If Ifill betrays the public trust I suggest everyone join my
> class-action suit to disband PBS.
>
The McCain camp could have said "No" to the selection of moderator. They didn't. If they now claim bias, they either didn't know about Gwen Ifill's book (which represents piss-poor due-diligence on their part - at best, and possibly complete incompetence), or they DID know about it, and decided they could use it to political advantage when the time came (which smacks of being a little disingenuous, at best). Or maybe they knew it and figured their standings in the polls by now would make it a moot issue. (?)
The Republicans ought to just let this one lie. If there's a way to spin it to their advantage, I don't see it. (?)
I was not too terribly impressed with Ifill's performance in the candidates debate. I do hope she won't treat either candidate with kids gloves. We'll know soon.
The McCain camp could have said "No" to the selection of moderator. They didn't. If they now claim bias, they either didn't know about Gwen Ifill's book (which represents piss-poor due-diligence on their part - at best, and possibly complete incompetence), or they DID know about it, and decided they could use it to political advantage when the time came (which smacks of being a little disingenuous, at best). Or maybe they knew it and figured their standings in the polls by now would make it a moot issue. (?)
The Republicans ought to just let this one lie. If there's a way to spin it to their advantage, I don't see it. (?)
I was not too terribly impressed with Ifill's performance in the candidates debate. I do hope she won't treat either candidate with kids gloves. We'll know soon.
-mpm
Dude, you are such a moron... if you don't get a doctor to look at that you might end up an imbecile.
mpm wrote in news:47fbb037-7d39-4cd9-b031- snipped-for-privacy@q5g2000hsa.googlegroups.com:
IRIC, she was supposedly vetted and approved several weeks ago.
Maybe the Repub campaign need to brush up on what the word "vetting" means...
IMO, it's completely in keeping with what their strategy has been all along - create confusion in an attmept to distract people from the real issues.
I don't understand the problem. Don't both candidates naswer the *same* questions, as was done in the Pres debate? Plus, teh format has been dumbed down to only 2 minutes per answer with somethign like 30 seconds for rebuttal. How the bleep can the moderator "create bias"? ALl that the moderator does is ask the question, and keep the candidates within the time allotted per answer. IMO, teh "bias" thing is absurd.
OTOH, let's face it, the fact is that people who've already made their decisions re: voting are completely irrelevant - teh "base" will declare victory as long as Palin can put toetehr somethign resembling a sentence, and the Obama voters will continue to feel that she isn't ready to be VP.
The only relevant group is the still-undecideds. Specifically, the undecided who have not been paying any attention whatsoever so far to what either of the VP candidates has been saying.
IMO, this is the origin of the new schtick about "it's time we have Joe Sixpack in office" ((which makes me wonder, Where has she been the past 7+ years...?)) The GOP campaign is IMO betting that the still-undecideds are schlepps, whereas it seems to me that Obama/Biden are figuring that the undecideds are undecided because they are interested in having more information.
IMO, it's characteristically supercilious to assume that all teh undecideds are merely doofs - which, like it or not, is what the phrase "joe sixpack" DOES imply - not that IMO "proof" should be needed, but:
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QUOTE: "Roughly equivalent [to John Q. Public], but more pejorative, are the names Joe Six-pack, Joe Blow, and Joe Schmoe, implying a lower-class citizen..."
I've heard Biden; there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that he is intelligent and has depth and breadth of knowledge. I've heard Palin, and the GOP commentators simply have not convinced me that her answers are actually genius, and she is merely "nervous". I keep coming back to "What if McCain is elected, and God Forbid gets sick, and she has to go toe-to-toe with Putin or Ahmidinejad?" She hasn't even been able to take on WOlf Blitzer, never mind on of them. They sure as s**t woun't give a damn about "treating her gently because she's new to national politics" - they're sexists to begin with, and would hammer on her as hard as possible.
So I'm personally disgusted with all of this excuse-making and demands for special treatment. McCain has been in Presidential elections before, and he knows *damn* good and well what is involved, and what the stakes are. I don't "blame" Palin, I blame McCain - because *he* should have known better, and IMO made a very poor, and to me personally VERY disappointing, judgement call.
I like your comment re: Joe Six-Pack and the incumbent administration. Too funny. (How many DUI's did Bush rack up??)
Anyway, back to the topic. I think the moderator bias issue boils down to question selection. Would Ifill give easy ones to Biden, and impossible ones to Palin, for instance. Although there are many other variations on the theme.
But to say that Ifill's book subject matter is the only bias potentially involved is also flawed.
Whose to say Ifill won't throw Palin slowballs because (like Ifill) she's a woman. Or racism perhaps? Ifill's black and so is the top of the Obama ticket. Or geography (Ifill's east coast, Palin's west coast - far west coast!!) Or stature (Biden's a senator, Palin's only a small state governor)
Frankly, given Ifill's last debate, who's to say she'll ask the "right" questions of EITHER candidate?
I guess I just don't understand why the Republicans get so apoplectic over the issue when they were given ample opportunity to raise objections (and they did not, or chose not to object). Hell, they selected the moderator before they even selected a VP candidate...
I would say it's yet another well-documented example of bad judgement on the Republican's part, except that I don't think there's any merit to the argument in the first place.
If you truly believe their spin (McCain supporters), you have to conclude that the campaign could just as easily be blindsided by something of even more importance. I mean, are they paying attention at all?
mpm wrote in news:2146de02-d412-49c7-8a65-337eff7d7e05 @u26g2000hsd.googlegroups.com:
[snipped due to bad and confusing text-wrapping]
Actually, not funny - that's Palin's new schtick (in the sense of WWE schticks). She was saying it's about time that "joe sixpack" was VP.
We already have Joe Sixpack as a President. Bush seems to be a perfectly affable fellow, and has been describes as such by many who've had personal contact with him. And maybe Palin is great to her friends.
The problem is that the world is an increasingly complex and dangerous place.
They're suppsoed to be given the same questions.
The thing is that *ALL* people have some sort of bias. I'm biased towards intelligence. And people who drink GOOD beer ;) No, seriously, everyone has some bias. What's important is whether Ifill's questions will reflect teh questions that are being asked by the Undecided voters.
It's the Undecided voters, after all, who are important right now. The GOp base is obviously going to remain in lock-step with the Campaign Tactics Manual. ANd people who have made up their mind to vote for Obama will basically ignroe whatever Palin says (except, perhaps, as a source of humor).
What matters is the peole who are undecided, and looking at McCain's health, and realizing that Palin has a much higher-than-usual chance of ending up taking over as President, either temporarily or permanently.
No matter what, the GOP will cry "foul". That's irrelevant, because Obama supporters will see it as nothingmore than the campaign's consistent strategy of creating confusing and raising smoke-screens. Poeple who've decided to vote for ROn paul think teh otehr candidates, for Pres and for VP alike, are all dunderheads and prob won't watch the scripted play that's being called "a debate".
The onyl thing that is relevant is whetheIfill will ask the questions that are of concern to the Undecided voters.
See, you're assuming that this is a real issue, as opposed tomerely a tactic that's consistent with theiroverall strategy. Look at why they picked Palin in the frist palce - there *ARE* competent Republican women who are *more than capable of politically beating the snot out of most men. But they're mostly *older* women. You've heard it all: "Palin is a Fresh Face", "Washington outsider", and so on - I mean, former beauty-contest contestent, the "sexy librarian look" bit, the "Unkbnown". Do you think for one moment that the choice was *not* a calculated tactic? It was, and it achieved what ti intended to achieve: a couple weeks of poeple madly buzzing about Palin, and ignoring things like McCain's voting record, health, and so on.
This kvetching about Ifill is just more of the same. Th campaign knows it's not goign to fool alert people - but they don't care, becasu ethey're making the assumption that most of the Undecided voters are ONLY undecided because they're dim bulbs (even Wikipedia notes that "joe sixpack" is aperjorative term) who can be folled by simply tossing out another smokescreen of trained-seal indignation.
I originally thought it was bad judgement, but now, I think it's attempted Machiavellian manipulation.
Machiavelli was a smart dood, but it's easy to confuse "Machiavellian" with "mere manipulativeness". Machiavelli knew enough to not underestimate his adversaries, whereas, from what I've seen and read, the "ugly cousins" in the GOP cannot help but underestimate others, because the primary characteristic of the true dyed-in-the-wool elitist is the inability to see
*any* capability, talent, or heck, even real threat, in their adversaries.
And that is why I think that neither McCain nor Palin is a real Leader. A real Leader has to be able to look the adversary in the eye, and go toe-to- toe with that adversary's *strengths*. Any doofus can go up against someone's weaknesses - but will be incapable of predicting that such tactics are likely to fail, and also be incapable of comprehneding *why* such tatics so often fail.
I have an idealistic streak, I'll not deny that. But make no mistake - if my expereince in the intelligence community taught me nothign else, it at elast taught me that Leadership is NOT merely a matter of amking people feel all warmfuzzy-touchyfeelie; it's a delicate balance between understanding actually empathizing with, how to inpire peole to do things, and empathizing wiht, *sharing*, the very Human traits that explain why poeple can be inspired, all mixed in with a goodly portion of cold rationality, and depth and breadth of intelligence IOW a truely Machiavellian capacity.
In a way, it's like being an Intelligence Analyst, but over a far wider range of issues. On has to be able to *objectively* look at an adversary's capabilities, culture, everything, and make as unbiased a judgement as possible; this includes recognizing, and having some respect for, and adversary's capabilities. Note that "respect" does NOT mean "agreement with". I respect the capabilities of a great white shark - that doesn't mean I'd jump into the water with one. It simply means understnading the psyche, seeing the caapbilities - AND seeing the holes in both. That sort of respect *never* confuses recognition of capacility, with admiration or agreement with ideology or methodology.
This is important because one cannot defend against an adversary whom one does not understand.
Hubris is dangerous, therefore, because all teh ahubris recognizes is *its own capability*. Hubris admits no vulnerability or weakness in itself, but sees ONLY teh weaknesses of the adverasary. If that adversary can set aside enough egotism to see its own adversary's capabilities AND weaknesses, then avenues for possible attack (or inmfiltration) become clear.
And personally, what I perceive in both McCain and Palin is too much hubris
- too much ego, without enough substance to back it up.
In Obama, I see at least intelligence, capacity for empathy, and rational planning. Of course I'm not absolutely sure he would be a great Leader, but I do think that McCain (and Plain) would not be. That of course is NOT to say that they've nothing to offer the nation - that isn't in question, but it also isn't relavent to the central question of Leadership.
Of course they are. THe problem is that, as above, the Campaign is being manipulative, rather than truely Machiavellian.
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