Wait, really?

I haven’t spoken about the Biden – Palin debate that took place the other night, which is a rather glaring omission. This was likely the most-watched political event EVER, and it definitely bears some consideration. I will say this: it probably wasn’t the debate that most people were expecting to see. It wasn’t a train wreck. Sarah Palin’s performance was neither crash-and-burn bad, nor did it reach the levels expected by those who believed that she was lulling Biden into complacency and setting him up for a massive trouncing. This actually bears repeating: it wasn’t a train wreck, but there were signs of a less-than-stellar performance by Palin. She pretty much immediately pitted herself against Biden and moderator Gwen Ifill, so that if and when she did not fully answer their questions, it would appear to be intentional and not due to ignorance. She stuck like glue to her talking points, but did it in such an obvious way (repeating the same MAVERICK! phrases ELITE! a lot WASHINGTON INSIDER!) that she did not come across so much prepared to debate as she did rehearsed to perform.  Biden did a good job of answering the questions put to him without looking like a bully, which is impressive, since he came across that way a bit when he was responding to Obama during the Democratic candidate debate. On the whole, I doubt that either candidate influenced anybody who wasn’t already inclined to be on his or her side. A transcript of the debate can be found here.

Today, I ran across this funny chart a couple of times, and thought I’d share it:

If you’d like to read more from the man who created this flow chart, click here.

Here they go again

In advance of tomorrow’s vice presidential debate, Gwen Ifill, the moderator, is being attacked for a book that she wrote called Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama. This book is being published in 2009, and is not available to be read, yet some people have exercised their powers of precognition to determine that she is somehow biased in favor of the Obama-Biden ticket, and cannot possibly be fair. Now, to be honest, it’s not impossible to believe that personal biases or loyalties can influence how one moderates a debate; just ask George Stephanopoulos and Charlie Gibson. I don’t think that anybody who was paying attention has forgotten how awful they were when they moderated a debate between the Democratic candidates earlier this year. They asked stupid questions, soft-balled Clinton (at least Stephanopoulos did), and took almost an hour to get to substantive questions regarding Iraq, Iran, and other issues meaningful to voters.

So, it’s not impossible to believe that a debate moderator can be too much for one side or the other. But it seems insulting to insinuate that, because she is a known supporter of Democratic politics, Gwen Ifill won’t be able to attain the level of fairness and bipartisanship required of a good moderator. Maybe the questions about Ifill are warranted and come from people who are genuinely concerned about witnessing a fair debate. But maybe not.

Let’s give a moment of though to what else could possible be fueling these speculations about Ifill’s fitness as moderator. Could it be fear? A lot of the furor over this issue has been raised by Republicans and others on the right. Perhaps concern about Sarah Palin’s prospects in a debate has also contributed to questions about Ifill’s commitment to a fair debate. Let’s face it: during her interview with Katie Couric, Vice Presidential nominee Palin did not shine. In one of the most difficult exchanges to watch, she demonstrated that she did not understand the causes of the current economic collapse, and could therefore offer no cogent or even coherent answer regarding what the country’s next steps should be. Maybe it was nerves, or maybe the slowing dawning realization that she’s totally unfit for the job she’s in the running for, but Governor Palin’s miserable performance definitely did not win over anybody who wasn’t already aligned with her.

Actually, pretty much every televised appearance by Sarah Palin that has followed her energizing, successful, nasty, and entirely scripted coming out party at the Republican National Convention, has shown her to be completely out of her depth. Like the current president, she has shown herself not to be a convincing, confident extemporaneous speaker. Like him, she also seems to have trouble grasping the details and nuances of issues of great national and global import.

Unless her peformances during the month of September were part of a carefully-orchestrated Machiavellian strategy to sharply lower expectations and lull Joe Biden into a false sense of security, she is in big trouble tomorrow. And what better way to negate unflattering day-after assessments in the press than by deflecting attention onto the moderator, before the debate even begins! If Ifill asks tough questions that Palin cannot answer intelligently, then this will be used as proof of Ifill’s supposed biases, and she will be called a bully. If the bruhaha makes Ifill ask easier questions that Palin can answer in a way that makes her seem more aware than she has in any of her recent appearances, then the right will be able to say, “Look! We told you that she know what she was talking about.”

I would love to be excited to see a woman excel on a national stage at such a high level in politics, but nothing I’ve seen so far has convinced me that Sarah Palin is going to be that woman.