OlderFri, 03 October 2008 at 8:48 am
Vice-Presidential Debate 2008
Gov. Sarah Palin and rival Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. faced off during their first vice-presidential debate on Thursday night at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.
The Vice presidential candidates sparred about a lot of the important issues–taxes and the economy, energy and oil, same-sex marriage, Iraq and Afghanistan.
To watch the full debate online, visit NYTimes.com. The video is about 1.5 hours long. Be sure to check it out–the interactive video and transcript is really nifty!
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I can see clearly why this country is in trouble just by reading some of the previous posts. Biden did not stay on track. many of the questions given to him were answered with “look what bush did!!” and he was outshined by Palin. Obama/Biden don’t want to accept the fact that pulling out of iraq right now would not only could put the u.s. at risk it will make it all the more difficult to confront the problems in afganistan and pakistan not to mention iran!! wake up people. oSama/Biden is the fast track to failure.
What’s up with that FAKE smile of Biden’s! What a looser!
Joe Biden is a slime ball!
Sarah Biden talked directly to the “American” people?! America is a country rich with diversity with people from all backgrounds, cultures and ethnicities. She said she wanted to stand up for the “Joe-Six packs” and “hockey moms”?! I’m sorry, but she is speaking only to middle-class white Americans here. That generalization is just an insult to the diversity that makes up America. It just goes to show what a narrow-minded world view she has. She has been sheltered in Alaska and because of it she is ignorant to what and who America really is.
Look, she is a charismatic, very likeable politician. But, she is not ready to be VP! In the debate, she didn’t answer any tough questions and outrightly ignored them and changed the topic to a rehearsed speaking point about energy. She also stated that she has no problems with extending the powers of the VP beyond what is dictated by the constitution. This is scary to stuff! Here you have a woman, with a very limited world view, very little knowledge of the details of our failing economy, very little knowledge on foreign policy, and she wants more power as VP?
Come on Americans, look beyond her pretty package and in-depth at her answers or lack there of any sound, reasonable, intelligent answers to the serious problems our country is facing today. Is this who you really want to be the next President should something happen to McCain?!
Oops, meant to say Sarah Palin in my previous post!
@ 26
How exactly could pulling out of Iraq (which you guys have no business being in in the 1st place) put the US at risk?
Back to the debate, Biden could have and should have destroyed Palin. I’m sorry but it’s getting unacceptable that this woman can’t answer the questions she’s being asked. Energy, Alaska and Maverick were all she could talk about.
Wake up people she is only candidate for vice president, not the president .McCain is the candidate for president We all saw him against Obama last week he was so Pathetic.Does McCain will win Because of Palin if that so i want Palin to be candidate for president against Obama.
Palin’s little girlish actions, comments, and lack of actually grasping questions, evidenced by her extremely rehersed comments and psudo-”answers”, reminded me of a Shirley Temple movie. I kept waiting for something original and substantial from Sarah, and am still waiting.
Good thing Daddy WAR-bucks sent her to Debate School.
Jeez you are sure up on things aren’t you trace? You can say she isn’t ready to be VP but I’ll bet that you can’t back that up with a logical line of reasoning. You are just regurgitating what you have heard.
i can’t believe the posts here ! WAKE UP !
how can you believe for one sec that Palin can be a VP ?
she has no place in the white house, it’s going to make america looked stupid again ( after 8 years of bush)
To Dawn N°5 : politicians need to be smarter than the rest of the population not dummer !!!!!! where are you from ?????
mj @ 10/03/2008 at 9:45 am Joe Biden clearly won this debate. He was able to stay on track and give clear, concise answers. Palin made it clear that she would answer questions only on her terms and to hell with the moderator and the country who wanted to hear her answers to the questions asked.
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I couldn’t agree more. While she did better than I thought she would,
given her interviews (especially the one with Couric) IMO she is still far from qualified to take over the presidency in the event something
were to happen to McCain. The cutesy winks and folksy talking did not impress me at all. Gwen Ifill did a fine job as moderator. Obama/Biden 08
Sarah’s answers were convoluted and escapist. She would go round a question to come back to something that she was capable of talking, like families, children and God. Politics and economics drive our success in the private domains. VP ought to be very good at policy. Just being everyday Jane will not work.
Congrats Sarah! You did a fine job lady!
Wow you people must really enjoy the shape our economy is in right now, I mean lord forbid if McCain wins and dies while he is in office .. Would you people really be comfortable with Pallin as PRESIDENT? This is sicken that our country is full of loose minded people like that .. I must admit that during the debate she did a lot better then I thought she would do but overall the FACT is she is not ready to have that much power and if I hear soccer mom one more time I’m going to puke! This is not a joke this is our country we’re talking about! - TAMMY
You have just got to take those rose colored glasses off girl! Obama is even LESS experienced and HE’S RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT!
Biden told SIXTEEN definitive lies and SIX more that are truly debatable “lies”. The entire Obama/Biden campaign is running on falsehoods. And the financial advisors for their campaign are none other than the same people who just bankrupted Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac all the while professing that everything was okay so they could be handed their million dollar bonuses. People, you need to GET REAL!
Neither VP candidate directly answered the questions, that is normal for debates. Either one did great for those that wanted them to. Both of them had coaching and rehearsals before hand, that’s normal too.
Biden convoluted some of his answers with too many numbers and muddied the waters with excessive detail, as feared by the Demo party.
Palin was quite generic with her answers but did get into specifics while dancing a bit.
Nobody “won” except to the voters who have favorites and already made up their minds, although Palin probably secured more support from undecided women voters, and those who want no BS in Washington.
A good debate overall, but both parties were fairly careful to maintain status quo.
Why didn’t Biden launch more aggressive attacks on McCain? His past shows him less of a wimp, but with buffoonery racist remarks, so I’m sure he was told to be more tactful.
Why didn’t Palin talk about the Fannie Mae corruption with three individuals paying themselves 9 figure bonuses, funding the Obama campaign, and then being currently employed by Obama?
If they did speak of this, maybe I was out of the room at the moment, but to me this indicates that they were too afraid to rock the boat and potentially look bad.
Sarah Palin will take woman’s rights back to the 1800’s. If you get raped by your father or your brother, she’ll counsel you to choose adoption. Not the choice any woman should have to suffer.
All the debate showed was that she could read sound bites from a card. Have Americans become that simplistic?
This debate was a JOKE…at least on the part of Sarah Palin.
She is so inept and ridiculous that it makes my stomach churn. Her “aw shucks” demeanor comes off as totally fake and staged. My God…this isn’t a beauty pageant….winking at the judges isn’t going to earn you points here. She is absolutely NOT like me and does not represent me either as a woman or as an average citizen. Her backwoods attitude about censoring books and sex education practices is completely out of place in today’s society. Yeah..I guess abstinence education worked SO well in her own household. Speaking of which, have any of you noticed how the pregnant teen daughter is no longering parading around supporting Mom? To you Palin supporters…WAKE UP and collect a few brain cells. She is not even qualified to run for student council president let alone being the number 2 person in charge of our country.
Like I said before, they will have advisors to help them make important decisions once they are in office. And even those decisions need to get passed!!!!
What is funny is that most of you think that Palin did very poorly and appeared “stupid” and didn’t really answer the questions. Isn’t that what all those “experienced” politicians do anyway? So doesn’t that make her an expert politician?
I love how people are blaiming the Republicans for the state of the economy. Last time I checked, aren’t there more Democrats in the House than Republicans?
As far as the abortion issue, seriously people, do you EVER think Roe vs Wade will ever be over-turned. Never!
OMG you guys! Sarah Palin was just so good. I loved everything she had to say! She didn’t answer a single question, made lots of accusations, and repeated her empty campaign slogans like 100 times. It was so wonderful, I had a hard on the whole time! Imagine if she were the president, women would finally be back in the kitchen, pumping out all kinds of retarded babies, (just like Palin)!! Yippee, i’m so excited, I can’t wait!
Joe Biden has 26+ years in politics, so of course he has more facts at his fingertips and is smoother in a debate. He’s done it for decades.
That being said, neither Biden nor Palin is running for President. Palin isn’t on the ticket because she is an expert on national policies - she is on the ticket because she is a normal person who decided to get involved, and where she did get involved locally, she made a huge difference and showed character, judgment, intelligence and the ability to get things done without a bunch of political games. There is a reason she has a 80% approval rating - people like what she gets done.
Sarah Palin has only been on the national political scene for a month and a half. She hasn’t spend her life in national politics like Joe Biden has. But again, they are not running for President.
I found it telling that Palin described her role as VP as supporting McCain’s policies and addressing specific areas that she knows well. That is what our VPs usually do.
Biden, on the other hand, described his role as more of a partnership with Obama. Well, that’s the Bush/Cheney set up, which is ironic.
The whole “heartbeat away from the Presidency” thing is a bunch of goofy scare tactics. McCain isn’t going to drop dead in office (oh how they wish). Palin will be just fine. She didn’t know anything about being a mayor when she became one. She didn’t know how to be a governor when she became one. She rocks at both.
It would be very foolish to count Palin out because she is the outsider and a rookie. She has proven to be very capable when she has been given the challenge.
Wake up PEOPLE. John Mc Cain is 72 and Palin oh….. she is an IDIOT. you bet ya.
To: wake up women
Abort yourself!!!
Palin is simply the best. Come November, she will be the elected Vice President of the US of A.
Go Palin Go!
poor sarah palin
since all her answers were scripted she stumbled over all the questions she didnt memorize
and could she possibly just not say”you betcha” anymore
BARACK THE VOTE
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