Last Night's Democratic Debate: Ho-Hum

Nothing new came out of the Democratic debate last night in Cleveland.

This is what happens when they have too many debates; they've already said their piece about twenty debates ago, and they have nothing new to offer.

I fell asleep watching the replay last night. Ho-hum.

What Will Be Clinton's Tone Tonight at Ohio Debate With Obama?

This:




Or this:



This will probably be one of the last debates. Will she play nice, or will she go on the attack? It will be interesting to watch. Hopefully she keeps the shrill voice--you know, the one that sounds like fingernails being dragged across a chalkboard--down to an absolute minimum.

Republicans Finally Spend Some Time in Michigan: Election is Tomorrow

Republican presidential hopefuls are spending a great deal of time in Michigan, courting voters for their half-powered votes ahead of tomorrow's primary vote.

It's nice to see, but I see that they're ignoring the U.P. again. There was little to no mention of the primary in U.P. news web sites today.

I hope that the eventual winner of the GOP nomination pushes the Democrats to hold at least one of the debates in Michigan. And if the Democratic nomination turns out to be anyone other than Kucinich, then they should pack the hall with P.O.'ed (and disenfranchised) voters to ask "Where were you during the primary season? And why should we vote for you now?"

It'd be fun to watch the candidate squirm.

I mentioned Kucinich because he alone campaigned in the state on the Democratic side. Good for him.

Hillary Exposed for What She Is at Recent Debate: The Undisputed Queen of Flip-Floppers

Senator Clinton had a disastrous performance at the NBC Presidential Debate on Tuesday; the other candidates zeroed in on her two-minute flip-flops on positions and her non-committal responses to the questions.

A note to Senator Clinton: when one is taking both sides, one does not attempt do in front of the same audience within a two-minute time period. This was ASTONISHING to see. Did she not learn anything from "I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it" line of John Kerry in 2004?

As much as I don't care for his politics, Tim Russert correctly went after Hillary after she started playing both sides of the issues. Clinton's campaign teams were heard muttering that the moderator needed to be shot in a pathetic attempt at damage control. Perhaps if they did their jobs in preparing their candidate, they wouldn't have to shoot the moderator.

Poor Russert. Clinton wants to shoot him. And we still don't know where she stands; only that she's running against President Bush. Bush was mentioned 40 times during the debate; 25 of those mentions were by Hillary while she was busy dodging questions over what she stood for.

I think she knows Bush's positions better than she knows her own.

Youtube/CNN Debate Was Interesting: I Hope This Format is Done Again

I watched the CNN/Youtube-sponsored Democratic debate a few nights ago and came away impressed with the format. Having people send in video questions and comments is a great idea.

The fellows from Tennessee were great with their comment on this:



The snowman was idiotic (and I thought the answer was a bit of a stretch):





I thought the liberals up on the stage were going to have a heart attack with this question on gun control (and the "prop" used by the person asking the question!)



Thirty-nine questions were asked on all kinds of issues that were important to the Democratic base as well as the viewing public. I do hope they do this kind of debate with the eventual nominees from both parties. Trying to question eight or nine candidates was unwieldy, but they pulled it off.

Someone had a real good idea.

Debate Rages Over Use of "Articulate" to Describe Senator Obama: Severe Overreaction in Progress

Prominent African Americans have been going on TV lately, criticizing the use of certain words to describe Senator Obama. Some criticisms of some of the words are acceptable, but others are way off the mark.

Senator Biden got in trouble for describing Obama as the first "mainstream African American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy..." Biden ended up apologizing for the remarks, which Rev. Jesse Jackson said were "highly suggestive, but not off-color." Biden realized that he royally screwed up and mended the fences with Obama, which was the right thing to do.

But the debate raged on over the use of the word "articulate" (separate from Senator Biden's unfortunate remarks) which, to some, smacked of condescension. Some have severely overreacted to this word and took to the airwaves last night on FOX News and on CNN. They were angry, and unwilling to listen to other points of view.

If someone says one is very articulate, the proper response is "thank you." It's a compliment, and Senator Obama's speaking style is superior and better versed than many of his fellow politicians, as well as many in the general public for that matter. He's an outstanding public speaker.

But if "articulate" is good enough to describe you, or me, it should be good enough for Senator Obama and the talking heads on TV too.

Democrats on Verge of Breaking Promise Not to Cut Funding to Troops in Iraq

The Democrats in Congress are on the verge of breaking their promise not to defund the troops in Iraq. This is hardly a surprise given many ran on anti-war platforms. And their defeatist Republican lap-dog colleagues are too weak and ineffectual to disagree with them. I believe de-funding was always inevitable--it's what the Democratic majority wanted all along.

But still, to cut off reinforcements and bullets and equipment to the soldiers who are over there now is irresponsible. And Congress will be unable to keep dodging their collective responsibility in authorizing the war in the first place. Their votes gave Bush the authority to invade Iraq, whether his intel was good or not.

They keep saying they are a co-equal branch of government, yet they clearly don't want to take their share of the blame. They're co-equal all right, but only to a point.

The military needs to complete their mission and soon. We have bigger fish to fry and Iraq is taking up too much time, attention and resources. Blindly cutting their funding to bring them home in six months without a measure of success will only make the situation worse, not better.

All that will happen is the next President will have the unenviable task of sending troops back in once terror groups use Iraq the same way they used Afghanistan to attack New York and Washington. And Congress will blame Bush for that too, for stopping the war too soon.

And this will be after Congress and the next Administration decide to slash military rebuilding funds, too.

What a vicious cycle we find ourselves facing.