Maverick….Main Street…Maverick Team….Change…Washington Insiders…You betcha…ya know…small town values…
And of course, the droppin’ of the “g”….bringin’, changin’, reignin’….
We watched two debates last night. First, the American vice presidential one and then I watched the Canadian leaders one during one of Joseph’s late night feeds.
There are at least another two things that I think Americans would benefit from our system:
- SHORT ELECTION CYCLES. Seriously. We called our election and it’s happening in six weeks SIX WEEKS. These senators have all been absent from their roles for more than TWO YEARS. Stupid fixed election dates. Get back to work.
- Round table format for debates. Rather than a moderator going one at a time, ours is more relaxed and conversational but also confrontational as the leaders actually spar with one another instead of respond one at a time to the same question. They directly challenged each other’s answers and it seems more like a real debate/conversation than a side-by-side interview.
American Debate Thoughts:
- I thought that Palin did pretty well for the first third or so. I’d even say she carried honours there. That cheeky “can I call you Joe?” was pretty cool and she was obviously well-rehearsed and prepared. Unlike her Katie Couric interviews and other candid moments, her verbs and nouns all agreed with one another so that’s another point. She certainly enjoyed low expectations going in so as long as she didn’t throw up or curse, she’d be considered to have held her own. But she did much better than that, particularly, as I said for the first bit. Then her folksy-cheekiness started to piss me off. You know what? You’re running for VP, for pity’s sake. Grow up. Cute doesn’t work on the world stage.
- I disagree with the McCain-Palin ideas and plans etc. but you guys know that so I won’t go into that much. Content-wise, I understand there were a lot of “fact-checkers” busy last night though - and not because the two candidates were so good at telling the truth.
- By the mid-point of the debate though, it shifted to Biden. He was tremendous – strong, senatorial, gracious. I was very impressed with his handling of himself.
- There were two moments that to me summed up why I struggle with Sarah Palin and why she actually kind of frightens me (by that, I mean, the thought of her in charge of the United States if anything were to happen to McCain….which is pretty likely…after all, he’s super-OLD). First of all, she never answered the questions. She was evasive and contradictory usually going back to her talking points even if they weren’t relevant. She wanted to frame the debate a certain way and even admitted at one point to “not answering the questions” because she wanted to “talk directly to the American people”. I do believe that answering the question would have afforded her the same privilege of talking directly to the American people but whatever. This showed me that she had memorized certain things and only could talk about these specific phrases and “zingers”. The second moment was when Joe Biden spoke meaningfully and tearfully about his own struggles as a parent after the loss of his wife and baby daughter. He roundly schooled Palin on the notion that mothers – and “small town folks” – somehow have the market cornered on a deep and abiding love for their children. It was very moving. I anticipated that she would at least say something along the lines of “you’re right – fathers are indispensable for the family” or something but she just coolly jumped right into “we’re mavericks’ for the 84,000th time. It showed a deep lack of compassion and ability to listen to me. Or maybe she just can’t think on her feet? Could only recite?
- I found it interesting that everyone was saying Biden had to be careful not to come across too “hard” or harsh with Palin. I wonder if anyone would have those concerns if it was Hillary Clinton up there. Have we just accepted that Palin is a bit weaker and somehow, because she’s a woman, prone to burst into tears? I highly doubt Hillary would have engendered the same concern.
- Overall, Biden won, hands down. But Palin didn’t embarrass herself either. So we move forward.
The Canadian Debate
- I thought that Stephen Harper likely won the debate. I’m sure it killed him to not zing everyone around the table but he stayed calm and “prime ministerial”.
- I hear that Dion just spanked him at the French debate (didn’t watch that one). But he seems like such a poor leader – shrill, panicky, Chicken-Little-ish to me.
- Best line of the night? Gilles Duceppe informing the other leaders “none of us are going to win and we all know it.” BWAHAHAHAHA.
- Overall, it was interesting to me that the Canadian people seemed so absent from this debate. It was all about how evil Harper is. These other four leaders keep banking on his unlikability to elect them. It was definitely dog-pile on Harper but he held his own. The issues weren’t really focused on us but more on them.
- Well, hallelujah – Harper FINALLY admitted that he was wrong to try to push Canada into Iraq. Thank God we didn’t join the coalition there. Right now, we’re busy saving the world in Afghanistan still. And likely will continue to go it alone while the US remains mired in Iraq and NATO remains unwilling to touch any US-lead plan.
- I wasn’t impressed with any of them. Not. One.
- Here’s the thing: I’ve voted Conservative almost my entire life. But this year I am ripe for the picking because of Stephen Harper and the tone of the Conservatives lately. Even though I agree on most (certainly not all) of their points, I’ve found their style too American and negative. So I was pretty ready to abandon ship this election if there was at least a halfway alternative. And there simply isn’t. Not one of those leaders impressed me to vote them in for Class Secretary let alone Prime Minister.
- So I’ll likely vote for the Conservatives. Despite my dislike of Stephen Harper (that whole fixed election date thing I didn’t agree with but then to break the promise? Not cool.), I simply can’t stomach any of the others. So now what? It’s best of the worst, I guess.
Only one more sleep until Tina Fey does her take on it! Yippeee!
