Sarah Palin: Beauty Queen At The Debate

Posted by on October 3, 2008 at 12:42 pm. NO Comments :

With a brilliant smile and a confident swagger, Sarah Palin faced Joe Biden, and America, in the first and only vice presidential debate. But the face she presented was that of shallow Pollyanna with a woefully insufficient grasp of issues and facts.

Let’s set aside for the moment that she was flatly wrong when she said that there were fewer troops in Iraq than before the Surge. And never mind that she doesn’t know the name of the American commander in Afghanistan. Palin’s big problem was that she outright refused to answer the questions that were asked. Now, that is a venerable debate tactic and, when used skillfully, can be quite effective and undetectable. However, when Palin did it she clumsily announced that she was changing the subject, and then proceeded to deliver her memorized talking points.

What might have been an enlightening exchange between the candidates was severely constrained by a format and a moderator that discouraged direct interaction. The question arises as to whether Gwen Ifill was cowed by allegations that she would be partial due to the upcoming publication of her book on race in American politics. We may never know if that’s the case, but we do know that Ifill was a virtual non-entity on the stage and failed to ask probing follow-ups of either candidate. That could explain why Palin expressed such satisfaction with the event in her closing remarks:

“I like being able to answer these tough questions without the filter, even, of the mainstream media kind of telling viewers what they’ve just heard. I’d rather be able to just speak to the American people like we just did.”

First of all, she wasn’t asked any tough questions and I suspect that that is what she really liked. Secondly, the Mainstream Media to which she refers doesn’t apply filters to her interviews. The Gibson and Couric affairs simply allowed her to speak on her own, and any resultant embarrassment was of her own doing. Thirdly, her impression of speaking to the American people appears to rely heavily on the help she receives from her speech writers and a teleprompter.

Her statement above is a thinly veiled declaration that she intends to have no further association with the media for which she is so dismissive. I predict that she will have maybe one more interview with a reputable national journalist (probably Brian Williams), then will scurry off to the more comforting embrace of comrades like Hannity and Limbaugh and the Washington Times. By November 4th, she will not have had a single open press conference for the entire election cycle.

The fact that she relates so closely to Dick Cheney, whose warped and unconstitutional view of the Vice Presidency she shares, alarmingly foreshadows the sort of secretive cabal she seems even now to be shaping. The last thing this country needs is another administration that aspires to conceal itself and its actions at every turn and reside outside of public view in a secret undisclosed location.

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Frantic Conservatives Trying To Ditch The Sarah Palin Debate

Posted by on October 1, 2008 at 3:29 pm. NO Comments :

Let’s face it. They have a right to be scared. Conservative activists have seen Sarah Palin humiliate herself and her Party repeatedly. She can’t name a single newspaper or magazine that she reads, or cite a Supreme Court decision other than Roe v. Wade, or give an example of McCain’s maverickiness. She doesn’t know who Hamas is. She adopts Obama’s policy toward cross-border attacks in Pakistan (then denies that she did so). And she asserts that her fresh face and new ideas (see Barack Obama) make her a better candidate than Joe Biden because he is just an old guy who has been in the Senate for a long time (see John McCain).

She has still only been permitted to be interviewed twice in the thirty-three days since McCain tapped her for his VP. She is being purposefully sequestered from the media and any serious inquiry into her positions or her past. There have been conservative commentators calling for her to be dropped from the ticket for the good of her Party and the country. And last week McCain suggested that the VP debate be postponed until some undetermined date and replaced by the first presidential debate.

Obviously, they don’t want the debate to proceed. And the latest evidence of that is a new effort to remove the debate’s moderator, Gwen Ifill of PBS. The argument is that Ifill has authored a book that prevents her from being objective. “The Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama,” is scheduled to be released January 20, 2009. The book is a study of how…

“…the Black political structure formed during the Civil Rights movement is giving way to a generation of men and women who are the direct beneficiaries of the struggles of the 1960s.”

For the book Ifill interviews Obama, as well as Republicans like Colin Powell. By all accounts, the book is not political advocacy, but an exploration of race in contemporary politics. But the controversy being manufactured by the likes of Fox News, National Review, and Human Events is a thinly disguised attempt to kill the debate. Even if their allegations were valid, it would be very difficult to find a replacement for Ifill literally on the eve of the debate. They would have to find someone who was able to immediately clear their calendar and then would still come to the event unprepared – no research, no questions, no context for engaging the participants. The only viable option would be to delay the debate to some undetermined date, just as they tried to do last week.

This is yet another transparent attempt to sabotage the debate by having it canceled or by preemptively discrediting the results. How convenient to have a reason to disregard the whole affair should Palin, true to form, embarrass herself. This dust up could also have the effect of influencing Ifill’s performance as moderator. She may decide to bend over backwards to avoid the appearance of bias and, consequently, display bias in favor of Palin.

We can only hope that the cynical manipulations of the rightists orchestrating this controversy are not successful, and that Ifill relies on her own sense of professional ethics and not the rantings of frightened partisans.


Another Media Mea Culpa For The War In Iraq

Posted by on October 1, 2008 at 11:03 am. NO Comments :

In a book review for Bob Woodward’s latest installment of his Bush chronicles, the New York Times’ Jill Abramson decides it’s time to salve her guilty conscience. Woodward’s “The War Within” serves as the impetus for her confessional.

Abramson reveals her misgivings regarding the Times’ coverage of the build up to war with Iraq after citing a passage from Woodward’s book wherein he admits that he had not done enough at the Washington Post to expose the weakness of the administration’s arguments for the existence of WMDs and for going to war. Abramson followed up that citation by saying…

“I was Washington bureau chief for The Times while this was happening, and I failed to push hard enough for an almost identical, skeptical article, written by James Risen. This was a period when there were too many credulous accounts of the administration’s claims about Iraq’s W.M.D.”

Thanks a lot. Another too late revelation of dereliction of duty that resulted in the deaths of thousands of American soldiers and tens (hundreds?) of thousands of Iraqi civilians. How exactly does this expression of regret compensate the victims of a disastrous and deadly war? How does it repair the damage done to both Iraq and America, who is now on the brink of bankruptcy partially due to having wasted a trillion dollars fighting an imaginary enemy.

This is not the first time that prominent figures in the press have sought absolution for their failures:

Woodward previously expressed these thoughts in an online chat:
“I think the press and I in particular should have been more aggressive in looking at the run-up to the Iraq war, and specifically the alleged intelligence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction stockpiles.”

The New York Times issued this mea culpa:
“Editors at several levels who should have been challenging reporters and pressing for more skepticism were perhaps too intent on rushing scoops into the paper […] while follow-up articles that called the original ones into question were sometimes buried. In some cases, there was no follow-up at all.”

New York Times editor, Bill Keller personally apologized:
“I’ve had a few occasions to write mea culpas for my paper after we let down our readers in more important ways, including for some reporting before the war in Iraq that should have dug deeper and been more sceptical about Iraq’s purported weapons of mass destruction.”

CNN reporter Jessica Yellin weighed in with this bit of uncharacteristic honesty:
“The press corps was under enormous pressure from corporate executives, frankly, to make sure that this was a war presented in a way that was consistent with the patriotic fever in the nation and the president’s high approval ratings. And my own experience at the White House was that the higher the president’s approval ratings, the more pressure I had from news executives.”

Even Bill O’Reilly announced that he was wrong (but it’s OK because, he says, everyone was wrong):
“Now I supported the action against Saddam because the Secretary of State Colin Powell, former Secretary of Defense under Bill Clinton, William Cohen, the CIA, British intelligence, and a variety of other intelligence agencies all told me Saddam was making dangerous weapons in violation of the first Gulf War cease-fire […] I was wrong in my assessment, as was everybody else.”

I am willing to concede that a lot of people, reporters and politicians alike, were wrong, but not everyone. There were many who opposed the war, who saw through the administration’s lies, who spoke out about the fraud that was being forced upon the nation. The sane objections were mostly confined to alternative sources that were ignored or ridiculed. But even the mainstreamers quoted above seemed to have known at the time that they were being less than responsible with regard to their reportorial obligations.

Now Abramson joins those who have seen the error of their ways. Or have they? Abramson is the Times’s managing editor for news, but this revelation appears in a book review rather than in the news pages. And there has been little evidence that the press has altered its behavior. Keller, the Times’ editor noted last year that…

“The administration has subsidised propaganda at home and abroad, refined the art of spin, discouraged dissent, and sought to limit traditional congressional oversight and court review.”

But even with knowledge of that, the administration’s press releases are often reprinted or broadcast virtually verbatim as news. Some of that can be seen in the current Wall Street affair that is characterized as a crisis that demands the immediate implementation of the White House’s untested and hysterical solutions.

It isn’t enough for these people to confess their sins and be on their way. I don’t want to sift through another collection of apologies for the next disaster that they feel so sorry for having misreported or ignored. They need to initiate real reform that addresses the root causes of these journalistic failures. And they need to fire those who have let down their papers, their readers, and their country. When steps like these are taken, I will start to take seriously their assertions of regret. Until then, they are still just covering up for themselves and the Washington insiders on whom they are pretending to report.


This Week With John McCain

Posted by on September 29, 2008 at 12:12 pm. NO Comments :

It seems fitting that John McCain sat down with George Stephanopoulos yesterday on a program called “This Week,” because the name itself carries the suggestion that what you hear McCain say will only be operative for a limited time. Next week may be a different matter entirely, and last week has succumbed to history’s dust bin.

The tone of the interview was set early on with McCain answering the second question in a distinctly political dialect:

Stephanopoulos: Congress has to pass a stimulus plan for the middle class, which extends unemployment benefits, adds infrastructure funding, and sends money to the states to shore up their budgets. Are you for that, as well?

McCain: I am for keeping taxes low. I am for whatever steps we think we need to be taking right now.

Wow! So, by extension, he’s against whatever steps he thinks should not be taken. That’s a courageous stance.

It was also noted by several observers that McCain would did not look at Obama at all during the entire debate. Even when they shook hands, McCain quickly turned away. This behavior was somewhat eerie and obviously purposeful. When Stephanopoulos asked him about it he said:

McCain: I was looking at the moderator a great deal of time. I was writing a lot of the time. I in no way know how that in any way would be disdainful […] I’ve been in many, many debates. And a lot of the times I don’t look at my opponents because I’m focusing on the people and the American people that I’m talking to. That’s what the debate’s all about.

Got that? He was looking at the American people. That’s why he was unable to glance at his opponent, to whom he was presumably engaged in discourse, even once in an hour and a half. Did he have a magic mirror that allowed him to see voters in their living rooms as they watched the debate on their TV machines? Would he also decline to look at Putin and other world leaders with whom he meets in order to keep his gaze on Americans that he is imagining?

Next up, Stephanopoulos asked McCain about Sarah Palin’s assertion that she, like Obama, would approve of cross border incursions into Pakistan to target Bin Laden and Al Qaeda. This is contrary to McCain’s own position, though he denies it:

McCain: She would not – she shares my view that we will do whatever is necessary. The problem is, you don’t announce it.

The problem is Palin did announce it, as did McCain in the same sentence that declared that he would not. McCain further argued that, while Palin said what she said, she shouldn’t be held to it because it was said while someone had a microphone picking up what she said, and besides what she said was the same thing that he was saying and that she did “just fine.” Can we hold him to that?

McCain also defended Palin from criticism she’s received, much of it from conservatives, that she is unprepared for the position that McCain has thrust her into.

McCain: Listen, I’m so excited about the reaction that Sarah Palin has gotten across this country, huge turnouts, enthusiasm, excitement. She knows how to communicate directly with people. They respond in a way that I’ve – that I’ve seldom seen. You know, they can complain all they want to. I’ll rely on the American people.

The American people have resoundingly rejected Palin. She has the lowest favorability ratings of anyone on either ticket. And it isn’t because she is getting bad press. In fact, Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post is reporting that many journalists are “censoring their comments about Palin to avoid looking like they’re piling on.” He also notes that CBS has more embarrassing responses from the Couric interview that they haven’t aired. So if CBS and others in the press were more honest and candid, the public’s view of Palin would be even worse.

That’s what McCain had to say this week on “This Week.” I can’t wait to hear what he’s going to say next week.


Random Thoughts: McCain, Palin And Olbermann

Posted by on September 27, 2008 at 3:22 pm. 1 Comments :

Just a few things that are running through my idle mind:

On John McCain: In last night’s debate, McCain suggested that folks check the website of Citizens Against Government Waste to confirm his allegations about Obama’s congressional earmarks. What he didn’t say is that CAGW is a McCain front group that has endorsed him for president, donated $11,000.00 to him or to PACs he controls, and is run by Orson Swindle, a long-time associate and an adviser to his campaign. Not exactly a neutral source, eh John?

On Sarah Palin: Did you all notice that Palin was AWOL for the post-debate commentary last night? Joe Biden appeared on every broadcast and cable news network, as VP candidates traditionally do following presidential debates. Palin appeared on none. The McCain camp must be terrified of her slipping out of her cage.

On Keith Olbermann: It just occurred to me that Olbermann has been mocked mercilessly by rightist pundits and bloggers as nothing more than a glorified former sportscaster. I wonder why they don’t direct that same ire toward Sarah Palin, who holds a degree in journalism and pursued a career as a sportscaster in her early professional life. If they think that Olbermann is unfit to be a political commentator based on his sports background, then surely they must think that Palin is similarly unfit to be vice president. Either that or they think that Olbermann would make a great VP.


Cafferty To Blitzer: Don’t Make Excuses For Her (Sarah Palin)!

Posted by on September 26, 2008 at 2:14 pm. 1 Comments :

This has to be enshrined as one of the premiere moments in television news.

CNN’s Jack Cafferty rolled tape of Sarah Palin’s interview with Katie Couric. Couric asked Palin about the expense of the White House’s Wall Street bailout proposal. Palin gave a rambling and non-responsive answer. But what came after is even more startling.

When the camera returned to Cafferty he merely stared into it for a few profound seconds and then said that that was one of the most pathetic things he has ever seen. He said if you aren’t afraid that she is a 72 year old heartbeat from the presidency, you should be.

Then Wolf Blitzer tried to cover for Palin by saying that she was just trying to squeeze a lot into her answer. To which Cafferty replied:

“Don’t make excuses for her. That was pathetic.”

Cowed, but still deferential, Blitzer said it wasn’t one of Palin’s best moments. Does anyone have an example of one of Palin’s best, unscripted moments?

This is more evidence for why it so important for McCain to loosen the chains on Palin and let her speak. Most of the media doesn’t have the honesty and courage of Cafferty. But our nation’s future is riding on this: The Palin Watch

Addendumb: Later on Blitzer’s program he interviewed Lou Dobbs about tonight’s debate. Dobbs defied the reality that he is an anchor for one of the most prominent news enterprises in the world when he said…

“Imagine what it would take for the liberal national media to declare McCain the winner.”

Did he mean the same liberal national media for whom he works? Or maybe Fox News? Or GE, or Disney, or Viacom, or Simmons, or Comcast, or Tribune, or AP, or ….. ? The same media that employs Blitzer, Palin’s official apologist? Besides, Dobbs must not have heard that McCain won the debate before it even started.

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Free Sarah Palin From Rupert Murdoch!

Posted by on September 25, 2008 at 11:06 am. NO Comments :

While John McCain is consumed with personally resolving the nation’s financial crisis, Sarah Palin is cavorting with the glamor set (elitist?) and the uber-conservative media barons who are propping up the Republican ticket:

“Sarah Palin schmoozed with controversial media tycoon Rupert Murdoch at a swanky charity gala here Wednesday night.”

And just because I may have to much spare time on my hands:

Free Sarah Palin

Silence of the Palins

As for John McCain’s promise to suspend his campaign so that he can concentrate on saving America by bailing out Wall Street … like much of what McCain says, it isn’t true:

McCain ads are still running.
McCain’s surrogates are still making the rounds on TV.
McCain is still scheduled to attend a Beverly Hills fundraiser Wednesday.

So much for saving America. Perhaps these campaign commitments are why he doesn’t have the time to debate Barack Obama tomorrow.


McCain Proposes Suspending Campaigns To Address Economy

Posted by on September 24, 2008 at 1:38 pm. NO Comments :

John McCain has announced that he is suspending his campaign in order to return to Washington to help pass legislation on the financial bailout. He is characterizing this political stunt as a way of avoiding political stunts. In fact, Barack Obama’s team reportedly called McCain’s camp this morning to discuss issuing a joint statement, to which McCain agreed. But McCain then stole the ball and ran down field with it in an attempt to score all of the points for himself. So McCain wants to get away from partisanship by reneging on his agreement with Obama and returning to Washington, DC, where there is never any partisanship?

In addition to the suspension of campaign activity (which subsequent reporting suggests may just be dropping TV ads), McCain is proposing that the debate scheduled for Friday be postponed. He argues that the economy is too important not to take this step. McCain is right that the financial problems we are facing are important, but so is electing the next president. I don’t see how participating in the debate would throw the economy into a tailspin. And if you can’t participate in congressional actions in the daytime and show up for a debate in the evening, then you aren’t fit to president – a job that requires multitasking. The presence of the candidates in DC can be useful to focus attention, but they are not critical to the sausage-making process. They should lead by articulating direction and vision. What better place to do that than a nationally televised debate?

At this point, it appears that Obama wants the debates to proceed: Obama Camp: ‘The Debate is On’ That is exactly the right response. Let’s hope it sticks.

Update: Obama made a statement on the financial crisis and presented a timeline that shows that he was indeed the one who initiated the discussion. He thought that McCain was considering the things they discussed, but instead McCain went on TV with his statement, betraying the notion of bipartisanship.

With regard to the debates, Obama confirms that he thinks it is more important than ever to present themselves to the American people. He said that they ought to be able to deal with more than one thing at a time.


Part two is here.

I think it is also significant that after McCain made his statement, he scurried hurriedly out of the room. Obama stayed and took questions from the press, as a responsible leader would do.

Update II: The McCain campaign is now proposing that the first presidential debate occur on October 2, the date presently set for the vice presidential debate. The VP debate would then occur on a later, undetermined date.

If McCain really wants to move the presidential debate to Oct 2, why doesn’t he just suggest swapping the events and have the VP debate this Friday? Surely the economic bill can be written without Palin and Biden. The preparations, the venue, the personnel, and the media are already in place. And there is precious little time to reschedule the VP affair before the election on November 4. This seems to be a wholly transparent attempt to further avoid exposing Sarah Palin to any public scrutiny. She must really be failing miserably in her practice sessions.

Update III: McCain retreats! The debate is on. So I guess the financial crisis has been resolved (not). His statement contained these contradictions:

“There was no deal or offer yesterday that had a majority of support in Congress.” And… “He is optimistic that there has been significant progress toward a bipartisan agreement…”

He also said that he is resuming all campaign activities, which, of course, he never actually stopped.


CNN’s Campbell Brown: Free Sarah Palin

Posted by on September 24, 2008 at 8:08 am. 7 Comments :

It would be a mistake to get too bogged down on the Republican spokesmodel for vice-president, Sarah Palin, but this commentary by CNN’s Campbell Brown is notable for diving straight to the point:

This is also notable because Brown herself has not been a particularly bright light in the media sky. She has a history of leaning rightward in her reporting and is married to former Bush flack Dan Senor. But giving credit where it’s due, Brown has nicely summarized an argument not often heard with regard to the sequestration of Palin from the press – sexism:

“Tonight I call on the McCain campaign to stop treating Sarah Palin like she is a delicate flower that will wilt at any moment. […] Free Sarah Palin. Free her from the chauvinistic chains you are binding her with. Sexism in this campaign must come to an end. Sarah Palin has just as much a right to be a real candidate in this race as the men do. So let her act like one.”

The only problem with Brown’s demand is that the reason the Palin/McCain camp is treating Palin like she may wilt is because that’s what they are afraid she will actually do. They have calculated the risk of keeping her closeted with the risk of letting her out and concluded that they must keep that door shut tight.


Palin/McCain Camp Bars Press From UN Meetings

Posted by on September 23, 2008 at 10:36 am. NO Comments :

Continuing their strategy of stonewalling the media, Palin and McCain are refusing to admit reporters into the meetings that Palin has scheduled at the United Nations. Palin’s UN visit includes chats with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. The campaign is hoping to enhance her foreign policy cred by having her spend a few minutes with a couple of U.S. allies.

Whatever public relations boost they intended to score with this stunt is going to be severely limited by the fact that they consider the press to be persona non grata. According to the AP:

“The campaign told the TV producer, print and wire reporters in the press pool that follows the Alaska governor that they would not be admitted with the photographers and camera crew taken in to photograph the meetings. At least two news organizations, including The Associated Press, objected and were told that the decision was not subject to discussion.”

CNN, whose camera crew were assigned to cover the event for television news organizations, threatened to pull out of this sham photo opportunity if their producer (who is also a reporter) was not allowed in. As that would have denied Palin the all-important TV exposure for which these events are staged, the campaign relented (I guess the decision was open to discussion after all). But he will still not be allowed to ask any questions.

Without submitting to questions from the press, Palin’s tea party does nothing to inform her or the public. She is no more a foreign policy expert today than she was yesterday, and voters are no better acquainted with her qualifications to be vice president. Of all the questions that won’t be asked, there is one that is rising in urgency: What are they afraid of?