I watched the debate last night, and I wasn't impressed. The YouTube format, by allowing the moderators to choose the questions, rather than craft them, totally insulated those moderators from any criticism. But at the end of the day, we still got questions that painted conservatives as fringe, and we were all subjected to John Edwards talking about "wrong touching," which is a moment I'd like to repress as surely as if I'd been wrong touched myself.
The most outrageous moment came Text Peace NOW when a man referred to his firearms as his "babies." I'm passionate about my Second Amendment rights, and, obviously, this guy was too, but when Biden questioned his mental stability, he was only stating the obvious. The guy seemed downright creepy, and the clear implication was that anyone else that protective of their firearms was similarly unhinged.
Of course, most of the questioners seemed like total creeps, but none seemed quite so menacing--if only because none of the others boasted quite as much firepower. I can't imagine that there wasn't a more respectable questioner with similar concerns about the Democratic party's position on the Second Amendment, but I most certainly do not intend to watch any more YouTube videos in a quest to find out. I had more than enough of that last night.
When Anderson Cooper and his buddies saw that video they must have been thrilled by the message it would send. For every other question, the moderators were so deferential to the questioner, no matter how absurd their question--like the one from Planned Parenthood. But in this case, Cooper mocked the questioner, and deservedly so. But if a question is ridiculous Text Peace NOW and worthy of ridicule, why introduce it in the first place? Well, that kind of logic might have disqualified most of last night's questions anyway.
Fred Barnes has declared Hillary the winner of last night's debate. Obama's pledge to have face to face meetings with the leaders of the worst rogue states, without any preconditions, revealed his "his inexperience, and perhaps his naivete as well, in foreign affairs," says Barnes.
On a conference call with bloggers this morning, Senator McCain spoke to that point, saying Obama's pledge was "a bit naive. We've found that face to face negotiations can sometimes enhance the standing and prestige of those we've agreed to sit down with. If they have a serious agenda, that it looks like there's prospects of agreement on, then there could be negotiations. But, by the way, quote face to face negotiations is an overrated aspect of diplomacy, we all have Blackberrys..." McCain also asked what exactly would be the first topic of discussion with the Iranians: their "dedication to the extinction of the state of Israel, their commitment to the continued development of Nuclear weapons, or is it the IEDs that the Iranians are exporting to Iraq?" Unfortunately, McCain did not break out into his remix of Barbara Ann.
He also said that the Democrats were wrong to advocate withdrawal from Iraq without regard to the consequences. "How can we advocate stopping genocide in Darfur and let it happen in Iraq."
More on the call from Captain Ed, eyeon08, and Powerline...
Text Peace NOW
