Tuesday, October 16, 2012

What we know after the second presidential debate

A few things we know after tonight's presidential debate:
President Obama performs better when he is not comatose. 
He is not always comatose
The debates are better when the moderator is not comatose 
The failure of Obama's policies in his first term looks no better when he is not comatose than when he is 
The exact nature of Obama's economic plan for his second term is no clearer when he is not comatose than when he is 
Oh, and since when is it the moderator's job to point out when she thinks the Republican candidate is wrong (whether he is or not)? And if she is going to do this, then why doesn't she do it for the Democratic candidate as well?

Nevermind. I know that answer to the question.


17 comments:

ZPenn said...

I find myself in the weird state of agreeing with everything you said in this post.

Singring said...

Of course it's the moderator's job to point out when the candidate is wrong - and it has nothing to do with her or him 'thinking' the candidate is wrong, it has to do with whether the facts agree with what the candidate is saying.

That's the job of the free press, for crying out loud!

I wish that in every debate the moderator would come back at the candidates with the facts if they were starting to spout lies.

But hey - that's just me.

Anonymous said...

Moderator Candy Crowlesy has done something very unusual..she has issued a statement where she has now sided with Romney more than Obama. Thank you journalist Crowley for checking your notes which show that Obama's administration spent weeks spinning a narrative about Libyan demonstrations which never happened based upon some obscure You Tube video. Now the press needs to camp on UN Ambassador Susan Rice's doorstep to ask why she peddled obvious lies.

Anonymous said...

PS Perhaps Crowley issued her clarification because she works for CNN whose journalists walked into that compound and found the Ambassador's personal journal... a site which the FBI didn't enter until more than a week later because it was deemed too dangerous. Would it have been too dangerous for Marines, Mr. President? Perhaps we should quit apologizing to murderous religious zealots for America's First Amendment which offers no protections for offense takings. If it did, then shouldn't we have jailed that "artist" who got taxpayer funds to place a crucifix in a bottle of urine?

Anonymous said...

Double PS that Germans can't vote in American elections.

Anonymous said...

edit...Thank God, Zeus and the Flying Spaghetti Monster that Germans can't vote in American elections.

ZPenn said...

I don't understand the random German hating. Is Singring German or something? I really, really want to visit Germany some day. It's the number one foreign country I've always wanted to visit. But anyway, back to the topic:

Singring: I actually have to disagree with you on that. I don't think the moderator is supposed to call out either of the candidates for anything other than dodging the question, or going over time, etc. The problem with a moderator pointing out a lie, is that both candidates spent most of the debate lying through their teeth, and when one of the candidates gets called out, it makes it look like the moderator is taking sides. Whether she actually was taking sides is irrelevant, the appearance of impropriety of this type can be a big deal.

It's not a big deal to me though, because I really despise both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. Obama appeared to actually be awake this debate, but he basically said a whole lot of nothing. Romney said the same nothing that he said at the last debate. It's all just popcorn theater at this point, and any illusion of substance just makes me laugh. Barack Obama is going to win the election, and even if he didn't we'd have Mitt Romney in the white house. It's a lose-lose situation.

Anonymous said...

Random German Hating? Isn't that a Milwaukee indie band?

ZPenn said...

I wouldn't know, Anon, I don't listen to a lot of indie music. I just didn't understand why there were suddenly comments about not wanting Germans to vote in American elections when there was no mention of anything German to spark such an interjection. I don't really understand it. I mean, I wouldn't want a German to vote in an American election because they don't live here and aren't in need of representation by the US government, but the way that it was said "thank God, Zeus, and the FSM that German's can't vote in American Elections" seems to imply that your problem with a German voting in our elections isn't due to the fact that they don't live here, but because you seem to think that Germans are somehow inherently bad, which sort of baffles me. I'm pretty sure there are good and bad Germans as much as there are good and bad Americans. I rather like the few Germans I've met.

Old Rebel said...

"when is it the moderator's job to point out when she thinks the Republican candidate is wrong"

Interesting answer to that here:

http://www.ramzpaul.com/2012/10/candy-crowley-empowered-moderator.html

Andrew said...

This has been interesting to me. Candy Crowley, from what I could tell, meant well, but a mild chaos erupted when she made her comment.

She said that President Obama did speak of acts of terror in his Rose Garden speech, and while Gov Romney was speaking the President started interrupting loudly asking Candy to repeat what she said.

It was, I though, a surprising thing for Ms. Crowley to do, and an untoward reaction by the President.

But I don't think she was taking sides. All in all, I kind of enjoyed the approach she took. I guess the President ended up with four more minutes than the governor, but I don't know if that has any straight up significance.

Has anybody done one of those interruption counts like they did for Biden-Ryan, where Jolly Joe supposedly interrupted or smiled at Mr. Ryan 86 times to Ryan's 6? I'd be interested to know how many times Candy stopped and/or corrected each participant.

Andrew said...

This German stuff is weird. Ich war ins Deutschland geboren und lived there for six months. I prefer Austria, but Germany is a wonderful country with amazingly hard working people. And the Rhine Valley is beyond gorgeous.

My mother grew up in Potsdam before the war, so I knew a little more personally about the Nazi era, though it certainly wasn't common discussion. Germans did not generally see themselves as fighting for Hitler so much as for Germany. Oops.

I hope we can avoid similar mistakes in the Nietzschean days ahead.

Then I grew up in Milwaukee, so the Milwaukee Indie Band thing went Matrix on me. Ooh, I mentioned the Matrix. Cool.

Anyway, from what I can tell (my kin still live there) Germans learned a lot from their experience. Singring, where do you live?

ajk

Singring said...

'Singring: I actually have to disagree with you on that. I don't think the moderator is supposed to call out either of the candidates for anything other than dodging the question, or going over time, etc. The problem with a moderator pointing out a lie, is that both candidates spent most of the debate lying through their teeth, and when one of the candidates gets called out, it makes it look like the moderator is taking sides. '

Not if the moderator points out everyone's lies (as they should).

I don;t quite get your attitude in this respect, ZPenn: on the one hand you say you despise Romney and Obama for their dishonesty (fair enough), but then you are uncomfortable with moderators actually fact-chacking their statements.

The whole reason politicians are so dishonest is because they get away with it time and time again - nobody ever has the guts to stand up and say 'Hold on - what you just said is a complete lie!'.

That's what the press is for.

'This German stuff is weird. Ich war ins Deutschland geboren und lived there for six months. I prefer Austria, but Germany is a wonderful country with amazingly hard working people. And the Rhine Valley is beyond gorgeous.'

That's some good German there, Andrew.

Don't worry too much about Anonymous. I think he believes we all run around in Marxist uniforms in Europe, aborting babies, having gay sex and hanging the rich from the highest trees in our free time.

This precisely illustrates the complete lack of political perspective that is dominating much of American politics.

Anyone who thinks Germany is the be-all and end-all of the socialist terror state, is simply are living on another planet. The kidn where they wear pointy tin foil hats.

Singring said...

'Singring, where do you live?'

Oops. sorry, almost forgot to answer that question, thanks for asking Andrew.

Funnily enough, after living in Ireland for a few years, I now live in the Southeast of the UK, where I just recently started working as a lecturer.

I lived in Germany until I was 26, and that was in the South, close to Stuttgart. A lovely area really, with plenty of old villages, castles, forests - the kind of clichee you picture to be honest.

I've only been to the US and Canada briefly, but in each case I was very taken with the natural environemnt there. As a biologist, I was obviously fascinated with the scale and scope and sheer variety of landscapes you have. At some stage I can see myself living in Canada or the Northern US, which I consider to be very beautiful, but for the time being I'm extremely happy here in the South of the UK, a lovely place to live.

Anonymous said...

Singring, Milwaukee would be the perfect Northern U.S. city for you to occupy. However, after a couple of winters there, you will be praying hard for global warming to intensify.

ZPenn said...

Singring:

I appreciate your position, and I am of the opinion that the press and fact checkers need to do their job (and they tend to do it fairly well as soon as the debate ends, and often during the debate online), but that the member of the press acting as the moderator should not do this during the debate so as not to convince one side that they have been cheated. The fact is, every person is biased, and while moderating they need to be extra careful not to do anything that might appear to show any favoritism. I love the free press, and I love it when the press calls politicians on their BS, but I don't think that the moderator should engage in this during the debate.

Also, out of curiosity, how did you find Martin's blog? I found it because I live in Kentucky and heard of him locally. I think it's really cool to see that you found it having spent relatively little time in the US. The internet is a wonderful thing to connect people around the world! Always a pleasure to hear your perspective, Singring.

Anonymous said...

Crowley jumps in one time with an instant "fact check" and gets it wrong. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?