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Author Topic: The Debate by Slate (magazine)  (Read 1626 times)
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Tylergal
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« on: September 27, 2008, 05:23:06 AM »

kausfiles: A mostly political Weblog.
McCain's Small VictoryWe want game-changing! We didn't get it.
Slate Magazine, By Mickey Kaus
Updated Friday, Sept. 26, 2008, at 11:16 PM ET

I've just heard Chris Matthews make three seemingly insane points in rapid succession: 1) McCain somehow defamed soldiers or America or something by worrying about whether they "died in vain"; 2) It was surprising that Obama didn't make a point of the specific economic problems of African Americans; 3) It was an incredibly winning, decisive moment when Obama laughed after McCain (somewhat effectively, I thought) compared his inflexibility to Bush's. ... That's not even getting to the official MSNBC obsession with whether McCain looked at Obama when he criticized him. ...

Update: Matthews just asked John Heilemann about McCain: "Do you think he was too troll-like?" ... 9:52 P.M.

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Debate #1: Before I get spun, I'd say: small, Pyrrhic victory for McCain. McCain wanted to make Obama seem naive and inexperienced. He did about 40% of that. Obama wanted to make McCain seem dangerously ambitious, bellicose and hotheaded. He did 0% of that. But a) the foreign policy stuff came after a long period on the economy, where McCain seemed a bit frenetic and Obama had the upper hand; and b) Obama didn't seem non-credible, which may be enough to carry him through given all the other advantages he has. ..

More: c) When Obama talks about the struggling middle class, etc., he always says "they" (seems distant) or "you" (seems condescending). Why not "we" or "us."? Or "my buddy Joe down the street"? A core problem, and one that shouldn't be that hard to fix; d) The big areas where Obama could scare voters about McCain are Georgia/Ukraine/Russia and Iran. On Georgia, Obama threw away his leverage by essentially moving toward McCain's position, up to including Georgia in NATO. I guess we really are all Georgians now. On Iran, McCain didn't say anything particularly scary--if anything, he seemed able to dispel some of those legitimate fears, Reagan-style. He achieved that effect even more clearly on Pakistan:

f you're going to aim a gun at somebody, George Shultz, our great secretary of state, told me once, you'd better be prepared to pull the trigger. ...

I'm not prepared at this time to cut off aid to Pakistan. So I'm not prepared to threaten it ...


(e) Even more important, Obama did little to bring home what a nightmare the last six years have been for Americans, since the decision to attack Iraq. Wasn't there something sound-bitey he could have prepared? ("Do you want to go through another eight years like the last eight?") f) McCain has that candidates' shorthand disease--when he recycles old campaign rhetoric he so sick of it he shortens it down to code words: "Pen. Veto. I'll make them famous." If you weren't already sick of the rhetoric you probably didn't have the faintest idea what he was saying. (When I worked for Sen. Hollings, it seemed as if by the end of the campaign he'd invoke an old chestnut from Pogo by barking "Pogo. The enemy! Us!") g) McCain could have effectively hit Obama on his big spending plans ("$800 billion") earlier and harder. Maybe this wasn't the right week to make $800 billion seem like a big number. ... h) I don't understand the difference between "strategy" and "tactics." Is there something wrong with me? ...

P.S.: Jim Lehrer ostentatiously noted that he wanted the candidates to mix it up. But every time they began mixing it up it seemed as if Lehrer interrupted them to cut the argument off. Too interesting! ...

Post-spin Update: i) Does Keith Olbermann's show make it seem like their guy must have lost because their guy lost--they sound like the Politburo meeting after the Cuban Missile Crisis--or would Keith Olbermann's show make it seem like their guy must have lost even when their guy won? ...

j) If actual undecided voters who watched the debate favored Obama, as this CBS poll suggests, is that because, after the events of the past week, they were just looking for Obama to pass a threshold test? Add if that's the case, how would McCain now be doing if he'd just gone ahead and had this debate, and done as well as he did, without pulling The Stunt first? (Whether you think McCain's trip to Washington helped or hurt the chances of resolving the current financial crisis, it seems clear he could have gone to D.C. and had whatever influence he had without trying to delay the debate. Think how good that would have looked.) ... 7:43 P.M. link

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The Refs Dream They're Being Worked: When McCain's campaign attacks the press, he's not "working the refs." That implies McCain's strategists still care how the "refs" make calls. I think it's pretty clear they're doing something else (and they're perfectly happy if the refs keep making calls against them). ... P.S.: Of course the MSM "refs" like to think McCain's "working the refs," because that implies they're worth working--that their refereeing role is still all-important (as opposed to their role as, say, a totemic focus of political, class and cultural resentment!)... 3:50 P.M. link

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A's Fever
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« Reply #1 on: September 27, 2008, 09:12:43 PM »

Well this undecided voter was surprisingly impressed by McCain.  Just wish he had chosen a different running mate . . .
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WhiskeyGirl
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« Reply #2 on: September 28, 2008, 05:35:01 PM »

Well this undecided voter was surprisingly impressed by McCain.  Just wish he had chosen a different running mate . . .

I think Obama and Palin are probably on the same experience level with regard to many issues. 

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