VP Debate: Not a landslide

 “Can I call you Joe?” “Yes.” But then she didn’t. Obviously a stage prop.
Especially since Joe repeatedly called McCain, ‘John.’ Nice strategy. Since Joe’s not running for Prez and John is, Joe doesn’t have nearly as much to lose by attaching them both to the Beltway.

All in all, I thought Palin might’ve pulled the upset for the first 20 min. or so.

Q: Who’s at fault?
A: “The predator lenders.”

This was followed by the statement “I’m going to talk straight to the American people” (instead of answering questions). Very assertive.

Biden: Until 2 weeks ago McCain said the “economy was strong.” True, but kind of ‘facty.’

Biden won the “Taxes vs. Class Warfare” question. “It’s fairness” (in balancing out what came before). Next hitting “affordability and accessibility” vs. the ‘$5,000 health care tax credit paid for by taxing your payroll health benefits proposed by McCain. But  ‘Joe’ got a demerit for his gratuitous ‘Bridge To Nowhere’ blast on the same topic.

Promises you can’t keep:
Biden: Answers the question. “Doubling of foreign assistance.”
Palin: “Broke Alaska’s oil monopoly.” (Truish enough. But, umm, see McCain answer in previous post..maybe she didn’t hear the question). She does get personality/honesty points for copping to not having promised much. “I’ve only been here for 5 weeks.”

Debt crisis/home owners: Seems like kind of a draw. Neither said much. 
But then Palin goes to energy. Again, it wasn’t the question. She even pushes so far as to suggest that “East coast politicians” don’t understand. Umm, energy presumably.

Climate change causes:
Sarah starts off on a pretty good tack about how Alaska is at least as aware as anyone, but then starts babbling.
Biden keeps it short: It is man-made. If you don’t understand the cause, you can’t find the solution. Plus, you can export new technology.
Palin somehow accuses ‘them’ of having voted ‘no’ to everything on the issue. But that’s just the warm-up act for her first major f-up: dropping the ‘rape’ bomb into her answer. Considering  how sensitive women usually are when the word gets used, seemed like a bit of a stretch.
Both say they support capping carbon emissions.

Now begins the real freefall.

Same sex unions:
Biden: “Absolutely.”
Palin: “Not if it redefines marriage. But I am tolerant. I have family and freinds….” Whoooah there frontier chick. Isn’t that the same thing white dudes say when they get accused of being racist?
In the end they both backpeddle pretty substantially. But, I tend to believe their initial responses.

The sinking accelerates.

Iraq:
Palin: Have got to win in Iraq or else we’re lose in Afghanistan and everywhere. Do what?! How does that even make sense?
Biden: Iraq and Bush are on the same page [re: measured withdrawal]. The only person on the outside is McCain.
Palin: Your plan is a white flat of surrender. Obama still can’t admit the surge worked. Wow. I could have sworn I heard him say exactly that at least 3 times in the first Prez debate.
Biden: I said we’d be there for a decade. McCain said that the Sunnis and Shiites would get along and that oil would pay for the whole thing.

Pakistan-Iran:
Biden: Pakistan already has nukes. Iran isn’t close. But either way the war isn’t in Iraq. The next attack won’t come from there. We need to support Pakistani development.
Palin: The central war on terror is in Iraq. Both Al-Qaeda and McCain say so. Holy shit! Do you truly really still not understand that Al-Q says that to GET us to stay there?!?
Biden: The clerics actually control Iran anyway. Our friends and allies say we need to talk.

Israel:
Palin: Two states = the solution. No second holocaust. And then her spending-freeze equivalent: an embassy in Jerusalem. You might as well say you’re going to put one in Constantinople. It’s not going to happen in your lifetime, Ms. Palin, no matter how much anyone might want it to.
Biden: Racked up some more lay-up difficulty foreign policy points regarding where Ms. Rice has stood, where he has stood, and how doofy Bush and McCain looked with egg all over their faces after urging West Bank elections and then having to talk to Hamas when they won.

Afghanistan:
More of the same from Biden. You can tell he’s just riffing now. Because he not only just knows what he’s talking about, but actually lives it. It’s part of his knowledge base. Like 2 + 2 or ABC. “We reject regime change and seek cooperation.”
Somehow Palin works ‘main street Wassila’ into the question and Biden hits back with mainstreet USA: McCain is the same as W. Main street is getting the short end of the stick.

When the VP job gets brought up things just go from bad to worse.
Palin resorts to humor. Biden points out that “kids weren’t left behind, funding was” then goes into describing Dick Cheney as “the most dangerous VP ever” and Cheney’s suggestion that the VP is part of the legislative branch not just as contrary to the constitution but as a “bizarre notion.”

The next question prompts Palin to go back to the common folk-single mom card. She also mentioned our status as ‘the shining city on the hill’ as if we still had it. Wake up. W threw it away like one of his jizz rags. [Speaking of which, it is comforting to know that whoever our next president is he’ll probably at least be getting laid by his wife regularly.]

I digress. Back to the whole ‘struggling American woman’ thing. Biden shot back with both barrels, bringing up his own childhood background, having become a widower with two children, and stopping just short of flat out saying: “don’t pull that one out again, baby.”

Then Palin goes into more blather about ‘taking on your own party’ and what not. Maverick Maverick. Maverick. Met with an equally M laden response of exactly the instances in which McCain had been anything but one.

Both of their answers to ‘any instance in which changed your view’ were weak. Biden explained how he came to realize that a judge’s character was important. Palin said something about always finding a way to work together (Maverick? Is that you over there?).

Closing statments:
Palin wheels out the ol’ “Only one man that ever REALLY fought for you” chestnut again. Biden talks about an 8-year deep hole and reinvigorating neighborhood beliefs to “get up together.”

Things got pretty spirited there for minute. In the end I’m not sure why I don’t think it was a landslide. I just don’t. I am, however, sure that Biden won.