DEM Primaries/Candidates thread

[HuskyCaucasian]

I'd be more than happy to never hear again about a celebrity endorsement of a candidate if I also didn't have to hear about all the other garbage that's clogged up the airwaves for the last few months.

[HuskyCaucasian]

Check out the blogs and Digg. ABC is getting torn a new one.

[Balta1701]

Check out the blogs and Digg. ABC is getting torn a new one.

Are the right wing sites having the same reaction or are they eating it up?

[HuskyCaucasian]

Are the right wing sites having the same reaction or are they eating it up?

probably eating it up.

But check this out. I think this is what you and I are saying but much better writen than either of us can put it:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-mitchel...ig_b_97122.html

 

[HuskyCaucasian]

Check out the blogs and Digg. ABC is getting torn a new one.

Take a look at the last 2-3 pages of new posts on Digg....

http://digg.com/2008_us_elections/upcoming

 

[Balta1701]

The crowd at the debate seems to have booed and heckled Gibson at the last commercial break. Video here. It was enough that he said "The crowd is turning on me".

[HuskyCaucasian]

The crowd at the debate seems to have booed and heckled Gibson at the last commercial break. Video here. It was enough that he said "The crowd is turning on me".

Glad to see this just isn't the "blogosphere" saying it was a shame. People THERE were offended by it.

[HuskyCaucasian]

This could get some legs in the next few days:

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: ....et's stay in the region. Iran continues to pursue a nuclear option. Those weapons, if they got them, would probably pose the greatest threat to Israel. During the Cold War, it was the United States policy to extend deterrence to our NATO allies. An attack on Great Britain would be treated as if it were an attack on the United States.

 

SENATOR CLINTON: Well, in fact, George, I think that we should be looking to create an umbrella of deterrence that goes much further than just Israel. Of course I would make it clear to the Iranians that an attack on Israel would incur massive retaliation from the United States, but I would do the same with other countries in the region.

 

Sounds kinda like... well, BUSH!

 

[HuskyCaucasian]

I was listening to Hannity today (because I am a freaking masochist) and when he talked about Obama, he mentioned 3 things... lapel pin, Wright, Weather Underground.

 

Sound familiar?

[Balta1701]

Editor & Publisher's top guy Greg Mitchell is already on record calling out ABC and the candidates for going along with it.

In perhaps the most embarrassing performance by the media in a major presidential debate in years, ABC News hosts Charles Gibson and George Stephanopolous focused mainly on trivial issues as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama faced off in Philadelphia.

 

Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the health care and mortgage crises, the overall state of the economy and dozens of other pressing issues had to wait for their few moments in the sun as Obama was pressed to explain his recent "bitter" gaffe and relationship with Rev. Wright (seemingly a dead issue) and not wearing a flag pin while Clinton had to answer again for her Bosnia trip exaggerations.

 

Then it was back to Obama to defend his slim association with a former '60s radical -- a question that came out of rightwing talk radio and Sean Hannity on TV, but delivered by former Bill Clinton aide Stephanopolous. This approach led to a claim that Clinton's husband pardoned two other '60s radicals. And so on.

 

More time was spent on all of this than segments on getting out of Iraq and keeping people from losing their homes and other key issues. Gibson only got excited when he complained about anyone daring to raise taxes on his capital gains.

 

Yet neither candidate had the courage to ask the moderators to turn to those far more important issues. But some in the crowd did -- booing Gibson as he exited.

[mr_genius]

Editor & Publisher's top guy Greg Mitchell is already on record calling out ABC and the candidates for going along with it.

 

I didn't see that debate, but stupid questions and basically ignoring important issues seems to be the norm. The CNN and MSNBC GOP debates were horrible. A complete joke, actually.

[BigSqwert]

I didn't see that debate, but stupid questions and basically ignoring important issues seems to be the norm. The CNN and MSNBC GOP debates were horrible. A complete joke, actually.

ABC took it to another level.

[iamshack]

Honestly, I have a hard time blaming ABC for this. Instead, I blame the American public. If voters are going to be concerned about ridiculous nonsense that has no bearing on the issues, than the media is going to exploit that. Either way, another debate on the same issues would have just been reiteration by the candidates of the positions they have articulated so many times previously. But again, it's not the fault of ABC that the citizens of Pennsylvania have chosen to allow their primary to revolve around Bittergate, Wrightgate, Lapelgate, and Snipergate.

[southsider2k5]

Editor & Publisher's top guy Greg Mitchell is already on record calling out ABC and the candidates for going along with it.

 

This is the key for me. They can change topics in an answer any other time, but they really seemed to feed into this garbage. Clinton I expected this from, Obama I didn't. I am REALLY disappointed in him, and lost a lot of respect for the guy.

[Texsox]

I did not see it, and do not want to seek to defend or attack it, but I have one thought as I read the accounts. Does every debate have to be over the same stuff? Perhaps these guys did it poorly, but going away from the stuff that they are repeating for the 3,000 time, may be a great way to offer something new.

 

Again, it seems by all accounts that they did it poorly but it would seem we have all the sound bites we need on Iraq etc.

[HuskyCaucasian]

ABC took it to another level.

I did not see it, and do not want to seek to defend or attack it, but I have one thought as I read the accounts. Does every debate have to be over the same stuff? Perhaps these guys did it poorly, but going away from the stuff that they are repeating for the 3,000 time, may be a great way to offer something new.

 

It's not a matter that they talked about the "insignificant" issues. It's how much time they gave to them and how they handled the MAJOR issues. This was not a debate for America. most Americans have already voted! This should have been a debate about issues that matter to Penn. It wasnt. The bitter thing needed to be addressed, but a lapel flag pin? William Ayers? Bosnia? Those are old or "loose connections" stories being pushed by the far right and George Stepenopolus fell right into Hannity's hands.

 

This was a debate for the people of Penn. They BEARLY talked about the economy. They never addressed NAFTA, free trade, the mortgage crisis. Due to time, they rushed through Iraq, the economy and taxes. Heck, at the very end they said "ok, 1 minute response.... the price of gas...". So Rev Wright gets 5-10 minutes, but gas gets 1 minute?

 

This was a shame of a debate.

Edited April 17, 2008 by Athomeboy_2000

[Texsox]

It's not a matter that they talked about the "insignificant" issues. It's how much time they gave to them and how they handled the MAJOR issues. This was not a debate for America. most Americans have already voted! This should have been a debate about issues that matter to Penn. It wasnt. The bitter thing needed to be addressed, but a lapel flag pin? William Ayers? Bosnia? Those are old or "loose connections" stories being pushed by the far right and George Stepenopolus fell right into Hannity's hands.

 

This was a debate for the people of Penn. They BEARLY talked about the economy. They never addressed NAFTA, free trade, the mortgage crisis. Due to time, they rushed through Iraq, the economy and taxes. Heck, at the very end they said "ok, 1 minute response.... the price of gas...". So Rev Wright gets 5-10 minutes, but gas gets 1 minute?

 

This was a shame of a debate.

 

As I mentioned, *they* may have done it poorly, but certainly they have already talked about the mortgage crisis, I can't believe NAFTA is still an issue; Iraq, economy, etc, again covered many times over.

 

I guess then in your opinion, debaters should keep hammering away at the economy, Iraq, etc. and BARELY touch on anything else? Ican understand that, but one debate for an hour or so, out of the tens of thousands of hours they will speak, seem trivial enough to allow for minor subjects and characters. In fact, if anything, I think there has been aterrible job done of expanding beyond the top four or five positions. We certainly have the time and resources.

[lostfan]

This is the key for me. They can change topics in an answer any other time, but they really seemed to feed into this garbage. Clinton I expected this from, Obama I didn't. I am REALLY disappointed in him, and lost a lot of respect for the guy.

I didn't watch the debate (went to the Sox game instead obviously and probably wouldn't have wasted my time watching it anyway) but read about it, from what I can tell Obama spent most of his time looking and sounding annoyed because he had to answer stupid and irrelevant questions... not sure how he can be blamed for anything except poor handling of his answers and allowing it to bother him. It's not like he was the one asking the questions or moderating the debate. Clinton either... although most Americans would agree that she is the source of all below-board negativity since Super Tuesday.

[HuskyCaucasian]

I didn't watch the debate (went to the Sox game instead obviously and probably wouldn't have wasted my time watching it anyway) but read about it, from what I can tell Obama spent most of his time looking and sounding annoyed because he had to answer stupid and irrelevant questions...

My guess is he spent most of the afternoon prepping for questions about sub-prime mortgages, taxes, iraq, the economy, health care, ect... but the moderators decided to spend the first 50 minutes launching attack after attack at him. He wasnt prepared for it because he was preparing for ACTUAL issues.

[lostfan]

I'm pretty sure he knew it was coming. I don't really see how he could be blamed for feeding into it though, it's not like he can't answer the questions. He spends most of his time defending himself.

[HuskyCaucasian]

I'm pretty sure he knew it was coming. I don't really see how he could be blamed for feeding into it though, it's not like he can't answer the questions. He spends most of his time defending himself.

If Obama had tried to say "let's get off this and talk about health care", there are those who would have said he was trying to dodge the issue. He had to fight through it and Clitnon was in no hurry to bail him out.

I think she got knocked back about her husband pardoning Weather Underground people. They negates anything she might try and say about him.

[HuskyCaucasian]

For those who might argue "well, they were talking about issues ont he campaign trail"...

The never once asked Clinton about Mark Penn, her support for NAFTA, or Bill's tie to off-shore tax shelters and the Chinese government

So, there was a clear bias in my opinion..

[lostfan]

If Obama had tried to say "let's get off this and talk about health care", there are those who would have said he was trying to dodge the issue. He had to fight through it and Clitnon was in no hurry to bail him out.

I think she got knocked back about her husband pardoning Weather Underground people. They negates anything she might try and say about him.

I'm reading there was a point in the debate where they put out some bait for him to go after Clinton on the whole sniper deal and all he said was "we've both made mistakes." So while a James Carville will tell you Obama's being nasty too by doing things like pointing out the Clinton pardons, when it's not in response to a direct personal attack on him, more often than not he doesn't like to fire back.

[HuskyCaucasian]

I'm reading there was a point in the debate where they put out some bait for him to go after Clinton on the whole sniper deal and all he said was "we've both made mistakes." So while a James Carville will tell you Obama's being nasty too by doing things like pointing out the Clinton pardons, when it's not in response to a direct personal attack on him, more often than not he doesn't like to fire back.

Oh if Obama wanted to point out Clinton's "questionable" relationships, he's had a shopping list to choose from. He just hasnt.

[lostfan]

This is the key for me. They can change topics in an answer any other time, but they really seemed to feed into this garbage. Clinton I expected this from, Obama I didn't. I am REALLY disappointed in him, and lost a lot of respect for the guy.

Here you go - this is what I was talking about a few posts ago, I knew of it but couldn't find the exact quote. This is what Obama said during the debate when they pressed him on Clinton's sniper white lie. He tried to change the subject... didn't work though.

 

“[T]he fact of the matter is, is that both of us are working as hard as we can to make sure that we’re delivering a message to the American people about what we would do as president. Sometimes that message is going to be imperfectly delivered, because we are recorded every minute of every day. And I think Senator Clinton deserves, you know, the right to make some errors once in a while. I’m — obviously, I make some as well.

 

“I think what’s important is to make sure that we don’t get so obsessed with gaffes that we lose sight of the fact that this is a defining moment in our history. We are going to be tackling some of the biggest issues that any president has dealt with in the last 40 years. Our economy is teetering not just on the edge of recession, but potentially worse. Our foreign policy is in a shambles. We are involved in two wars. People’s incomes have not gone up, and their costs have. And we’re seeing greater income inequality now than any time since the 1920s.

 

“In those circumstances, for us to be obsessed with this — these kinds of errors I think is a mistake.”

 

Edited April 17, 2008 by lostfan