apple juice

my standard line after these things is, “well, it doesn’t really matter what I thought”.

but two points struck me immediately during this debate. The first was the VP question. Palin gave a rambling answer saying that it was a good thing to expand the powers of the vice president’s office:

I’m thankful the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the vice president if that vice president so chose to exert it in working with the Senate and making sure that we are supportive of the president’s policies and making sure too that our president understands what our strengths are.

The Senate’s role is to be supportive of the president’s policies?

Biden gave a direct and damning answer about the role of the VP, saying that Cheney has been the worst VP ever and that the role of the VP is clearly spelled out in the Constitution.

Vice President Cheney has been the most dangerous vice president we’ve had probably in American history. The idea he doesn’t realize that Article I of the Constitution defines the role of the vice president of the United States, that’s the Executive Branch. He works in the Executive Branch. He should understand that. Everyone should understand that.

I don’t think there are many people out there who think Dick Cheney has been a positive force for the country.

The second moment that really struck me was the moment when Biden choked up talking about the car crash that killed his wife and daughter and left his sons in the hospital.

Palin came back with her rote answer on John McCain being a maverick. I can’t do it justice here in text, but the insensitivity of her remarks following Biden’s very real moment was tremendous.

I finally had a chance to ride my bike into work today. Luckily it was a late start today at work, so the fact that I was totally unprepared for riding was fine. When you haven’t ridden your bike to work, there are a lot of little things to worry about. I have a small wardrobe in my office to store some essentials, but from time to time I forget things. For example:

• Do I have socks, underwear and an undershirt to change into? Yes.
• Do I have deodorant? No.
• Do I have a belt? No. (Borrowed one)
• Do I have shoes? Yes.
• Did I remember my keys? Yes.
• Did I remember my bike lock? No.
• Do I have a towel? No. (Borrowed a clean one from the trainer’s room)
• Do I have a dress shirt and tie? Yes. Pants? Yes.

Anyway, it’s a beautiful time to ride your bike to work. Cool and crisp in the morning. The sweat factor is basically zero. Just give yourself a little extra time those first couple days to make sure you have everything in order!

I’m starting to think I should just link to youtube and ask you, my faithful readers, to search for ‘sarah palin’.

Let’s just say that the videos of Sarah Palin being incompetent are more numerous than those of her showing some shred of knowledge about any given subject.

I mean COME ON. You could’ve said you read the funny pages in the Anchorage Daily Herald and that Calvin and Hobbes was your world view and had more credibility than whatever that nonsense just was.

Marmaduke.

Anything.

Ok,

Did you see this past saturday night live? I thought it was pretty dang funny! That Tina Fey is amazing! Didn’t get a chance to see it?

(Skip to about the 3min mark to see the relevant passage)

http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/clips/couric-palin-open/704042/

And then I saw the actual interview.

Sarah Palin can’t be President. She is not qualified. I don’t trust her to run my local supermarket, let alone the country. I’m sorry, but there has to be a bar to cross before you can actually make a run for the Presidency.

You know, I am all for telling your kids that they can be President someday. You know, anyone can be President.

As long as that anyone has, at the MINIMUM, a basic knowledge of the issues of the day.

Sarah Palin shouldn’t even be allowed to VISIT the White House at this point.

Please, read this:

COURIC: Why isn’t it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700 billion helping middle-class families struggling with health care, housing, gas and groceries? Allow them to spend more and put more money into the economy? Instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess?

PALIN: That’s why I say, I like ever American I’m speaking with were ill about this position that we have been put in where it is the tax payers looking to bailout.

But ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the health care reform that is needed to help shore up the economy– Helping the — Oh, it’s got to be about job creation too. Shoring up our economy and putting it back on the right track. So health care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americas

And trade we’ve got to see trade as opportunity, not as a competitive scary thing. But 1 in 5 jobs being created in the trade sector today. We’ve got to look at that as more opportunity. ALl those things under the umbrella of job creation.

This bailout is a part of that.

Ask yourself this:

Is that the quote from Sarah Palin? Or Tina Fey making fun of Sarah Palin?

please, please PLEASE do not vote for John McCain.

We were driving through central Wisconsin during the debate last night. My car’s stereo has developed extremely poor reception. We couldn’t pull in any stations that were covering the debate. So I called up my sister, “Hey, can you put your phone up to the speaker? My stereo isn’t working.” So we drove for about 15 minutes listening to my cell phone on speaker.” That was pretty hard to hear, so Sonja asked if we could connect to the internet on the laptop via the phone. Why, yes, I think we can.

So, driving across central wisconsin, we had the computer using the phone as a bluetooth modem, streaming the debate live from mpr.org, with the headphone output plugged in to a tape adapter in the car.

We caught most of the second half of the debate, and we pulled into the parking lot of a coffee shop to quickly synchronize Google Reader. My initial impression, listening to the debate, was that although Obama was clear, thoughtful, and intelligent, I worried that McCain would be viewed as having “won” the debate. He certainly sounded visceral, aggressive tone on the radio.

After we got unpacked, I opened the laptop again to read through some of the debate reactions. Talking Points Memo and Andrew Sullivan seemed to be more favorable towards Obama than I initally thought. The nytimes article I read was very balanced. Even Fox seemed to think it was basically a draw.

Finally, today, I was able to download a video of highlights from the debate. What a difference seeing the video vs. just hearing it on the radio. Obama looked serious, forceful, very presidential. McCain wouldn’t even look him in the eye! Obama caught him on a number of moments that McCain had obviously hoped to own. The soldier’s bracelet and also the “naivete” lines that McCain had hoped to bag were upstaged by Obama’s comebacks.

So, I’m feeling pretty good now, going into thursday’s VP debate. (Did you see palin on Katie Couric’s show? Wow.) Obama’s team will have learned a few things about how to deal with McCain, and I think that Obama has clearly made great strides as a debater since earlier on in this process.

McCain calls Letterman and lies about why he has to miss the show. Definately worth 10 minutes.

I can’t go anywhere these days without hearing all these Republicans squawking about privatizing Social Security and de-regulating health care.

I mean, you have to hand it to them, it’s worked so well for banking and financial services.

Err…