LOL… just lookup the YouTube Democratic debate from July 2007 to see what Obama did say. To make matters worse, when he was running against Obama this was what Biden had to say about Obama’s comments: “Would I make a blanket commitment to meet unconditionally with the leaders of each of those countries within the first year I was elected president? Absolutely positively no.” (he said this at the National Press Club – Google it).
    – during the debate he said he did not vote to authorize the war in Iraq, and gave some hogwash story about voting to give the President authority… LOL… this is not a gaffe… this is deceit.
    – … and my favorite, because Palin called him on it and he reiterated it a second time (with authority), he said that the top military commander in Iraq said the principles of the surge could not be applied to Afghanistan. In fact General David D. McKiernan, the top military commander in Afghanistan, didnt say a surge wouldnt work, he said a surge like the one in Iraq would not be ENOUGH: http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/10/01/mideast/military.php
    Researching is right, Palin was WRONG to assume that the fact-finder pundits would set things straight the following day.

    So again David, which is worse, deliberate lies or forgetting peoples names or supreme court judgments? 🙂

  4. Micro Mock Engineer Avatar
    Micro Mock Engineer

    EyeSpy… I would be interested in examples of Palin ‘stretching the truth’ during the debate (or any of her previous interviews for that matter).

    Don’t misunderstand me, I am in no way suggesting that she is a good VP pic… quite frankly I don’t know what the McCain team was thinking… but she is certainly not the conventional “embellishing, stretch-the-truth” politician like ALL of the rest in this race (maybe this was the quality that attracted them to her). She is ignorant of many important issues one would expect someone running for the second highest executive post in the US to understand, but to my mind Biden is equally unfit for the post based on his public display of poor CHARACTER. Knowledge can be fixed a whole lot easier than character 🙂

  5. David Avatar
    David

    @MME

    We will not defend Biden to the hilt on this one. We thank you and researching for exposing the flip side to the issues, we like it! What we will say though is since the arrival of Palin to the US political landscape the media has given Biden zero (or close) attention in this race. Palin’s charisma has been overwhelming. The point we are making is she has enjoyed the GOOD (spotlight) for about 3 weeks and McCain has benefited from it. As you would expect now that the honeymoon has abated somewhat the POLITICS will play-out.

    For example has the BU family seen this STORY?

  6. Micro Mock Engineer Avatar
    Micro Mock Engineer

    … one thing she isn’t ignorant on is energy… she is the only one among the lot who has consistently put forward a sensible approach to the energy challenges faced by the US. 🙂

  7. Eyespy Avatar
    Eyespy

    Micro Mock Engineer // October 4, 2008 at 9:59 am

    EyeSpy… I would be interested in examples of Palin ’stretching the truth’ during the debate (or any of her previous interviews for that matter).
    ————————————————–
    Micro:
    Here are a few. I encourage you to research…..

    1. The Statement: In the debate, Sarah Palin said that Barack Obama proposes “to mandate health care coverage and have a universal, government-run program.” “And unless you’re pleased with the way the federal government has been running anything lately, I don’t think that it’s going to be real pleasing for Americans to consider health care being taken over by the feds.”

    The Facts: “Obama’s health care plan does include a government mandate that all children be covered by health insurance. Beyond that, while the plan is “universal” in the sense that it aims to make health care coverage available to every American, it is not “universal” in the sense that a government mandate would require coverage for every adult. ”

    The Verdict: “Mostly False.” “Obama’s plan would increase government’s role in health care, and mandate coverage for children, but would include existing health care systems and not mandate universal coverage. There is no evidence in the plan to support Palin’s claim that health care would be “taken over by the feds.”

    2. The Statement: Sarah Palin said that “Sen. Barack Obama “would be willing to meet with” Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad” without preconditions being met first.”

    The Facts: Palin stated an assertion made repeatedly by John McCain. Joe Biden said at the debate, “it is simply not true” that Obama said he would “sit down” with Ahmadinejad.” “Obama has talked about meeting with Iranian leaders if necessary, but not Ahmadinejad specifically.”

    Verdict: “Misleading.” “While Obama has said he wouldn’t rule out meeting with any foreign leader, he never specifically said he’d meet with the Iranian President.”

    Now, to balance the playing field…

    The Statement: Joe Biden described John McCain as “a long-time supporter of deregulation of the banking industry. He said, “John recently wrote an article in a major magazine saying that he wants to do for the health care industry is deregulate it and let the free market move like he did for the banking industry.”

    The Facts: “Sen. John McCain has frequently supported deregulation. Some aspects of that deregulation are now widely blamed for the problems on Wall Street. In the current issue of a magazine for the American Academy of Actuaries, McCain discussed a change he wants to bring to the health care market, allowing people to buy plans across state lines.” He said in the magazine called “Contingencies,” “Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation.”

    Verdict: “Misleading.” “McCain does want to overhaul state oversight of health care, but the deregulation he is calling for is not nearly as extensive as what was done to the banking system.”

  8. Micro Mock Engineer Avatar
    Micro Mock Engineer

    Wow Eyespy… I have to give it to you… yuh work REAL hard to find those “stretching-the-truth” examples. I am compelled to concede given your effort. 🙂

    A couple comments though… while I think Obama has the better health care plan of the two candidates, tell me about this new ‘Government run program’ a.k.a. the National Health Insurance Exchange which your team proposes… how much will it cost?

    … with respect to item 2, ROFL… (I apologise in advance David) 🙂

  9. Micro Mock Engineer Avatar
    Micro Mock Engineer

    Question for David and Eyespy… do you believe Obama when he made this statement in his debate with McCain:

    “What I’ve called for is a tax cut for 95 percent of working families, 95 percent.

    And that means that the ordinary American out there who’s collecting a paycheck every day, they’ve got a little extra money to be able to buy a computer for their kid, to fill up on this gas that is killing them.” (… transcript of the debate here: http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/26/debate.mississippi.transcript/ )

    … or do you think that this statement is just a “introduce-ITAL-within-100-days” comfort-to-a-fool promise? 🙂

  10. EyeSpy Avatar
    EyeSpy

    Micro Mock Engineer // October 4, 2008 at 7:17 pm
    Do you believe Obama when he made this statement in his debate with McCain: “What I’ve called for is a tax cut for 95 percent of working families, 95 percent.”
    ————————————————–
    It was said that “Obama’s statement at the debate did not go into detail about those who would get tax cuts under his plan,” and that he “stretched things when he said that 95% of “you”– everyone would receive a tax cut.”
    It was also stated “if you look at ALL tax filers – talking about everyone, 81% would see reduced taxes under Obama’s plan, and if you’re talking about working families, it’s 95%.” Therefore, it was ruled that his debate statement was Half True.

    Obama’s statement, however, that “95% of working families would get lower taxes under his plan” was found to be true.

    According to the Tax Policy Center’s analysis about Obama’s tax proposal, they said that 95% of all families with children (working and nonworking) would get a cut in their total federal taxes, and 95% of all tax filers (working and nonworking) will get a cut in their individual income taxes.

  11. Micro Mock Engineer Avatar
    Micro Mock Engineer

    Eyespy,

    So I take it you believe that in the current financial climate and with a national debt that now exceeds $10 trillion, Obama will take a tax plan to Congress that cuts federal taxes for 95% of working families next year… we’ll see.

    Incidentally… according to the US Tax Foundation (http://www.taxfoundation.org/research/show/1410.html) 32% of working Americans and at least 13% of working families (or households) in America in 2006 already pay NO federal taxes… so technically you can’t CUT federal taxes for 95% of working families when less than 87% pay federal taxes in the first place. You could increase the number of working families that pay no taxes, and the level of rebates for those who already have a negative tax liability… maybe this is what he means, but I would be very surprised if they implement a plan that does this in the current financial climate.

    Note: According to the US Bureau of the Census, the total households in the US (both working and non-working families) in 2006 was 108 million (http://www.census.gov/population/projections/nation/hh-fam/table1n.txt)

  12. Sir Bentwood Dick Avatar
    Sir Bentwood Dick

    Interesting clip on the Bush presidency.

    http://www.theonion.com/content/video/bush_tours_america_to_survey

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