To listen to the debate or a summary analysis : go to NPR's coverage of the debate, where you can download both.
The video is here.
Make up your own mind and share your perspective with us.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
news from the campaign trail
Tonight the third and last presidential debate will be held in a university in N.Y. State. What to expect? A lot of talk about the economy and probably no major changes in the polls.
To read more about this and about McCain's recent policy announcements ( the government would take over troubled mortgages, for instance) meant to prove that he is capable of handling the financial crisis, read this story from NPR.
A quick note now on what's been all over the papers, TV and radio for a couple days.
1. The polls show a strong Obama lead both at the national level and in several crucial battlestates. However, the Democrats and commentators have been wary of these figures because of what has come to be known as the "Bradley effect", i.e. voters tell pollsters they will vote for the black candidate but at the polling station on election day, they have a change of heart. This is what happened to Tom Bradley, running for governor in California in 1982. Recently the Bradley effect seems to be much weaker or to have disappeared altogether. Perhaps there might even be an inversed Bradley effect, as was the case in some of the primaries this year, when more people voted for Barack Obama than the polls had predicted.Have a look at NPR's full story on this.
2. The economic crisis is a boon for the Democrats, since it is obviously difficult for a party to retain power in such circumstances. Moreover Obama has seemed to keep his cool and reason rationally whereas McCain's response has been called "erratic" both by Obama negative ads and by the liberal media.
3. The campaign has become nasty, with agressive negative advertisements. If one trusts the liberal media, it is the Republican candidate that has been resorting to such tactics the most. One example that has attracted much talk is when Senator McCain used the term "that one" to refer to his opponent during the debate when they were together on stage Not only is it rude not to name your opponent in such circumstances, but as you remember from your English grammar classes, "that" implies agressiveness or negativity, whereas "this" would have been more neutral. Of course, many wondered whether this was racially tainted. I don't believe that it was, I think it reflected the hostility McCain was directing at Obama and his disbelief of the fact that he is losing to such a younger and inexperienced candidate!
4. Sarah Palin is still a problem for the one part of the elite of the Republican party ( see David Brook's columns in the NYTimes) but the mainstream Republican media have embraced her for better or for worse and are now aiming all their hatred at Obama: check out the National Review Online. Even Kathryn Jean Lopez has toned down her criticism of Sarah Palin and is no longer asking her to stand down but quite the contrary to step up and start campaigning more efficiently ( at the very end of her article on Team Sarah, an organisation of women mobilizing for the Republican ticket and creating supporting videos).
To follow all this effectively I recommend highly the following weekly podcasts (usually no longer than 15 minutes) :
It's All Politics (NPR)
The Campaign Trail (The New Yorker, this week's edition of the magazine focuses on the campaign and has excellent reporting, fiction and hilarious cartoons)
You can download them from i-tunes or from the media's website.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Palin's problem : denial?
A report has been issued Saturday on Governor Palin's involvement in the attempt to fire a state trooper, who happened to be her ex-brother-in-law. Listen to a four minute summary presentation of the situation.
When asked about the report which concluded that the governor of Alaska had abused her authority, Sarah Palin insisted that there had been no such thing and even said that she was thankful that the report had shown that there had been no illegal or unethical activity in her choice to replace the commissioner.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
a little bit of fun
There has been a blitz of negative ads recently from both candidates. The most controversial negative ad released by the Obama campaign raises the fact that McCain doesn't know how to send an email. The talk of the grapevine has been that he doesn't type on computers because of the injuries he sustained to his arms when he was prisonner of war (POW) in Vietnam. Another negative ad put forth by the Obama camp relies heavily on a misguided comment made by McCain in September ; he had declared that the "fundamentals of the economy were strong" in at the outset of the massive market failure America is now going through.
From the Republican side, negative ads have mostly concerned Obama's connection with a William Ayers a member of a terrorist network in the 1960s. This ad was not paid for by the McCain campaign per se.
A cheeky commentary by Jon Stewart:
a quick note on the second presidential debate
For the last two weeks, Senator Obama has been ahead in the polls. The challenge for McCain was to turn the race around.
Watch the beginning of the debate :
A quick exerpt from the debate on climate change ( a minor issue in a debate dominated by the economic crisis)
To watch the entire debate, read the transcript check NYTimes website.
Even better, go to NPR's page and download the interesting commentary by journalists (18minutes) or download the entire debate (1H30) and listen to all this while you are on public transportation or on the move.
More from me later, got to go.
Friday, October 3, 2008
vice presidential debate 2008
Little gloating but self-satisfaction all round for an average performance by both vice presidential candidates.
Read the transcript.
A quick review of the papers tells us that the debate was not as exciting as anticipated, with neither candidates making any huge gaffes. For the NYTimes, Sarah Palin's performance was satisfactory albeit not as fantastic as hoped by her supporters. She isn't helping John McCain who is lagging in the polls both nationally and in swing states, but she hasn't hurt his bid for the presidency either, at least not as much as she did when she performed very poorly in an interview with Katie Couric.
(one of the most mocked points made by Sarah Palin is one on her foreign policy credentials (video) based on the geography of Alaska)
The Economist rates Governor Palin's performance mediocre with Joe Biden giving a "strong and disciplined performance".
What doesn't go down very well with The Economist is Palin's strategy of ignoring the question she is asked to make another point. When asked about Darfur she offered a rant against Washington insiders and exposed Joe Biden's shifting position on the Irak war; however she did later offer a laconic and non-specific answer on Darfur, but only after having scored a few points.
Watch the video:
However annoying for pundits and commentators, I think that this tactic is actually quite effective. Why? First it provides the media with good soundbites that will be played over and over again. Second, these quips go down well with voters tired of the Washington politics and Palin started by saying that she would be speaking directly to the American public, and not the journalists attending en masse. In the end, it might not matter whether Palin answers the questions, and she had better say something she knewto be popular than stumble on an issue she hadn't been briefed about.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Will Palin deliver?
The only vice-presidential debate will be held tonight in St. Louis; and most of the media coverage have been concentrating on whether Sarah Palin will appear as qualified to be President, should something, God forbid, happen to John McCain.
Over the last two weeks, Palin has been hammered for being unprepared, and even plain inadequate. She has given several interviews which have attracted lots of negative attention and insolent impersonations of the Alaskan hockey-mom vice presidential nominee.
Even in conservative circles, the initial enthousiasm has seemed to wane and there has been criticism of John McCain's choice for number two slot, nevertheless Palin's appearances at campaign event still attract huge crowds.
On the conservative National Review Online, you can read several rather damning articles on her candidacy. The toughest criticism and most radical solution is voiced by Kathleen Parker : she suggests that the VP candidate should step down now and give another chance to McCain to select someone that would be better prepared for the job. The op-ed ends with the line : "Do it for your country"! Whether this would actually help the Republican ticket, regardless of who takes her place, is rather doubtful : how could John McCain recover from an error in judgement so awful that it is Palin herself who admits to it by tending her resignation? Read the "Palin Problem" now.
Other commentators however still harbor high hopes for Sarah Palin and wish she would fight off the liberal media blitzkreig.
The end result is that the expectations for Sarah Palin's performance have been lowered in such a fashion that to make a favourable impression, she only needs to appear articulate and capable of giving policy points and not going in circles, repeating a hugely simplified talking point. The past campaings has proved that Governor Palin has the ability to hold her own. The fact that she is a woman will force Joe Biden to be more careful so as not to appear to be patronizing, this might make it easier for Sarah Palin to give a good performance.
- how will Sarah Palin attack Obama? probably not on his lack of experience of foreign affairs.
- how will Joe Biden discipline himself so as not to alienate voters and especially women
If you are very passionate about the election, do watch the debate in the middle of the night and up date us on how you think it went...
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