My Take on the VP Debate
Oct3
When I got home from class last night, I decided to stay up late and watch some of the VP debate. I only got through about an hour, so this is kind of a half-analysis of what I saw.
Palin—Based on her Katie Couric interviews, I expected Palin to fail miserably in the debates. To my surprise, she wasn’t that bad. She was extremely personable and was able to mention a number of facts and quotes when applicable to the debate. I think she even won a few rounds by calling out Biden’s earlier contempt in the primaries for Obama’s voting record on the war.
With that said, I had read the article What it’s like to debate Sarah Palin before the debates, so I had an idea of what was coming. For me, it wasn’t a surprise when she did not answer questions directly and related tough questions to a personal story. When she played coy with the audience saying “it’s so obvious I’m a Washington outsider”, I did not buy it. I guess that when you know how a magician performs a trick, the trick is not as impressive.
Biden—Biden, on the other hand, was exactly what I had expected. He was well prepared and his command of existing policy, relevant statistics, and Obama’s platform were impressive. I think he did a pretty good job of connecting with the audience and made a big win when he said “No one making less than $250,000 under Barack Obama’s plan will see one single penny of their tax raised whether it’s their capital gains tax, their income tax, investment tax, any tax.” This statement was quite memorable and I think it really helped dispel the “raising taxes” myth that is being sold to the middle class.
My only bad remark about Biden’s performance is kind of an odd one. I thought his smile was a bit odd. For me, it did not seem genuine and at times took away from his performance.
Issues—In terms of energy and the environment, I tend to side with the Democrats in this election. I do not think “drill, baby, drill” is a good solution to energy independence. I believe that renewable solutions are more viable in the long-term. I do think that the environmental changes we are seeing as part of global warming are caused by man’s action. Palin said nothing to change my views on any of these items. And, Biden was quite effective defending Obama’s platform in this area. For me, Biden was the clear winner here.
In terms of the economy, both parties favor strong regulation on Wall Street and a bailout, so this is pretty much a push. If you read my post on treating government like a business, you probably would have guessed that I appreciated Palin’s statement “Government is going to have to learn to be more efficient and live with less if that’s what it takes to reign in the government growth”. This statement was a win for Palin in my eyes. With that said, I think one of the major contributors to growth is the war in Iraq. As a result, I would side with Biden’s argument that we need a definite time table for withdrawal from Iraq. I would also side with Biden that the middle class needs help. Overall, I give a slight advantage to Biden and Obama on the economy because I do think we need to withdraw from Iraq and better support the middle class. But I do agree with Palin that government needs to become leaner and meaner.
I am not going to go through each issue, because for me the biggest issues facing our country in the next four years are the economy, the war in Iraq, and the environment. This is what I am voting on this year.
Conclusion—To make the conclusion short and sweet, Biden won this debate. And after the first two debates, I am in the Obama corner because I believe his policy toward the environment, the war in Iraq, and the economy are better developed and more viable. I do give credit to Palin for a good show and her insightful statement about improving efficiency in the government. However, I think that the McCain ticket needs to better develop this platform to convince me to move into his corner.
October 3rd, 2008 at 10:07 am
“Biden—Biden, on the other hand, was exactly what I had expected. He was well prepared and his command of existing policy, relevant statistics, and Obama’s platform were impressive.”
Biden and Palin made several mistakes concerning statistics, existing policies and how the top half of their respective tickets voted in the past. If you google this it comes up with array of mistakes made by both.
“I think he did a pretty good job of connecting with the audience and made a big win when he said “No one making less than $250,000 under Barack Obama’s plan will see one single penny of their tax raised whether it’s their capital gains tax, their income tax, investment tax, any tax.” This statement was quite memorable and I think it really helped dispel the “raising taxes” myth that is being sold to the middle class.”
Both parties have made campaign promises in recent presidential elections (see Clinton and Bush I) where they have promised not to raise taxes and then did exactly the opposite when in office so if you believe what any candidate says about what they’ll do with taxes, you’re crazy. The best indicator about what they’ll do when in office is what they’ve done in the past and Obama has voted to either raise taxes or voted against tax cuts between 40-90 times depending on whose number you use. In addition Obama has said that he is going to give a “tax cut” to 95% of Americans. Don’t you have to pay taxes to get a tax cut? In fact, Obama will simply give money to rougly 45% of people who pay NO TAXES. He will get this money by increasing taxes on the top 5%. This is income redistribution i.e. Socialism. If you find this kind of thing noble I suggest you move to Cuba or Velenzuela and you’ll get more than your fill of these policies.
October 3rd, 2008 at 12:53 pm
As much as I hate to pay money out of my pocket to support someone else, I think this is part of a civilized society. I think that everyone has some basic rights including shelter, food, and availability of health care. If I have to pay some extra money out of my pocket to provide these rights, than I am more than willing to do so. I would much rather give up a small percentage of my salary then watch people starve or die because of my greed. And yes, rich people should bare much of this burden. If Joe Hundredthousandaire has to forgo the purchase of a Lexus so that the burden on the poor is less…than I am all for that. It is not like we are buying the poor a Yacht and a Bentley. I have heard the argument that this takes away the incentive to work. But, given all there is to buy in this consumer-driven country, I think there is still plenty of things to work for.
October 3rd, 2008 at 1:47 pm
Mostly agree. . . .although realize anything said in a debate is generally worthless.
Do you honestly believe Palin will strongly support deregulation or that Biden wants to give tax cuts? C’mon.
Only specific comment I completely disagree with your analysis is Palin truly is a Washington outsider. She is a governor, not a congressman or senator. Governor’s don’t live in DC and have their minds eaten away.
On that note, I really don’t see how generally the media sees Obama and Biden both winning the debates on style. Obama and Palin are both (relative for Obama) Washington outsiders and have fresh ideas and seem to possess a zeal for the job. McCain and Biden are crusty old Washington white men in suits.
But I don’t know. I’m a non-issue voter: the winner between these two hold relatively no effect of change of my life. Call me that swing vote.
Guess I’ll go Libertarian again. Get out of Iraq. Cut taxes. Legalize pot.
Bob Barr ‘08
http://www.lp.org/platform
October 6th, 2008 at 10:28 am
“And yes, rich people should bare much of this burden. If Joe Hundredthousandaire has to forgo the purchase of a Lexus so that the burden on the poor is less…than I am all for that.”
From Wikipedia:
Socialism refers to a broad set of economic theories of social organization advocating state or collective ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods, and the creation of an egalitarian society.[1][2] Modern socialism originated in the late nineteenth-century working class political movement. Karl Marx posited that socialism would be achieved via class struggle and a proletarian revolution, it being the transitional stage between capitalism and communism.[3][4]
Socialists mainly share the belief that capitalism unfairly concentrates power and wealth into a small section of society who control capital, and creates an unequal society. All socialists advocate the creation of an egalitarian society, in which wealth and power are distributed more evenly, although there is considerable disagreement among socialists over how, and to what extent this could be achieved.[1]
October 6th, 2008 at 10:52 am
Both pure capitalism and pure socialism are somewhat flawed ideals. A pure capitalist society has problems accounting for basic human rights without legislative-based incentives. And, a pure socialist society does not provide adequate incentives to motivate workers to be productive. In all reality, most societies are neither. They fall somewhere on the spectrum between the two.
Now, I am all for capitalism. But, I am in favor of the government providing for basic human rights via wealth distribution. I include health care to be part of these basic rights. You can argue that health care should not be included in this bundle of basic rights. But, simply arguing that wealth distribution equates to socialism (and, therefore is bad) is really an over simplification of the matter.
October 6th, 2008 at 11:27 am
Wealth distribution is the very definition of socialism. That’s not an argument, its a fact. By arguing that its not is really an overcomplication of the matter.
October 6th, 2008 at 1:05 pm
Right, what I should have said was “wealth distribution equates to pure socialism” is an over simplification. Regardless, all modern societies exist in a gray area between pure socialism and pure capitalism.
October 8th, 2008 at 11:57 am
[...] quick analysis from the debate last night. This time I am going to try to keep it shorter than my VP debate analysis, because, honestly, in my eyes, not much has [...]