The Debate
Sure it's late, but I only have a few comments. I didn't make it all the way through this one, as I took a much needed South Park break at 10:00, only to return to find the candidates making their closing statements. Just a few observations.
# If Obama's goal in these debates was to turn my luke-warm feelings about him into outright disgust, he's succeeded.
# McCain sounded good on a number of issues- trade, taxes, even health care where he continues to talk about unleashing markets. It's too bad that he didn't go after Obama's rhetoric as pure, unadulterated class warfare, but maybe that's hard when you're playing the class war card yourself (see Joe the Plumber; see also the race to see who can buy up the most mortgages.)
# I hope people recognize Obama's promises on health care as a load of bs. He promised better coverage for more people and all for less money.
# Speaking of bs, McCain continues to lead in the bs department with his empty promises of the knowledge to solve all of our nation's crises.
# As one of the blogs I was following put it last night, Obama believes in free trade, except in places like Ohio and Indiana, where such a position polls poorly.
# Yet again, neither candidate had the balls to talk about budget cuts. McCain's budget freeze is an interesting idea, but hardly productive, given the drastic number of spending increases that are built into budgets. Ultimately, I don't trust either of them to go through the budget and cut very much of anything.
# With the economic issues so pressing, the foreign policy issues that McCain looked to use to his advantage have been noticeably limited during all of these debates. McCain has the experience of course, but I'm not scared of an Obama administration conducting foreign affairs. Truthfully, in terms of actual policy, the candidates don't seem very far apart and they seem to come from the very same idealogical position that the United States needs to use it's military for good overseas. The biggest difference seems to be the D and the R in front of their names and the way those letters get people so worked up.
# I'm beyond all the attack nonsense, given my feelings about both of these guys. I liked Bob Schieffer's man up challenge to say all those nasty things to each other's faces, but both guys pussied out. McCain talked about his feelings getting hurt while being called a racist and Obama avoided the question altogether.
# Less than a month until the election, with all these debates wrapped up, my thoughts are these. Obama is far scarier than I initially had thought/hoped for. Given the opportunity to be Bill Clinton he's decided to be Walter Mondale, coming across as not just liberal, but ready and willing to literally redistribute wealth. To paraphrase Denny Green, McCain is who we thought he was. He's not a conservative or an ideologue of any sort, meaning he has no problem reaching into the big government playbook when it suits him. And perhaps that's what scariest about McCain, his unpredictability outside of his few big issues (earmarks, corruption, military, ect.). For all his talk about taxes and trade, his behavior during this economic crisis hardly indicates a reliable supporter of limited government.
Either way, our planet is doomed.
# If Obama's goal in these debates was to turn my luke-warm feelings about him into outright disgust, he's succeeded.
# McCain sounded good on a number of issues- trade, taxes, even health care where he continues to talk about unleashing markets. It's too bad that he didn't go after Obama's rhetoric as pure, unadulterated class warfare, but maybe that's hard when you're playing the class war card yourself (see Joe the Plumber; see also the race to see who can buy up the most mortgages.)
# I hope people recognize Obama's promises on health care as a load of bs. He promised better coverage for more people and all for less money.
# Speaking of bs, McCain continues to lead in the bs department with his empty promises of the knowledge to solve all of our nation's crises.
# As one of the blogs I was following put it last night, Obama believes in free trade, except in places like Ohio and Indiana, where such a position polls poorly.
# Yet again, neither candidate had the balls to talk about budget cuts. McCain's budget freeze is an interesting idea, but hardly productive, given the drastic number of spending increases that are built into budgets. Ultimately, I don't trust either of them to go through the budget and cut very much of anything.
# With the economic issues so pressing, the foreign policy issues that McCain looked to use to his advantage have been noticeably limited during all of these debates. McCain has the experience of course, but I'm not scared of an Obama administration conducting foreign affairs. Truthfully, in terms of actual policy, the candidates don't seem very far apart and they seem to come from the very same idealogical position that the United States needs to use it's military for good overseas. The biggest difference seems to be the D and the R in front of their names and the way those letters get people so worked up.
# I'm beyond all the attack nonsense, given my feelings about both of these guys. I liked Bob Schieffer's man up challenge to say all those nasty things to each other's faces, but both guys pussied out. McCain talked about his feelings getting hurt while being called a racist and Obama avoided the question altogether.
# Less than a month until the election, with all these debates wrapped up, my thoughts are these. Obama is far scarier than I initially had thought/hoped for. Given the opportunity to be Bill Clinton he's decided to be Walter Mondale, coming across as not just liberal, but ready and willing to literally redistribute wealth. To paraphrase Denny Green, McCain is who we thought he was. He's not a conservative or an ideologue of any sort, meaning he has no problem reaching into the big government playbook when it suits him. And perhaps that's what scariest about McCain, his unpredictability outside of his few big issues (earmarks, corruption, military, ect.). For all his talk about taxes and trade, his behavior during this economic crisis hardly indicates a reliable supporter of limited government.
Either way, our planet is doomed.
posted by lonely libertarian at 3:26 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home