Debate

Obama Wins Another Debate!

Bob Hertzog — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:58:38 -0700

Well this makes three in a row. Barack Obama won the final presidential debate tonight. Although, this was McCain’s best performance at least for the first 30 minutes of the debate and perhaps Obama’s weakest performance during that same period, Obama still came out ahead. McCain’s best line was a direct statement to Obama, after Obama attempted to tie him to the policies of President Bush: “I’m not George Bush. If you wanted to run against George Bush, you should have run for years ago.”

At the outset Senator McCain came across, to me, as energetic and articulate. He made the points he wanted to make and, it seemed to me, that he was connecting with people. This is what he did not do well in the two previous debates.

Then came McCain’s personal attack on Obama. He brought up William Ayers and ACORN. From that point on Obama had him. It was not so much that he brought up the questions, but more the way he did it. McCain seemed to lose his cool a bit and had difficulty hiding his real deep-down dislike of Obama. He simply looked like an angry old man. He reminded me of Bob Dole, in his debate with Bill Clinton. As the conversation continued the subject of negative campaigning was discussed and McCain seemed to get angrier and angrier, while Obama remained cool and seemed presidential.

Obama scored big with his answers on the abortion issue, the kinds of judges he would appoint and with his answer to how he would deal with education. These issues came about the middle of the debate and this is when Obama hit his stride. From the middle on, it was Obama who was energetic and articulate, while McCain just seemed angry. It was, what seemed to me, as a smoldering smirk on McCain’s face that McCain seemed to hold through most of the debate that made him come across as simply an angry man and not presidential at all.

In support of this analysis, I checked the preliminary polls on as many networks as I could. NBC and CNN both had first polls of people who watched the debate. These respondents gave the debate to Obama by about 15 percentage points.

McCain’s anger may have played well with his base, but McCain needed something to get swing voters moving toward him again. Angry attacks on Obama character will not do it. Now, in believe, we will see Obama numbers increase until the election.

The Vice-Presidential Debate: Both Exceeded Expectations

Bob Hertzog — Fri, 3 Oct 2008 07:38:40 -0700

The big Vice-Presidential debate is history. I thought it was a more interesting, although surely less important, debate than the last Presidential wrangle. How did the candidates do? In my view, both exceeded what was expected of them.

Sarah Palin aim was to appear competent and shake the impression that emerged from her recent CBS evening news interviews. In other words, Palin wanted simply to stop being an embarrassment to the McCain campaign. She accomplished that goal. For the past few days, at least, Palin was the campaign story not McCain. The debate last evening should allow the McCain campaign to get back on message.

Palin’s responses to questions were mostly superficial and in some cases simply off the subject. She offered almost no response to the questions on the economy. Instead, she turned over and over to the McCain talking points on energy. Nevertheless, Palin’s responses were personable, folksy, and reasonably articulate, a thousand times more effective than were her responses to Katie Couric’s questions. Palin even managed to get in a few zingers toward Obama and Biden. My guess is that the McCain campaign breathed a collective sigh of relief as the debate ended.

When the questioning turned from the economy to foreign policy Palin surely held her own, laying out the McCain campaign’s view on Iraq and Afghanistan. Even though she did not know the name of the U.S. military commander in Afghanistan (referring to General David McKiernan as General McClellan) her responses to questions were, otherwise, articulate and a great deal more clear than were her statements on the economy.

As for Biden, his performance was absolutely outstanding. He had a greater command of facts and information than Palin. Biden was polite, non-combative, and focused his attacks on John McCain. He even refrained from correcting Palin when she misspoke on the Afghanistan-commander’s name (a name he surely knows, as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee). I have not seen all of Biden’s debates (he has participated in many), but this was clearly the best performance of all that I have seen.

Biden’s goal was to support the top is his ticket and try to tie McCain to the policies of George W. Bush. He did this in an extremely concise and direct manner. Perhaps, his best moment was when he clearly and specifically argued that McCain is not the Senate maverick he keeps telling us that he is. He also laid out very clearly Obama’s plan for getting out of Iraq.

In my view, both candidates accomplished the goals the wished to achieve. There were no gaffes, no U-Tube moments, and no fodder for a Saturday Night Live skit. Will this debate do anything to influence the election? Probably not! But, surely neither candidate did anything to hurt their respective campaign. People vote for the top of the ticket not for the second spot. We can look forward to the second Presidential debate next week.

John McCain's Judgment: Not As Good As Advertised

Bob Hertzog — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 17:06:14 -0700

John McCain has made his judgment a staple of his presidential campaign. He says he has the experience and solid judgment to lead America through crisis times, while Barack Obama does not. Well, let’s take a close look at some of Senator McCain’s recent judgments.

First, he selected the grievously unqualified Sarah Palin to be his vice-presidential running mate. At first, this selection looked like a political master stroke. Palin became the darling of conservatives and energized the Republican base voters. But as we get to know Palin better, the lunacy of his choice becomes clear. I hope some of her supporters watched Palin’s interview with CBS News anchor, Katie Couric. In that interview Palin bragged of her foreign policy expertise based on the fact that her state, Alaska, borders Canada and Russia. Asked why she thought that was a basis for foreign policy experience, she said, “We have trade delegations to those countries” (countries to which she has never traveled in any official context). In another part of the interview, Palin was asked to comment on the Bailout deal that has made so much news in the past week. It was clear from her response that she barely knew what the legislation under consideration was or how it impacted our economy. This was a pitiful response and totally ignorant response. All of this, of course, reflects on the judgment of John McCain. If he gets elected, McCain will have placed some one so miserably unready for high office one 72-year-old heartbeat away from the leadership of the most powerful nation on this planet. If that does not simply terrify you, then my friends you are just not thinking.

As we all know, America is experiencing an economic crisis of towering proportions. Congress was heard at work hammering out a very difficult piece of legislation to ameliorate the crisis. They almost had a deal worked out. Then John McCain panicked. He put his campaign on hold, flew off to Washington, got into the middle of those very delicate negotiations, and almost blew up the deal legislators were making. Does this show good judgment? Again, as with his V.P. choice, McCain placed his campaign for President ahead of the needs of the nation. If this is his idea of calm leadership, in a crisis, we need to look elsewhere for a president.

The thing that made him look most silly was his threat to cancel the presidential debate. He said he would not debate, until there was a deal on the economic bailout package. Then he got enough feedback from fellow Republicans to see how his backing out made him look and what a really stupid move that was. So, he flipped on his threat not to participate and decided to debate even though there is not economic-package deal yet. However, with McCain out of Washington, there is a chance they will soon get a deal. Canceling the debate then backing down and deciding to do it, is a gigantic political blunder. Doing this made him look weak and indecisive. If McCain had any chance of winning the presidency, I believe he blew it with this decision. It seems he was against the debate before he was for it. When the analysis of this campaign is written, this move will be seen as the death blow for his campaign and will go down in history as one of the worst political blunders of all time.

McCain’s major asset, as seen by the American people, his experience and good judgment has been put to the test in the past several weeks. It has come up wanting. If he is to have any chance of salvaging his campaign, he will have to give a world-class performance in tonight’s debate.

Cancel the Friday Debate? Surely, You Jest.

Bob Hertzog — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 16:00:59 -0700

I just heard that McCain wants to cancel the Friday presidential debate, because of our economic crisis. What better time for us to hear from the candidates, than in a time of crisis.

I have a better idea. Let's change the topic of the debate to the economy, and let the foreign policy debate go until later.

I don't understand McCain's argument here. McCain and Obama are titular leaders of their respective parties and their imput into any plan would be valuable. However, they can do this by phone or by flying to Washington when needed. There is no use to suspend campaigning or to cancel the debates. Furthermore, as Barack Obama said a few moments ago. Presidents need to be able to multi task. They will have to be able to do more than one thing at a time once they get to the White House. So, I asked myself why does McCain want to cancel the debate. Is it a political ploy? Id he afraid to debate? McCain's campaign seems to be slipping in the past few days. Does he needs another stunning move to jazz it up? Can we call this "cut-and-run?"

I'm curious to know what others think of McCain's idea. Cearly, I don't think much of it.

The Democrats Debate

Bob Hertzog — Fri, 1 Feb 2008 08:42:36 -0800

I watched the Democratic debate between Clinton and Obama. I though it interesting that the candidates put aside some of the acrimony of their previous meeting and basically treated each other with sweetness and love. I wonder how long it will last.

Their attitude was different than when Romney and McCain went at it a couple of day earlier. They were like two pit bulls locked in a room together. I thought in that respect McCain sort of wiped the floor with Romney, but I’m not sure that their animosity played very well with viewers.

Obama and Clinton had a real debate, the kind of debate informs the audience. As an old argumentation and debate teacher, it was a pleasure to watch. They discussed issues, presented their arguments, emphasized their different views, and also focused clearly on the ways in which they agree. They discussed their views on health care, taxes, immigration, and Iraq. Both showed a good command of the facts and made clear, reasonable arguments. If I had to pick a winner, it would be close, but I’d give the nod to Hillary Clinton. She seemed to have a slightly better command of facts and her manner came across as knowledgeable and confident.