Debate Open Thread.

[Pic from New York Magazine.]

This is gonna either be a disaster or a snoozefest. 

Take it away, folks!

Final Thoughts? I’m not so sure. Biden was blustery and verbose and competent; Palin didn’t make any major gaffes, but she was still her normal, vague self. I call it a tie.

What say you?

10:32- Biden pulls out the Dwayne Wade thing. Also, HOFSTRA REPRESENT!

10:29- Palin and McCain will fight for America and the middle class. Also, as Reagan said: there is a post-apocalyptic future that awaits us, where men will eat the flesh of other men, and giant cyborg roaches will guzzle the blood of once-free  humans. Unless you vote McCain/Palin. 

10:25- Palin has never been wrong as governor of Alaska or mayor of Wasila.

10:23- Biden heard me through the screen! I’m made of magic! He murked that shit. MMMMM. GOOD.

10:21- New rule: Mavericks cannot call themselves ‘mavericks’.

10:20- It might be cynical, but Biden’s personal story pwns hers. She shouldn’t have opened this up. This is a good, good move. WHAT? HE TOOK THE OATH OF OFFICE AT THE SIDE OF HIS CRITICALLY INJURED SON’S HOSPTIAL BED! HE WENT HOME EVERY NIGHT ON AMTRAK FROM DC TO TUCK HIS KIDS IN!

*Tiger Woods fist pump*

Also, he tears up a bit. 

10:18- I want Ifill to rein this explosion of aphasia and self-aggrandizement just a little bit. Thx, MGMT. 

10:13- She’s doing surprisingly…okay. Biden hasn’t landed one zinger.

10:12- ‘Her reward is in heaven!’ PALIN IS AGAINST REMUNERATION FOR TEACHERS. She’s playing this question well, I think. 

10:09- I’m too annoyed right now. 

10:06- To paraphrase Chris Rock, Palin is holding. She’s taken to not answering the questions and linking Biden to McCain. Weird.

10:00- Joe Biden should be a wide receiver. He’s arrogant and refers to himself in the third person. Also, to extend the football metaphor, the time of possession gap has completely flipped.

9:58- Okay. He’s going in now. He brings up the Lugar bill. Good move.

9:56- She’s kinda losing her balance here.

9:55 – Here’s the linking of McCain to Bush, right on time.

9:54- WHOOPS. ‘There have been huge blunders.’ Expect a parry here.

9:50- Biden hits back, and its his best parry: McCain doesn’t get that the Ahmadenijad doesn’t control the military in Iran, McCain wouldn’t sit down for diplomatic talks, even though it’s become the popular position, even with Spain. This is his strong suit.

9:49- Kissinger shared with Palin his passion for diplomacy. True story.

9:39- Foreign policy. This could be a mess. Palin says we have to win Iraq and Obama voted not to fund troops. Biden said that McCain doesn’t have a plan,and voted against funding as well, for an amendment to a bill that had a timeline for withdrawal. He said, gracelessly, that he would end the war. She pauses for about five seconds. She said he’s waving a white flag, and gets in a jab on Biden’s friendship with McCain. Biden points out that McCain had been consistently wrong about Iraq.

9:36- This could be a possible wedge issue: same-sex marriage. Kudos to Biden for being forthright about it, but it could bring a lot of blowback. Palin says she’s tolerant, but doesn’t want to re-define marriage. Biden demurs and says  he is not for gay marriage. The cowardice on this issue is embarassing. Argh. Like Akon’s career, America’s opposition to gay marriage will one day prove to be a source of great generational shame. 

Also, Palin has gay friends. Whoop-de-damn-doo! (c) Derrick Coleman.

9:30- Okay. Ifill asks Palin about climate change. She basically says that she doesn’t care about the causes. Um. Alrighty then. Also, energy independence. Biden says the cause is man-made, and says McCain has consistently voted against renewable energy sources. He rightly points out that drilling on the OCS will take forever to yield oil.

9:28- She jumps off the economic question to go back to energy.

9:27-Okay. Maybe we spoke too soon. That answer on the much-derided bankruptcy bill was pretty awful.

9:24- She’s doing the time of possession thing, which shouldn’t be working. But it’s working. She’s getting better at pivoting back to those talking points, although that ‘only been at this for five weeks’ line was silly.

9:21- The inevitable “Bridge to Nowhere” shot by Biden. Corny.

9:16- Biden seems to be trying to match her in that department.

9:06- This has been repeated over and over, but she crafts some truly bizarre sentences.

G.D.

G.D.

Gene "G.D." Demby is the founder and editor of PostBourgie. In his day job, he blogs and reports on race and ethnicity for NPR's Code Switch team.
G.D.

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  • slb

    i’m hoping for disaster, but predicting snoozefest.

  • quadmoniker

    The problem is the low level of expectation set by SP. If she says anything remotely more sensible than “I have a vast variety of news sources where we get our news,” then it can’t rightly be called a disaster. And it’s hard for her to make more of an assault on grammar than that.

  • LH

    Biden seems convicted. Palin seems a bit tentative.

    And did Biden just get semi-crunk with, “That’s what I’m talking about” twice?

  • LH

    Nonsensical??? What? Wow … look at Gov. Palin.

  • Palins had a few moments where shes been like eff this debate, ill talk about whatever the f*ck i wanna talk about.

  • e.

    uhm i love it “i don’t want to argue about the causes of climate change.” palin just stop.

  • wait wait wait.
    “I wouldn’t attribute every man made activity to changes in the climate”
    Um. shouldn’t that sentence be the other way around? Or am I missing something?

    JPB: yeah, Palin is just like, “Fuck that question, what I wanna say about my record is…”

  • Palin paraphrased: “But I have gay friends!”

  • LH

    Did you all peep how she would not say she agrees with Joe Biden? What is that about?

  • lol Palin Tolerates gays. I’m sure she tolerates all the other minority groups as well.

    Tolerance!= Acceptance Mrs. Palin.

  • “Nucular.”
    Sigh.

  • Steve

    1. She’s said energy more than Keri Hilson

    2. That gay exchange was awkawrd on both sides …. I hated it.

    3. I’m over the colloquialisms..

    4. Bush says nucular the same way

  • Joe is doing a great job. He’s called out McCain’s record repeatedly, and hasn’t done much to her.

    I find it really amazing that she tosses out a lie, or mischaracterization, he shuts it down, and she tosses out another one.

    UE- I did notice her sentence was backward. And what’s funny is that she said it backward yesterday, too.

  • slb

    “past is prologue, gwen.”

    i’m gonna have to start saying that all the time now. just… randomly.

    also, on an unrelated note: i want her to stop saying nucular.

  • Why does she get to be condescending?

  • Steve

    I’m still not over the fact that neither of them gave a shit about the gays they were tryna move over that question fast as hell

  • quadmoniker

    I WANT TO DESTROY HER.

  • slb

    at least we know now she wasn’t saving any hidden substance and intellect for the debate….

  • LH

    @ Steve: LOL @ energy/Keri Hilson
    @ shani-o: because she’s a woman. That’s how it works.
    @ Steve: I think both Biden and Palin were pretty “straight up” about gays.

  • LH

    @ slb: “Past is prologue” is so stolen.

  • Slb: you *should* say ‘past is prologue’ all the time. I do, and people think I’m way deep!

  • LH: That gay marriage answer was a complete hot potato.

  • If she says “maverick” one more time….

  • LH

    Who is she winking at?

  • slb

    “past is prologue, *gwen*” is what i’m gonna be sayin’.

  • LH

    @ G.D.: If so, I think we have Ifill to see about that.

  • LH

    Ohhhhh woooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

    Say it ain’t so, Joe AND There you go again?

    Really?

    Someone.make.it.stop.

  • slb

    she’s giving SHOUT-OUTS to elementary schools? i bet that kitsch wins her a few votes.

  • I see Palin just giving a slew of shoutouts. Thats wassup

  • Palin going hard at the moderator and biden tonight

  • I cannot take her passive aggressiveness!

    UE- I have grown to hate the word ‘maverick.’

    I love that her kids are ‘public school participants.’

  • LH: she’s winking at her dad apparently. he’s in the audience.

    Lol @ the shoutouts.
    Gee whillikers! Goshdarnit! Heck!
    I have $10 on her saying “shucks” before the end of the debate or using a barnyard analogy.
    Could she be the bastard love child of Bob Dole and Ross Perot?

  • Biden speaking from the heart right now.

  • Oh no!!!!! Joey! Come here, let me hug you…

  • e.

    biden tears up and palin shuts up. i’m glad he let her know she’s not the only freaking parent running in this election.

  • slb

    ooop! attacking the “maverick” thing. *finally.*

  • quadmoniker

    SLB: I know!

    Also, I think it was really smart for him to turn that “domestic” bullshit around. How dare she suggest that he doesn’t know what it’s like to be a parent with hard choices just because he’s a man? Biden’s doing well.

  • slb

    i was so offended that she didn’t comment after he said that. he would’ve acknowledged her tragedies, if she’d disclosed any. she seems kind of heartless to me. like a cipher. well, no. like tracy flick, basically. kind of… sociopathic?

  • quadmoniker

    Yeah. Also, since when does a governor whose family makes more than $200,000 a year get to call herself average?

  • LH

    @ alb: I honestly don’t think she knew what to say. she doesn’t strike me as being bright enough to be quite that heartless.

  • Since when are the Palins representative of the average American family?

  • slb

    well, let’s not forget when she and ol’ boy “didn’t have health care.” i guess she was “average,” then.

  • Big Word

    My eyes have damn near rolled out of my head. I think Biden and Obama aren’t going for the knockout punch. I mean, this is America afterall for a comparatively young black man to beat up on an old white man or for a man to beat up a woman won’t go over too well. Biden was capable and knowledgeable, Palin was cute and folksy. It’s up to the voters to decide.

  • quadmoniker

    Palin didn’t answer any questions, and no one called her out on it because there wasn’t that talking to each other stuff. That would have killed her. Biden did much better, but Mickey Kaus on Slate is right, she made the debate about whether or not she was an idiot, not about the issues.

  • scott

    quadmoniker:

    I was watching Good Morning America this morning and they said Palin didn’t answer ten questions and Biden didn’t answer six. But then again, they are politicians so what do you expect?

  • ladyfresshh

    scott:

    there is a difference between intelligently and skillfully avoiding a question – biden

    and repetative sloganeering – palin

    while not answering a question is something i have grown used to from politicans it is still frustrating and irritating

    palin takes it to another level in which she ignorantly states she WILL not answer questions

    now wtf is that?

  • scott

    ladyfresshh:

    Okay so both avoid questions but one method is better? The Biden method is more stylish so it is okay? This is why I don’t watch debates, as neither politician answers questions and frankly I’m surprised when they do.

  • LH

    I can’t quite explain why, but I was offended when Palin said that she might not answer questions the way the moderator or Biden wanted her to. Why bother debating in that case? Why not call a press conference instead?