Fraud? You betcha!
What's this country coming to when a major candidate for vice president flatly states that she's not going to bother answering the questions put to her at a debate held to allow the public to judge her fitness for office, why bother having any press or debates or other public forums at all?
Have we officially gotten to the point where a candidate is picked and they blatantly set out to manufacture a persona and history and story line with only a vague connection to reality and fact? Where they brow-beat the press so badly that they're afraid of stating the obvious or even asking any questions which a candidate has to be asked?
When skills more suited to a contestant on the Dating Game are somehow said to prove a candidate's fitness for the second most powerful office in the world?
Have we all literally been brainwashed? What happened to our common sense?
Sarah Palin is a train-wreck. In a sane country, she'd be seen as the utter embarassment that she is viewed as by the rest of the world, who aren't bamboozled by relentless spin and pure B.S.
Not only have people gotten so dangerously off-base that they're literally supporting a candidate because they think she's "hot", but precisely because she's so obviously and completely ignorant.
A large number of otherwise sane people truly argue that they like Palin because she's essentially stupid. They use numerous code words and phrases, such as "hockey mom" or "Joe Six-pack" or an "outsider", but the truth beneath all that hooey is that they're saying that they view the fact that she's as incapable and ignorant of the world we live in as they are. And these Republican voters, rather than being ashamed to admit such a unpatriotic and bizarre view, seem to revel in it.
No one who has listened and watched Palin's performance since her reckless pick by McCain thinks that she's truly able to lead this country through perilous and quite dangerous times. Sure, they'll lie their asses off and say so, using every bizarre and delusional argument in the book, but even the reasons and arguments they concoct are clearly hogwash. (Alaska is close to Russia, leader of the Alaska National Guard, and on and on.) None of it proves her capable in the slightest.
So let's move beyond the experience question. How about just watching her think on her feet. That's a pretty good way to guage a candidate.
There too, she's an utter disaster. An embarrassing, cringe inducing mess that is so clearly out of her league and devoid of even the basest knowledge of the world she would be dealing with as V.P. that decent people can't bear to even watch as she displays her un-hinged attempts to play the part she's told to play and makes an utter fool out of herself in the process.
She's a B-string TV news reader, pumped full of lines and then shoved out on stage.
And the lines she regurgitated during the debate were almost entirely flat wrong or outright lies, doggone it! (WINK!)
I've got other matters to attend to, but I invite you to list the lies, falsehoods, and things she got wrong. The list is long.
Here's a few really inexcusable Palin lies to get you started (from ABC news)
-Bankruptcy Law
BIDEN: "We should be allowing bankruptcy courts to be able to readjust, not just the interest rate you are paying on your mortgage to be able to stay in your home, but in -- be able to adjust the principal that you owe, the principal that that you owe. That would keep people in their homes; actually help banks by keeping them from going under. But John McCain, as I understand it -- I'm not sure of this, but I believe John McCain and the governor don't support that….
GWEN IFILL: Gov. Palin, is that so?
PALIN: That is not so.
FACT: The Senate has voted only once this year on legislation that would change bankruptcy laws to help distressed homeowners. John McCain was absent for that vote. Contrary to what Palin says, the McCain campaign acknowledges that he does not support those changes to bankruptcy laws.
-Palin on Troop Levels in Iraq
During an exchange on Iraq, Palin erroneously claimed the United States is down to presurge levels in Iraq. Palin said, "We have got to win Iraq. And with the surge that has worked we're now down to presurge numbers in Iraq. That's where we could be." Palin is incorrect.
FACT: The Alaska governor is wrong because the number of troops on the ground is still higher and the number of combat brigades is the same as at the start of the surge in January 2007, according to Pentagon figures. Iraq troop levels before the surge were at 133,500. While U.S. troop levels in Iraq have been in the 142,000 range recently, today they are at around 150,000 because of an ongoing troop rotation.
-Obama's Voting Record on Taxes
Palin argued that Obama has voted to increase taxes 94 times. Palin said, "Barack had 94 opportunities to side on the people's side and reduce taxes and 94 times he voted to increase taxes or not support a tax reduction. Ninety-four times."
FACT: That's a wildly inflated number Palin threw out; the actual number is closer to half that.
Hell, you can just go to FactCheck.org and see a list of all the false statements by Palin and a few relatively mild errors by Biden.
The right wingers cheers and whoop because their candidate put on a ridiculously phoney act. She may have been wrong and lying more often than not, but they don't care. Palin didn't cause the moderator to end the debate out of simple human compassion, and that's a victory.
Good for them. She made it through. She put on a good act, it's true. She didn't fall apart, though in order to get through the debate, she disturbingly and habitually refused to answer anything which she wasn't scripted, and would lurch suddenly back to some topic for which she had some material memorized.
That's not a strong candidate by any stretch of the imagination. There's been no perceptible bump in the polling showing Obama pulling away from McCain. I'm proud that polling has shown that a clear majority of Americans didn't fall for the act of someone who is quite possibly the biggest fraud ever perpetrated on the American public.
What did you feel were some of the more freaky and disturbing aspects of Palin's performance?
posted by The Inside Dope @ 10/04/2008
5 comments
5 Comments:
(She may have been wrong and lying more often than not, but they don't care. Palin didn't cause the moderator to end the debate out of simple human compassion, and that's a victory). Sometimes you are too much for me! LMAO
First of all I was irked by the “ you bethcha’s” “ya darn rights” etc. It made me as uncomfortable as I would if I was in the presence of a leader e.g. a CEO of say a Fortune 100 company or man of cloth who swears. I have higher expectations of my leaders and this was the wrong forum for those colloquialisms (shout outs included)
My top faves:
It was clear she had no idea what’s “Achilles heel”. Her body language of the pulled shoulder was the physical indication and her valiant attempt to talk about her strengths (she was probably told when all else fails talk about your strengths) If this was a regular corporate job interview, the interviewer would probably reiterate and she would be forced to show she had no clue.
It’s also clear that she is unable to think and speak clearly at the same time. There was one moment where she said “that toxic waste on the main street created problems for wall street” Made no sense, I am surprised that MSM haven’t jumped on that gaffe and wring it to death
She still had no clue of what’s the role of the Vice President. She talked about the constitution allowed flexibility. Bull! The constitution allows no flexibility there and it was designed that way with cross checks and balances. She said that and I almost fell out of my chair. She has knowledge that even with Cheney trying to redefine the position was still blocked most of the time through the Legistrative branch. She no knowledge national politics and this response was a big give-away
The fact the she kept spouting that “Government is the problem” Yet wasn’t it her running mate who suspended his campaign to go to Washington to have a “Government” solution?
She was wrong on facts Obama taxing people making 42k
She was wrong on his voting records and had no clue about her running mate’s.
Dope, the floor is now yours
She winked. Repeatedly.
Is she trying to hit on voters, or explain why she's the best choice to lead the country?
One gets the impression that Palin definitely confuses campaigning for the 2nd hightest office in the United States with running for Miss Alaska.
Apparently to many Americans, "perky" and a fake persona (I was just waiting for her to break into "Animal Crackers in My Soup" any second, or put her infant on the podium and change his diapers) is just as good as "qualified."
Maybe these people think they're voting for First Mistress or something. Palin is dangerously close to bimbo status in my opinion.
The fact that so many people actually make their choice based on such an alarmingly shallow basis is cause for despair that we even are capable of rising to meet the challenges which await not far down the road.
I love her new stories about how "Todd and I are struggling" and how she can somehow identify with people living paycheck to paycheck. I call bullshit and I wish the media would too. They made over 160K last year according to her tax returns. While that's low compared to most politicians that's still a hell of a lot more than most "middle class" folks. My house makes significantly less than that (even when you adjust for cost of living) and I'm happy to say we're not "struggling". But we don't pay to have tanning beds installed in our houses or crap out 5 kids either (I feel it's irresponsible to have more than two in his day and age - that's what I have and I am done). Maybe if it was so hard for her and Todd to get by they should have cut back on those things. Or maybe (and probably closer to the truth) she's full of it and has the same reckless disregard for the middle class as her running mate.
Bush 43 is leaving office with the lowest approval rating of any U.S. president. (N.B.: His predencessor finished his two terms with the highest approval rating since FDR.) There aren't many dyed-in-the-wool conservatives around anymore who are pleased with him or Cheney. Yet they're already committed to voting next month for a Republican who, in the last four years, has proven to be no different, and will continue GWB's nation-wrecking policies, and who's running mate is naught but the political equivalent of a trophy wife. Why they can't figure out that when they vote for more of the same bad governance they're pissed about now the same bad governance is gonna continue...
Well, foolish consistency is true of both sides of the U.S. political coin. Unfortunately.
Keith O of MSNBC compared GWB's remarks, in his debate with Gore, with Palin's comments "debating" Biden ("Joe"). It was obvious they both had the same writers and cheat sheets.
I agree with TID that observers abroad would see Palin's "folksy" performance as contrived. Her use of the stereotype " Joe Six-Pack" offensive and what did she hope to gain by a wink?
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