Paul Ryan Campaigning In Pennsylvania

October 20, 2012 2 Comments

As most of you know my position on the election is that Romney doesn’t really have a pathway to victory. Nevertheless there are some encouraging developments on the campaign trail. Paul Ryan is going to be speaking in Pennsylvania today. Polls appear to be getting tighter in Pennsylvania. One poll actually shows Romney up 4. Most of the polls out there seem to indicate Obama is up 3-4, though these seem to be leaks of Obama and Romney camp internal polls. RCP still shows Obama up 5, though they don’t include the poll showing Romney up 4 in its average.

The question for the Romney camp is why are they sending Paul Ryan to Pennsylvania. Do they believe the state is in play or are they hoping to force Obama and the Democrat to shift their funds from real swing states to defend a state that Romney has no real chance of winning. Pennsylvania hasn’t been won by a Republican since 1988. It’s possible a local issue could make this closer than normal. Obama’s anti-coal policies have rankled the middle of the state, which depends on coal production. So perhaps this will be a closer than normal loss for the GOP. Still, if the polls show it close then maybe Romney really has a shot.

Or more likely the Romney camp is trying to get the Democrats to divert funds from Ohio and other swing states to defend what should be an easy blue pick up. The RNC has $83 million cash on hand while the DNC is taking out a loan. These aren’t the campaigns per se but they spend money on their candidate. Romney and Obama appear to be even on cash but with certain swing states clearly going Romney’s way, Romney has apparently begun to shut down operations in North Carolina and Florida. Obama hasn’t given up Florida yet. By shutting down spending in states Romney will clearly win, he can shift money to Ohio and perhaps some blue states where the polls are tightening.

The real point of the Ryan visit is to force Obama to buy ads and otherwise campaign in Pennsylvania. Romney spending a few thousand to send Ryan is a good investment if it means Obama will be forced to visit or even better if they have to take out $1 million in ads. That’s money Obama could be spending in Ohio or Nevada, states that Romney really needs to win badly. This is all part of the campaigning game, it’s a joy to watch. One wonders what the Obama camp is doing right now to out maneuver team Romney.

Pennsylvania isn’t in play. If it is, then we’re entering Dick Morris territory in which case Romney will win in a landslide. If Pennsylvania goes red, so will Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa to say nothing of all the swing states. Pennsylvania would represent a shift that goes well beyond one state, it would represent a national trend away from President Obama. There is zero evidence that a national trend is underway, at least not to this extent. Polls may have tightened after the first debate, there may be a small swing against Obama out there. But not to the point where solidly blue states like Pennsylvania end up red on election night.

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Reasons To Fire Obama

October 19, 2012 2 Comments

According to President Obama when four Americans get killed it’s “not optimal.” This our President said on Comedy Central. Words cannot even begin to express how callous this statement is. Not to be outdone, Joe Biden decided to get on the callous bandwagon. He told a group of Democrats that House Republicans “have their bullets aimed at you.” Because of course Republicans want to kill everyone who disagrees with them. It’s obvious isn’t it? Desperation seems to be setting in for Obama and his campaign. Obviously during a long campaign odd things are going to be said by both candidates. But calling the killing of four Americans “not optimal” is pretty dreadful.

Bill Clinton clearly isn’t happy that President Obama threw Hillary under the bus for the “not optimal” deaths of four Americans in Benghazi. As such, he threw Obama under the bus at a campaign event wherein he basically agreed with the premise of the Romney campaign. Clinton agrees that things aren’t better off under Obama, he so much as acknowledges that Mitt Romney is right. Clinton has pulled this stunt before, saying positive things about Romney before walking them back. My guess is that he doesn’t walk these comments back. Why should he? Obama has already thrown Hillary under the bus and it doesn’t serve the Clinton’s anything politically to save Obama.

At Tuesday’s debate Obama was set up with a softball question about equal pay for women. I tire of these “women’s” issues as though women are only interested in babies and faux equality issues. There isn’t a frilly pink politics just for women. In any event, Obama brags about the largely meaningless Lilly Ledbetter equal pay law. What Obama didn’t tell us and what Romney foolishly didn’t point out is that Obama pays women in his White House 18% less then men. More than one woman coming out of the Obama White House has complained about discrimination. So while Obama is pointlessly demanding equal pay in the private sector, when he has the opportunity to lead the way with equal pay he chooses not to.

Welfare has soared 32% over the last four years. The total cost of welfare is now over $1 trillion annually. For every $7 the Federal government has taken in under Obama the government has spent $11. The problem here is that for the last four years the economy hasn’t gotten any better. If the economy had picked up the Feds would have taken in more in tax revenue and spent less on welfare. It’s not like Obama has added welfare programs, with the exception of Obamacare. Certainly over the last two years he hasn’t been able to pass anything. The problem is the economy, which Obama has failed to turn around. His policies just haven’t worked. As a result, welfare rates have soared, we spent $1 trillion annually on welfare and we spend $11 for every $7 of tax revenue. Obama has failed.

One final thought. We’re going to hear a lot over the last couple weeks how it would be racist to fire the first black President. Let me offer a different perspective. Considering what a failure this President has been, it would be racist not to fire him. A sure sign of equality is when we’re willing to hire someone on their merits and then fire them if they don’t do a good job. Obama was, for all intents and purposes, hired on his merits. He’s failed to turn the economy around, he should be fired. If we don’t fire him because we fear being called racists, that itself is racist. If we would fire any other President for doing a poor job, Obama should be treated no different. We fired Carter, we fired Bush 41. Why should we be afraid to fire Obama?

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Romney Has No Pathway To Victory

October 18, 2012 8 Comments

We still don’t know yet if Tuesday’s debate will move the polls at all. My guess is that the polls don’t move much at all in either direction. According to Real Clear Politics, Romney is up 0.4% right now. That includes two ridiculous polls. The current Gallup poll which has Romney up 6, which is so extreme as to be unbelievable. RCP also includes the Washington Post poll which has Obama up 3 with a D+9 sample. Keep in mind the 2008 Obama landslide was only a D+7 election, thus making a D+9 poll not believable. These national polls are interesting but we all know it comes down to 50 state elections. Looking at those, where exactly is Romney’s path to victory?

 The Obama campaign won’t really admit it but they’ve given up on Virginia, North Carolina and Florida. They also appear to have given up on Colorado, which Romney is leading by a slight margin according to RCP. If these four states go Romney, that gives him 257 electoral votes, only 13 away from victory. That would leave Romney with two pathways to victory. One is win Ohio, the other is win Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada. He can’t do either of these and thus Obama is going to be re-elected.

Let’s look at Ohio first. RCP has Obama up by 2.4 right now. Rasmussen shows Obama up 1 point. Survey USA shows Obama up 3, with an unusual amount of undecided voters. The interesting poll though comes from PPP, which has a very fair D+4 sample showing Obama up 5. The 2008 election was a D+8 election in Ohio while the 2010 GOP landslide was a R+1 election. PPP went right up middle. Most importantly, Obama is over 50% in the poll. In Ohio it is clear that in early voting Obama is up by over 10 points. That matters in that these are people who won’t change their votes.

With Ohio out for Romney, his only other pathway to victory is to win New Hampshire, Iowa and Nevada. Even if we give Romney New Hampshire, where Obama has been in free fall and the latest poll shows the race a 47-47 tie Romney still has major problems in Iowa and Nevada. In Nevada, Rasmussen has Obama up 3 and hitting the 50% mark. In Iowa, We Ask America shows Obama up 3 while ARG shows the race tied in a D+1 sample. If Nevada is a loss, then Iowa won’t matter even if ARG is right. Nevada has not been trending in the GOP’s favor, especially with an influx of liberals escaping California over the past decade.

What isn’t being factored in any of these polls is how undecided voters will actually vote on election day. We know that historically 80% of people who say they’re undecided going into election day vote against the incumbent. That’s good for Romney but only if Obama has less than 49% support going into election day. Obviously a state where Obama is at 50% or better has rendered its undecideds irrelevant. That’s a problem if PPP is correct in Ohio and Obama thus has 51% support. It’s also a problem in Nevada if Rasmussen is correct. Lose Ohio and Nevada and Romney is done.

There’s been a lot of talk about enthusiasm this election. There’s no doubt that the liberal Democrat base isn’t delirious for Obama like they were in 2008. But that doesn’t mean they won’t go vote for him. We cannot assume that because the economy stinks and the President suddenly supports homosexual marriage that blacks will decrease their national vote share from the 13% they were at in 2008 to their historical 11%. We can’t assume that other people in the Democrat base won’t show up because their disillusioned with Obama or have lost interest. Cleveland is huge for the President, we cannot assume those folks won’t vote even if they aren’t sky high for Obama anymore.

Like it or not, Romney isn’t going to win this election. The numbers just aren’t there for him in the states that matter. Obama’s summer of setting Romney up to look like a cross between Scrooge McDuck and Thurston Howell III took place exclusively in these swing states and it clearly has worked. These states have been very slow to switch to Romney, unlike the rest of the country. Romney’s good debate performances simply cannot overcome an entire summer of negative ads from Obama which Romney didn’t have the cash to counter. We’re stuck with Obama for another four years, get used to it.

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Candy Crowley’s Left-Wing Bias

October 17, 2012 5 Comments

Candy Crowley’s performance at last night’s debate confirms everything negative conservatives have ever said about the media. At all three debates the Democrat has been allowed to speak longer than the Republican. In the case of Cowley, she let Obama speak 9% longer than Romney. Crowley interrupted Romney 28 times to Obama’s 9 times. Amazingly Obama is the one who whined about being interrupted, sarcastically talking about being used to interruptions. In case you think that’s because Romney was being rude or talking to much please refer to Obama speaking 9% longer than Romney. Crowley consistently cut Romney off before he made major points, she did so on taxes and she wanted no part of Romney’s discussion of Fast and Furious.

Crowley of course was worse than all of this. During the discussion of Benghazi she agreed with Obama that he had called the Ambassador’s killing terrorism all along. She basically told Romney he was wrong. After the debate Crowley  admitted she was wrong but took the opportunity to blame Romney anyway because he “used the wrong word.” What nonsense. In reality Obama didn’t call the Benghazi incident a terrorist act until two weeks after it happened. The day after he spoke in the Rose Garden and never once called Benghazi a terrorist act. After his Rose Garden speech, Obama told the UN the attack was the result of a riot caused by an anti-Islam video. He said the same thing on The View and during a Univision interview. Crowley was flat out wrong and Obama lied.

Candy Crowley had no business fact checking anyone during this debate. Especially so when she isn’t absolutely certain that she’s right. While Michelle Obama was clapping away (how inappropriate can this woman get?) and the biased audience erupts in cheers, all because of Crowley’s act, the American people didn’t get to see that Crowley wasn’t even in the ballpark of right. This is why people don’t trust the media, it’s why the press has favorable ratings almost as low as Congress. People see the bias, they saw how Crowley treated Romney, they saw how he was interrupted and many people won’t like it one bit.

It only gets worse for the media. At the media center during the debate press row cheered when Obama attacked Romney’s wealth. The notion that we have an objective, unbiased press has completely fallen apart during the Obama years. The media is clearly in the bag for the President, whether we see it in biased questions, terrible debate moderators or reports of cheering when Obama makes a point, the media is clearly one sided. Then they wonder why they’re accused of bias, they wonder why people don’t trust them then they wax poetic about the “good” old days when people were limited to three liberal networks and one liberal local newspaper.

If you’re Obama, on one hand you have to love the bias actions of Candy Crowley. She made sure there were questions asked that favor him (think the anti-Bush question and the feminist questions) while she avoided topics that hurt him (think Obamacare which remains unpopular). When Romney wanted to talk about Fast and Furious, Crowley cut him off. Obama had to be thrilled. But on the other hand Crowley’s one sided and incorrect actions on Benghazi will place Obama’s lie in the forefront for the better part of a news cycle.

Obama’s lie about his Rose Garden speech would have been forgotten by everyone but Romney supporters today. Instead, the media is being forced to discuss Obama’s lie in the context of attacks on Crowley. Benghazi would have been just another in a long list of background noise issues that people would have talked about today. That certainly would have been good for Obama because he flat out lied about his treatment of the situation. Now Benghazi is a focal point thanks to Crowley and her ridiculous one sided, partisan interjection into the debate. Media bias is alive and well, it’s only going to get worse from here.

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2nd Presidential Debate Review

October 17, 2012 Leave a comment

Last night we got to witness yet another in a long like of fake townhall debates, this one hosted by Carnie Wilson look alike Candy Crowley. The questions ranged from acceptable to absolutely ridiculous. We’ve gotten to the point where “please tell us you’re not a Republican” is considered a good question for Mitt Romney.  Both sides did what needed to be done last night. Obama appeared more aggressive and engaged which boosted his performance. Meanwhile Romney delivered an equal performance and hit Obama hard on the eeconomy.  In other words, we have a tie.

We have to start with Candy Crowley, whose performance was nothing short of outrageous. She let Obama speak 4 more minutes than Romney. She cut Romney off consistantly, especially when he was obviously about to make a major point. She didn’t do the same to Obaam, thus the time difference. She decided to interject her viewpoint into the Benghazi discussion, siding with Obama when he claimed that the attack was a terrorist attack 0n day 1 in the Rose Garden. That simply isn’t true and the moderator had no business declaring that one candidate was right and the other was wrong. It isn’t the duty of the moderator to play fact checker, especially when her own facts are flat out wrong. None of this is surprising, it’s what happens when Republicans agree to debates moderated by people who call their ticket a train wreck.

As for Romney, he had a pretty decent night. He hammered the President on the economy, which according to CBS’ instant poll 64% believe he won the issue. He made several tactical mistakes though. On Benghazi he failed to mention how the President sent his UN ambassador on 5 talk shows to claim the attack was due to riots over a stupid You Tube video, thus politicizing the issue. He also failed to point out that if the President called it a terrorist attack on day 1, why did he tell the UN that the attack happened due to riots over the video? Romney could have won the issue, instead he lost it after becoming flustered by Crowley’s ridiculous Obama defense. That’s no excuse though, Romney should have been on the ball.

Romney also asked a series of questions of Obama, which he must think set the President up. It seems to me a huge mistake for Romney to ask questions of Obama on a regular basis because he’s just setting the President up to shine. Never ask a question for which you are not absolutely sure of the answer. Romney should have stuck to broad points and themes like he did in the first debate. Focusing on minutia loses the audience. That’s not to say he didn’t do a fine job, he was nearly as good as the first debate. Just a few tactical errors last night which cost him an outright victory.

As for Obama, he certainly came out more aggressive and energetic. He has one problem facing him though and that’s his own record. He talks as though he isn’t the sitting President, as though the last four years haven’t happened or are someone else’s fault. It’s why he lost overwhelmingly on the economy, he just isn’t believable on taxes, spending and economic issues. He isn’t even believable on equal pay for equal work, his own White House pays women less than men. Obama talks big about gender equity but if he can’t even have gender equity over that which he directly controls it just isn’t believable.

The last question of the night about summed up the two candidates. Some guy asked the candidates to tell him something about themselves that has been distorted or otherwise isn’t known about them. Romney launched into a defense of himself and his character while Obama spent his time attacking Romney. It became clear at that point, if it wasn’t already, that Romney is seeking the White House because he has a vision for the country and wants the country to share in that vision. Meanwhile Obama wants to be re-elected by default because Romney is scary and evil. I wonder whether undecided voters caught that at the end, did they even stay up to watch?

Last night’s debate was just like the VP debate, it was a good example of why people hate politics. The questions were dumb, the candidates looked ready to exchange blows at one or two points and there was a lot of finger pointing. The reason why the first debate was so much better than the last two is because the candidates were able to engage in an exchange of ideas that wasn’t limited to two minute memorized answers. They actually had a discussion. Last night they just pointed at each other and yelled. Obama didn’t win many voters last night, he may have stopped the bleeding but he didn’t win anything. Romney probably didn’t win anything either. The debate was a tie, what that means in swing states is up for its own debate.

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8.2 Million Removed From Labor Force Under Obama

October 16, 2012 Leave a comment

The economic news in this country hasn’t been good throughout the Obama administration. Second quarter growth was just 1.3%, manufacturing orders and orders for durable goods are down substantially in recent months. QE1 and QE2 failed while QE3 is destined for failure. The Stimulus was a massive failure. Income is down $4,000 during the Obama years while prices are up. There are 48 million Americans on food stamps. If we blindly follow the government’s 7.8% unemployment claim, there are millions of unemployed Americans. If we subscribe to the U-6 unemployment model, the number of millions of unemployed Americans nearly doubles. The economic disaster has been sustained throughout Obama’s years.

The number of Americans in the workforce has barely increased during the last four years. We know that despite claims of 4 million jobs created, the fact is that the number of employed Americans is less than 300,000 more today than it was at the beginning of the recession. Couple this with recent claims from the government about the number of people in the workforce and the unemployment rate and the numbers don’t add up. The following chart was produced by Sen. Jeff Sessions, it demonstrates what the government has done with the unemployed during the last four years:

For every American added to the labor force over the last year, nearly 10 were added to the tally of people not in the labor force. That’s how the government came up with the 7.8% unemployment rate last month, they simply removed 350,000 people from the workforce. Unfortunately the numbers don’t mesh with reality. We need to create 150,000 jobs every month just to keep up with population growth. That is on average how many more people enter the workforce each month than leave it. In other words, we don’t have a sudden increase in retirements that explain these numbers. The government is simply removing people from the workforce to make the jobs market appear more stable and less of a problem than it really is.

One of the chief problems with the jobs report every month has been the small number of jobs created. We had a summer of less than 100,000 jobs created each month, September only saw 114,000 jobs created. Those numbers don’t keep up with population growth. Rather than count new people in the jobs market as unemployed, the government is shifting them into the ranks of people not in the job market. Then they don’t count as being unemployed, thus the unemployment rate drops. But it doesn’t actually drop, it actually increases because new members of the job market (usually young people) want jobs but cannot find employment.

One of the reasons Obama is having trouble whipping up enthusiasm among the young is because of the jobs market. The unemployment rate might not count young, new entrants into the job market as unemployed but the people they aren’t counting sure do feel unemployed. Believe it or not young people don’t want to live in their parents basement playing video games and wasting their lives away. They want to work, they want to be independent, they want their own home. Obama hasn’t worked out for them and they know it. It’s why fewer young people will go to the polls in three weeks and it’s why of those who do go to the polls a smaller percentage will vote for Obama. The government might fool people with a job into thinking unemployment is down to 7.8% but the government isn’t going to fool those who aren’t being counted and want jobs.

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2nd Presidential Debate Preview

October 16, 2012 Leave a comment

Today the second Presidential debate will be held at Hofstra University in New York. It will be a townhall setting, with undecided voters asking questions of the candidates. Why the Debate Commission decided to hold a townhall debate in New York, much less Long Island, is beyond me. Couldn’t those guys find an auditorium available in Iowa, Ohio, Virginia or Florida so that people in actual swing states could ask questions of the candidates? Instead of being relevant, the Debate Commission is heading to a Democrat stronghold where undecided voters are irrelevant as Republicans. It all goes together with a moderator, Candy Crowley, who called the Romney-Ryan ticket a disaster.

President Obama’s team has vowed he will be more aggressive at the debate tonight. They clearly believe that his problem during the first debate was being overly polite. It couldn’t possibly been the fact that Obama doesn’t have much of a record to run on or the fact that Obama isn’t a particularly gifted speaker off prompter. So Obama is going to go aggressive. What that means for him remains to be seen. We saw what it was for Joe Biden, who was so over the top that his otherwise stronger policy performance was lost in a sea of smirks, laughter and malarkey. Obama has quite a range between his polite, boring performance in the first debate and Biden’s overly aggressive absurdity in the VP debate.

The format may hurt Obama’s ability to be aggressive. There isn’t going to be a ton of back and forth like there was in the first debate. The nature of a townhall just doesn’t allow for that. Even if it did, it’s one thing to be aggressive before a moderator but it’s another thing to pull such a stunt in front of a voter with a presumably legitimate concern and question. Most voters don’t want to be told to their face that the other guy is a liar. They want to hear what the candidate believes himself, not necessarily his spin on what his opponent believes. Voters watching the debate put themselves in the shoes of the person asking the question, thus it requires the candidates to stay on point concerning their own plans.

Romney needs to stay the course. He needs to remain aggressive but polite. He’s surprisingly capable of connecting with voters one on one. Whether that will come across tonight via this debate format remains to be seen. He has to at least make an effort at that because Obama can turn on the charm if he has to. The problem for Obama in a townhall is that he gets defensive and bitter whenever someone asks a tough question of him. If he gets that angry look on his face that we’ve all seen when someone asks a tough question tonight, that hurts him. Romney doesn’t pull that stunt but he sometimes keeps a distance between himself and everyone else. If he can get past that and actually connect, which he’s capable of, Romney will be in fine shape.

Obama is sure to give a better performance tonight than he did two weeks ago. Having exceeded expectations, he’ll be declared the winner by the media. Whether that translates into a victory with voters remains to be seen. A tie for Obama will completely stop the Romney momentum. It would allow the Obama campaign to completely regroup and it would allow them to prepare for the final debate as a winner take all in a format that is better suited to a more aggressive style. Romney now has expectations, if he doesn’t live up to them and if Obama exceeds his then Obama will win. Romney though is likely to give a similar performance as the first debate. As such, I predict a tie.

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Both Campaigns Concerned About Candy Crowley

October 15, 2012 Leave a comment

We are entering what will likely be the most important eight days in the Presidential race. Tomorrow is the second Presidential debate and the final debate will take place a week from today. Obama has an opportunity to stop the bleeding and arguably has to tomorrow. Romney of course has a chance to come out on top at the debates and continue with his positive campaign trajectory. He’s up in most of the national polls, if he wins these debates he’ll start going ahead in some of the swing states. It is crucial for him to keep the momentum, obviously for Obama it’s crucial to halt Romney’s momentum.

Believe it or not we’ve actually been able to discover an issue that both Romney and Obama agree on. Both are concerned about tomorrow night’s moderator Candy Crowley. The format of Tuesday’s debate is a “town hall.” Supposedly undecided voters chosen by Gallup (an organization which has been pressured by the Obama administration to change their polling results) will be posing questions to the candidates. The moderator according to both campaigns is to largely stay out of the way. This is likely in response to Tom Brokow’s performance four years ago when he literally rephrased questions, as though ordinary Americans are to stupid to ask candidates questions all on their own.

Unfortunately Crowley has been running around CNN claiming that she’s going to ask whatever she darn well feels like asking. She plans follow ups and rephrases, demanding specific answers of particular candidates after the original question has been asked. Crowley clearly doesn’t want to be treated like Jim Lehrer was after the first debate. She started telling everyone what she was going to do just two days after the first debate. Crowley clearly is signaling to the left that she’ll tow the line.

The problem here is that both candidates have agreed that the moderator tomorrow won’t step in and will allow the town hall participants to ask their questions and allow the candidates to debate. It seems to me that if this is what the candidates have agreed to then this is what should happen. The Debate Commission has even agreed to this with the candidates but for some reason didn’t bind Crowley to the agreement. Whether that’s incompetence on the Commission’s part or whether it is intentional remains to be seen.

What we see with Crowley and Martha Raddatz is exactly what’s wrong with journalism today. Journalists see themselves as America’s watch dog but they’re so in bed with the Democrats that they don’t really watch out for anything. Instead, they play gotcha journalism, which is yellow journalism of the worst sort. They think it’s their job in a Presidential debate to challenge the candidates. But that isn’t what a debate is. A debate isn’t a joint press interview. In a debate a moderator allows the candidates to debate each other, they aren’t debating the moderator. In this silly town hall format, the candidates ought to do little more than answer the questions posed to them by voters. The moderator should only be seen introducing the next person to ask a question.

It’s probably time to do away with the debate commission. These guys have shown themselves to be completely inept at putting on a debate. They make agreements with the campaigns and then don’t hold their moderators to the agreement, likely creating a separate and contradictory agreement with the moderator. They schedule debates at ridiculous times, this is the second election in a row where a debate will go head to head against Monday Night Football. You might not like football but if the goal of these debates is to reach voters it’s probably not a good idea to go head to head with a major NFL game. You don’t have to like the fact that people like football more than politics but it’s reality. Unfortunately reality isn’t what the debate commission specializes in.

UPDATE: Candy Crowley called the Romney-Ryan ticket a “death wish.” Why do Republicans agree to national debates moderated by people who hate them?

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Biden’s Factual Errors, Raddatz’ Biased Performance

October 13, 2012 1 Comment

The VP debate fallout has been interesting to say the least. Paul Ryan has all but been forgotten about. His performance was mediocre on policy but at this point no one seems to care. He’s being given a pass, largely because he came off as nice and polite in comparison to Joe Biden and Martha Raddatz. We’ve previously discussed Biden’s ridiculous, condescending attitude and gestures. It’s his policy statements which drifted from inaccurate to surprising that are of interest today. As for Raddatz, we now know she attended a press “women’s event” at the Vice President’s residence just a few months ago. She also has a history of attacking conservatives at debates. What makes a good moderator?

Biden made a number of factual blunders the other night. Let’s begin with one that you might characterize as a lie. He blamed Ryan and the Republicans for voting for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He claimed to vote against them. He in fact voted for both wars, which he had to know was the case. For him to act like a know it all old man who knew better than those silly Republicans concerning the wars when its public record is simply the height of stupidity. The question then comes why didn’t Ryan call him on it. But that’s another matter.

On taxes Biden claimed that Obama’s tax increases on the “rich” would only hit those making over $1,000,000. That’s factually incorrect. Obama favors letting the Bush tax cuts expire for the rich, which would raise taxes on those making over $200,000 for singles and $250,000 for married couples. We won’t say that Biden lied there, perhaps he was giving away Obama’s negotiating strategy on the issue after the election. Or perhaps he’s confusing some Democrats demand to raise taxes even further on those making over a million. Still, what he said to the American public didn’t represent the truth even if it didn’t represent an actual lie.

Biden claimed that the ambassador in Libya never requested more security. That ought to be news to the State Department folks who testified earlier in the week in Congress that more security was requested. Biden as well as the administration was all over the place on Libya. It’s clear that their story was either inaccurate or an outright lie. It’s impossible to say which it is at this point. That the Vice President has no idea that more security was requested in Libya, especially considering that the Benghazi consulate had been attacked prior to 9-11-12 makes you wonder about Biden if not the administration.

What makes a good debate moderator? I enjoyed how Jim Lehrer handled the first Presidential debate. He allowed the candidates to go back and forth, he let them ask questions of each other. It was a real debate with the moderator setting it up by shifting the issues discussed and only butting in to ensure both sides got equal time. It’s a stark contrast from what debates used to be. Go back to the previous debates when the moderator asked questions and each candidate got a certain amount of time to respond. It was less a debate and more a joint press conference.

Raddatz is being praised to the hilt by the left for her performance. She was anything but passive. She played Barbara Walters tough girl journalist. That would be fine if she was hosting a one on one interview. But this was a VP debate. It’s not her job as the moderator to follow up with attack questions or with statements expressing doubt in what a candidate has said. Let the opponent do that, it’s a debate after all. Instead, it was a two on one, usually directed at Paul Ryan. Raddatz rarely questioned what Biden said but consistently questioned Ryan. Not surprising given her past history, which calls into question why she was a moderator. Had she been like Jim Lehrer her conflict wouldn’t have mattered much.

Only 50 million people watched the VP debate. That’s down from the nearly 70 million who watched both the 2008 Palin-Biden debate (Palin by the way did much better against Biden than Ryan did) and the first Romney-Obama debate. Less people cared about this debate, I suspect a lot of people turned it off halfway through. Biden’s factual errors likely won’t be noticed by a lot of people because they just don’t care. One wonders why we even bother with these VP debates. They don’t swing the polls, no one cares. Voters didn’t care in 1988 when Quayle looked a fool, they didn’t care in 1992 when Admiral Stockdale looked senile and no one will care that Biden looked like a crazy, obnoxious uncle at a family reunion. All that matters to voters are the Presidential debates.

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Vice Presidential Debate Review

October 12, 2012 2 Comments

What a horrible debate last night. Paul Ryan was absolutely dreadful. He came off as unprepared, a child allowed to chat with the adults for the first time. Joe Biden came off as a dismissive, senile old man. Biden was unlikable, Ryan while likable looked a child. Worse than the two candidates was Martha Radditz the moderator. She couldn’t decide whether she was going to let them debate like Jim Lehrer or interrupt. When she chose to interrupt it was almost always Ryan who was interrupted. Part of the problem is Ryan was to nice and let her do it, a good example of how unprepared he was for this stage.

The answers to the questions almost don’t matter. Ryan’s answers mirror Romney’s. Biden’s largely mirror Obama’s, though he threw the intelligence community under the bus with his Libya comments. No doubt the “fact” checkers will snarl over every comment made. I noticed some nonsense facts from Biden but in the end no one will remember any of it. What people are going to remember is Biden’s smirks and condescending tone. It is those two things that made this debate close to a tie. Otherwise Biden would have won in a landslide.

Let’s talk about Martha Radditz. President Obama attended her 1991 wedding. She has a history of attacking Republican positions. She consistently interrupted Ryan while always allowing Biden to finish his answers. Republicans will likely point fingers at her for her bias. They’re going to be right about her bias, it was pretty obvious. But what did we expect? This is what happens when we allow a liberal Presidential Debate Commission pick liberal moderators election after election. Until we insist on someone like Chris Wallace or Megyn Kelley we don’t get to whine about the liberal moderators. Having said that, it would have been nice for her to butt out and let the two candidates debate.

Does this debate change anything? It halts Romney’s momentum so in that regard Biden did what he was supposed to do. Paul Ryan didn’t do anything to hurt Romney. Yes, he looked a child and he looked unprepared. But Ryan was polite and respectful which contrasted well with Biden’s condescending attitude. When I say unprepared, it’s not that Ryan doesn’t understand the issues. It’s that he doesn’t have experience on this sort of stage. He’s never run for President, he’s never had a serious debate like this. So he didn’t hurt the Romney brand. Biden won on the issues but he looked like such a jerk that he lost the big gains he should have made for Obama. In short, the debate changed nothing.

Look, on the substance of the debate Biden won in a landslide. There’s no point in sugar coating it, Ryan got his clock cleaned because he was unprepared for the stage. But Biden was so shockingly condescending and disrespectful that he completely undid everything he could have done to help Obama. In the end though, this is a debate for Vice President. This was never going to change things much. People don’t vote for Vice President, they vote for the top of the ticket. Biden stopped the bleeding for Obama, at least on some level. He won.

One final thought. This debate came off as very unpresidential. It felt like a political fight between two useless talking heads on Hannity or Maddow. I think this will turn people off to this election and these two candidates. I get the feeling like people changed channels halfway through or just turned the tv off in disgust. The Presidential debate was a worldview debate, this was a petty talking head battle on cable news. The debate was boring, it didn’t offer us a serious look at either candidate’s worldview. It was petty, cheap and dreadful.

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