swishnicholson wrote:I think Biden will look awful against her, partly because he's Biden and partly because the press, NOT REALIZING THEY ARE WORKING AGAINST THEIR OWN NEFARIOUS ENDS, will play up Palin's inexperience versus that of Biden. When she holds her own (because, honestly, why shouldn't she), she'll appear to come out on top since she was positioned as the underdog.

This will then, of course, have all the earthshaking political consequences as did Bentsen's trouncing of Quayle.

couldn't have predicted the outcome any better

pacino wrote:I love that it's completely OK to put down the work, belittle the work, and essentially consider community organizing pointless. I will go tell my friends that they aren't doing anything, that gr's already done it all and it wasn't tough, and that they're just pussies who should tell people to man up and improve their own lives right quick. Why aren't they off making lots of money for themselves with their degrees? Losers.

Your indignation is very selective. Everyone is acting as though Palin walked in out of the blue and started attacking Obama's time as an community organizer with no precipitation or rationale. She hadn't even given her acceptance speech as a VP nominee and she was attacked by the Obama campaign belittling her experience with a count of how few people she was mayor over. The media took up the fight and the running theme over the past four days has been nothing but attacks on how being a mayor of a small town or governor of a small state is meaningless accomplishment.

Imagine you're Palin (or the McCain campaign). Your person has at least been elected in a popular vote, has "executive" experience, and the guy who's running (in part) on his experience as a "community organizer" (a vague term because it covers so many different tasks that aren't likely to be the same for any two community organizers). Why do you expect her to lay down and take her beating?

I think time will tell whether this gambit was good for Obama's campaign. On one side all this discussion of experience does involve his name in ways the campaign would probably not prefer, on the other side the expected defense then offense by his opposition gives nice righteous indignation fodder (see 85% of every post since yesterday afternoon) to the base.

I'm glad the crowd booed "Heal The Earth" - what a bunch of meaningless feel-good/means-absolutely-nothing twaddle.

I love how they (both sides, frankly) want it both ways -- trying to underscore the other side's "inexperience" as a fatal flaw while frankly making naked appeals to voters based on their candidates' personal characteristics rather than their actual accomplishments. I've been saying for the better part of a week that mocking Gov. Palin's "small townness" is a mistake because, rightly or wrongly, it plays into the silly narrative of Democrats as elitists. BTW, it amuses me greatly to hear Republicans mock someone for being "elitist." That crowd in St. Paul looked like a Brooks Brothers ad.

Again, both sides have thin resumes of accomplishments on which to run, so we're going to be subjected to eight weeks of "community organizer"/"PTA LOL"/"Huggy Bear"/"7-11 Indians" etc. etc. etc. It's going to be torture.

BSG Palin speech reax timeline:

1) Wow. This is the worst speech ever. I can't believe that I'm watching this. This woman better never become VP. Seriously, if you think this is a good speech you need to have your head examined.

2) Wow. All of the talking heads liked it. I guess it may have been an OK speech, but she was way too sarcastic, snarky and mean.

3) Waaaah. She made fun of Barack for being a community organizer. Waaaah.

Thanks to Vox for adding the poll. I thought since today is 2 months out, it would be interesting where things stand, and how they might change between now and election day.

My Facebook friend status updates this morning range from "OMG I'M SO AMAZED AT SARAH PALIN SHE'S SO INSPIRING WHAT A GREAT STORY HOCKEY MOM" to "I can't believe the Republicans picked such an intellectual lightweight for VP"

Extreme emotional responses > no responses

So there's that, I guess

republicans are bashing community organizers... and democrats are the elitists...

this political season is making me dumber.

can we at least all agree on this...

rudi is getting pretty pathetic, no?

Camp Holdout wrote:republicans are bashing community organizers... and democrats are the elitists...

this political season is making me dumber.

Whatever. The whole process revolves around hypocrisy, on both sides. At least admit that.

The Obama campaign is constantly talking about McCain's negative attack ad strategy being all they have and how they're being divisive. Meanwhile, they're spending millions on negative attack ads about McCain/Bush/number of houses. Hell, they wrote a parody song about McCain "not knowing much" about the economy. It's all BS

pacino wrote:I love that it's completely OK to put down the work, belittle the work, and essentially consider community organizing pointless. I will go tell my friends that they aren't doing anything, that gr's already done it all and it wasn't tough, and that they're just pussies who should tell people to man up and improve their own lives right quick. Why aren't they off making lots of money for themselves with their degrees? Losers.

They weren't belittling doing it, just pointing out that being a community organizer isn't experience that prepares you better for being President than being a mayor. Barack Obama doesn't have a long resume and neither does she. Both parties are trying to spin their person's resume and discount the opponent's resume. It's what they do.

Sarah Palin can't sell a long resume. She sold herself politically that she's a reformer who has changed things fiscally in Alaska. The Republicans argue that what she's done as a governor has been more significant than Obama as a senator. Did anyone expect them to not do that? Of course Democrats will dislike the speech and Republicans will love it. Talk to women who her being Pro-Life isn't a deal breaker and see what they think. I've gotten positive reactions from two women who are independent. She appealed well to special needs parents, women who vote for the person over the issues, and small town working class people who haven't decided that the Republican Party is a bunch of rich CEOs who only want to see everyone else suffer.

She will be asked about being "Commander-in-Chief on Day One" and all the national stage questions. I'm interested in hearing her answers. Maybe she should have addressed it, but she was going for her positives tonight. I don't see how including that would make her look good.

Sarah Palin didn't prove she is ready to be President last night. She proved that she deserves to be in the game and show that she can be President. She's no Dan Quayle.

Woody wrote:

Camp Holdout wrote:republicans are bashing community organizers... and democrats are the elitists...

this political season is making me dumber.

Whatever. The whole process revolves around hypocrisy, on both sides. At least admit that.

oh, admitted. which is why i said its making me dumber.

pacino wrote:I love that it's completely OK to put down the work, belittle the work, and essentially consider community organizing pointless. I will go tell my friends that they aren't doing anything, that gr's already done it all and it wasn't tough, and that they're just pussies who should tell people to man up and improve their own lives right quick. Why aren't they off making lots of money for themselves with their degrees? Losers.

thanks for missing my entire point. i'm sure he's done much more than i have. but i've done most of what's very briefly listed on his wikipedia entry. so i was looking for more information. i never put down the work (which, by that logic, would be putting down my own work) and readily admitted to not understanding what it is he referring to, or what was being put down at the RNC. but in your mind, that's equal to calling someone a "pussy." thanks for your contribution.

you can't even ask an honest question about the guy without being labeled a right wing nut job, which i am most certainly not (about a 50-50 voting record in federal, state and local elections). you look very silly saying this kind of thing.[/b]

I don't claim to be more than a political novice, but I am getting tired of the experience argument from both sides. Where is it evident that a candidate's past experience predicts their performance as president? Looking at a variety of successful presidents, their backgrounds are varied from a great deal of executive experience (Clinton, Eisenhower, etc...) to very little/none (Lincoln, Kennedy). Is it going to be impossible to get past these talking points and on to real issues before the election? I'm far more concerned with Palin's views than with her lack of experience.

My guess is that once voters get past the superficial items (experience, teenage babies, etc...) and on to real items, the dems will get a bump. It is going to be very hard from McCain to run away from the current administration.

After mulling this over while I got dressed this morning, here's my take on Palin's speech for what it's worth.

It was ok. I don't see how it could be seen as a great speech--if I may make a movie analogy, it was the remake of Ocean's 11.

On the other hand, does anybody really think she's ready to be President. You wake up one morning, you find out McCain died of a stroke, and do you say, awesome--that lady is going to make things right in the USA, or do you say a little prayer and shift some money to a Swiss bank, and buy some physical gold in the case all hell breaks lose?

There's no way a speech, even a good one demonstrates qualifications. That's what the Republicans were telling us all night.

Also, if I'm the Obama campaign, I start playing up my support for the faith based initiative thing, point to my experience working in the community, and insinuate that based on what Republicans said last night, they really don't care about the religious folks out there doing the good work they do--all the relief they have recently provided to hurricane evacuees, the success they've had getting people off drugs, and so on.

The thing no one say about many small towns in the heartland is that things aren't really going well for us, and if it weren't for people (often associated with churches) out there providing necessary services, things would be a lot worse for us. I'm not sure how you boil that message down, but I'm not a high paid political consultant.

TenuredVulture wrote:On the other hand, does anybody really think she's ready to be President.

Can we please wait for her first press availability and the VP debate? There's no real reason to think she's ready to be president. There's also no reason not to think she's ready to be president. None of us here know her stances on the big issues, know how much she's thought about them, and have seen her try and articulate them.

I'm not gonna sit here and argue she's more ready to be president than Obama on day one, but I don't see that she can't convince us that she's ready at least as much as he is. Especially if you adjust for the fact that as VP, unless McCain has a heart attack in the first week of his administration, she's going to gain a lot of relevant experience right away.

jerseyhoya wrote:

TenuredVulture wrote:On the other hand, does anybody really think she's ready to be President.

Can we please wait for her first press availability and the VP debate? There's no real reason to think she's ready to be president. There's also no reason not to think she's ready to be president. None of us here know her stances on the big issues, know how much she's thought about them, and have seen her try and articulate them.

I'm not gonna sit here and argue she's more ready to be president than Obama on day one, but I don't see that she can't convince us that she's ready at least as much as he is. Especially if you adjust for the fact that as VP, unless McCain has a heart attack in the first week of his administration, she's going to gain a lot of relevant experience right away.

I think if she really was ready to be President, she might have taken an opportunity last night to provide some evidence of that.

Do you need any dental work? Because I can do dental work. Have I given you any reason to believe I can't do dental work? I'll do that extraction cheap.

TenuredVulture wrote:

jerseyhoya wrote:

TenuredVulture wrote:On the other hand, does anybody really think she's ready to be President.

Can we please wait for her first press availability and the VP debate? There's no real reason to think she's ready to be president. There's also no reason not to think she's ready to be president. None of us here know her stances on the big issues, know how much she's thought about them, and have seen her try and articulate them.

I'm not gonna sit here and argue she's more ready to be president than Obama on day one, but I don't see that she can't convince us that she's ready at least as much as he is. Especially if you adjust for the fact that as VP, unless McCain has a heart attack in the first week of his administration, she's going to gain a lot of relevant experience right away.

I think if she really was ready to be President, she might have taken an opportunity last night to provide some evidence of that.

Do you need any dental work? Because I can do dental work. Have I given you any reason to believe I can't do dental work? I'll do that extraction cheap.

She's giving a speech that she's reading off a prompter, written primarily by someone else. If she got into some complex foreign or domestic issues last night, everyone's response would have been "Oh, well someone else wrote that."

She's shown the ability to lead. She's popular. She has accomplished some things in her tenure as governor (renegotiating contracts with oil companies can't be easy, and she pissed off her own party passing ethics reform legislation). Let's see how she handles herself in an unscripted format. I'm optimistic that she will do quite well.

Its been stated before, but I think the Republicans are negating some of Palin's potential by making her an attack dog. I think she will play less to the Hilary voters she is supposedly trying to get when she is as negative as she was last night. I'm sure the base loved it but the base is not going to be enough to win.

Woody wrote:My Facebook friend status updates this morning range from "OMG I'M SO AMAZED AT SARAH PALIN SHE'S SO INSPIRING WHAT A GREAT STORY HOCKEY MOM" to "I can't believe the Republicans picked such an intellectual lightweight for VP"

Extreme emotional responses > no responses

So there's that, I guess

I have a bunch of those too. People saying they are pumped about Palin or that she gave a brilliant speech.