Letters to the Editor
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Even rural conservative people were disgusted
"MOST PEOPLE were pretty disgusted by the debate, by the way."-- susanne freeborn
Yep. Even here in the boonies where wedge issues have been leading the overwhelmingly socially conservative population to vote for Republicans for a long time now, (despite being a historically Democratic region), the comments were the same--dumb questions; even in the so-called substantive part of the debate (none of the people I talked to today have any interest in discussions of capital gains taxes since they don't have any capital gains to tax).
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piece of advice.
Antidepressants are really bad drugs. Like cocaine, they make you think everything is ok when everything is really in the crapper.
I just cannot imagine that those ads for the airforce are providing you with enough money to distort your thinking as much as those drugs would.
The less you write, the more I like Salon.
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hold'up
i just read the text of your blog as apposed to your video statement. well ok. they were different. good luck to you and whatever...
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Question
Does your pastor love america as much as you do and the second part, does Nash McCabe really believe in your love of America as opposed to your pastors'. Wheres the effing flag lapel pin folks. WHERE IS IT!!! I will abstain from voting until I get these answers. Thats all I care about. Ef all the rest.
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No, it won't...
No, the debate won't hurt Obama in the primary election. When large numbers of voters and viewers MOCK the debate, you know the democatic base just doesn't care. However, these kinds of questions may hurt him in the GE if he doesn't aggressively put them to bed or basically shut them down. He's already on that path by mocking the moderators and Clinton in his subsequent rallies. I particularly liked the "brush your shoulders off" gesture.
OTOH, Joan, why is there no coverage of the inflammatory remarks Clinton made about MoveOn at a private fundraiser after her Super Tuesday failure? Talk about divisive and alienating your base. It's also dishonest, whining and embarrassing for Clinton to insult this group who formed to save her husband's lying, cheating rear-end.
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Irritated
I watched parts of the debate (and read transcripts). Those questions weren't tough, they were stupid.
And I'm not just saying this as an Obama supporter. The questions for Senator Clinton were stupid too. I felt embarrassed by the whole charade.
Tough? Please.
This does bring up the issue of how the respective candidates deal with these "Great American Hypocrite" style interrogations, however.
Clinton follows the script from the 1990s -- all spin. Remember, O'Reilly and Limbaugh came to power during this era based partially on the premise that they were the antidote to the constant spit-shining and twisting of political crises big and small during the Clinton era.
Obama is dismissive. This might be one of the core reasons that core Clinton supporters distrust or outright despise Obama.
But dismissive is, I think, the correct response to a moronic question like, "I see that you part your hair on the left not the right, why do you hate America?"
Although probably not politically expedient, I wished that both Clinton and Obama would have simply walked off the set with a "this is stupid, screw you guys."
Finally, as much as I am loathe to do, I have to say that I really get a sense that the pro-Clinton, anti-Obama camp tend to project all the negative emotions that relate to dismissive, domineering and yes abusive men onto Obama, and thus emotionally scapegoat him as more smug, more overbearing and more silver-tongued than he is. I'm loathe to assert the theory because it drips pop-psychology. But it is clear to me that those who are most vehemently anti-Obama in the Democratic party view him in an entirely different way than I do, and I need a theory to explain it.
Ironically, despite all the claims of misogyny and sexism, my own emotional response to Clinton is in fact similar to my own distaste for various authority figures condescension toward me: my father, my older sister, various teachers, bosses, etc. For me to say that my opinion of Clinton isn't emotionally shaded would be untrue, but to say that it is driven by sheer sexism is at best scarcely legitimate and at worst entirely unfair to me.
Someone in one of these 100+ page back-and-forth frothing Democratic Primary Salon.com letters clusterfscks pointed out that McCain communicates paternally, Clinton maternally (emphasis on "matron") and Obama fraternally. The term "first amongst equals" springs to mind -- and the imagery is that Obama is a prince of the people, not an overbearing and condescending mother or father.
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ETA --
This letter from a Clinton supporter gives some weight to my pet theory:
letters.salon.com/opinion/walsh/election_2008/2008/04/16/bittergate/permalink/b88fba6364cf08e402a91e6c3637d8f2.html
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The Penn Debate
I think Clinton came off okay. No plus at all. Sure Obama had a tough time. This is what happens when an intelligent person faces two journalists who have long parted from their craft. You may recall, Joan, that 60 minutes into the session George S made this observation prefacing yet another question to Obama: "The US economy is viewed as the No 1 problem in our country etc etc." I think that says it all.
You may also recall the way Williams and Russert set about slamming Clinton way back.
Obama should understand that he cannot expect intelligent questions from these non-elitists in the MSM. He should curb his impatience, and , just maybe, should say: I really have no inclination to answer stupid questions. It is time the idiotic questions and idiotic questioners should be treated with the contempt it/they deserve.
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Dealing with people who are embarrassing themselves and our nation IS irritating
Joan, he didn't stumble. I identified with his irritation; his grace in having to deal with those Yahoos was laudable. They were not tough questions, and answering them posed no difficulty. They were STUPID questions.
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"Like most people?"
What support do you have for that statement that most people think Obama stumbled? Your friends? Pundits? Polls? And what were the questions that were so "tough?" Flagpins? Old sixties radicals? Does an ex-marine (his pastor) love America?
This comment smacks of the same fantastical Brooks-isms that Greenwald pointed out just yesterday. I'm really disliking the Salon coverage of the primary lately. I'm most disappointed that this publication has caved to the republican "elitist" mythology, the flag-baiting, and the terrorist-among-us fearmongering.