True.

Call it a response to Reaganite's op. The op sets the pace.

I'm sorry you feel that way neorealist but I think if you watch it again, maybe repeat what she says word for word it is pretty darn close to gibberish. A rapid succession of catch-phrases that she uses to smokescreen the fact she doesn't have an answer. To me that's babble.

-She is on the subject of the economy and ends up on the subject of health care without answering the question.

-she is on the subject of the economy and the recent crisis and she ends up on the subject of trade. What on Earth has trade to do with the causes of the mortgage/credit crisis? Nothing as far as I can see.

-She is on foreign policy and all she can say is McCain has fought for the county.



On one or two energy related topics, when she stuck within the bounds of her govenorship of Alaska she didn't sound bad. I could actually see why people would vote for her then.

As for Ohio my point is that obviously if this debate is directed at anyone it's the swing states and the undecided. From that angle, do you really think any of her answers sounded even remotely convincing? To someone who's really feeling the pinch right now in any of these swing states do you really think she offered any confidence at all in her or McCain? Do you think when people want answers about the economy right now, or the war, in these swing states they're going to be happy with some silly story 'from back home'?  I disagree. Not unless the state is already red. I thought she was honestly much worse than I would've imagined.


Babbling maybe seems harsh neo but I think it fits in terms of what one expects from a political debate.

Ahk

From the transcript:

IFILLNow, let's talk about -- the next question is to talk about the subprime lending meltdown.

Who do you think was at fault? I start with you, Governor Palin. Was it the greedy lenders? Was it the risky home-buyers who shouldn't have been buying a home in the first place? And what should you be doing about it?

PALIN: Darn right it was the predator lenders, who tried to talk Americans into thinking that it was smart to buy a $300,000 house if we could only afford a $100,000 house. There was deception there, and there was greed and there is corruption on Wall Street. And we need to stop that. - Well that says a lot. Babble

Again, John McCain and I, that commitment that we have made, and we're going to follow through on that, getting rid of that corruption.-Could we be more ambiguous please?

PALIN: One thing that Americans do at this time, also, though, is let's commit ourselves just every day American people, Joe Six Pack, hockey moms across the nation, I think we need to band together and say never again. Never will we be exploited and taken advantage of again by those who are managing our money and loaning us these dollars. We need to make sure that we demand from the federal government strict oversight of those entities in charge of our investments and our savings and we need also to not get ourselves in debt. Let's do what our parents told us before we probably even got that first credit card. Don't live outside of our means. We need to make sure that as individuals we're taking personal responsibility through all of this. It's not the American peoples fault that the economy is hurting like it is, but we have an opportunity to learn a heck of a lot of good lessons through this and say never again will we be taken advantage of.
^^What the heck is that?

Bidens answer:

Well Gwen, two years ago Barack Obama warned about the sub prime mortgage crisis. John McCain said shortly after that in December he was surprised there was a sub prime mortgage problem. John McCain while Barack Obama was warning about what we had to do was literally giving an interview to "The Wall Street Journal" saying that I'm always for cutting regulations. We let Wall Street run wild. John McCain and he's a good man, but John McCain thought the answer is that tried and true Republican response, deregulate, deregulate.

So what you had is you had overwhelming "deregulation." You had actually the belief that Wall Street could self-regulate itself. And while Barack Obama was talking about reinstating those regulations, John on 20 different occasions in the previous year and a half called for more deregulation. As a matter of fact, John recently wrote an article in a major magazine saying that he wants to do for the health care industry deregulate it and let the free market move like he did for the banking industry.

Not the greatest, but not babble. It was like that all the way through imo.

AHk

 Well Joe went there to debate and answer the moderators questions...
 Moosejaw went there to recite well practiced talking points and catch phrases without regard to what anyone else was saying.
 She was completely disconnected from the proceedings and rattled off her memorization's with Miss America-like practiced poise.
 Very sad showing...she didn't melt down or faint or walk off stage but she didn't engage Joe, Gwen or the American people either. She recited what she had been taught to say and that was all...
 Barbie doll with a pull string.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/03/debate.poll/index.html

Its important not to understand the power of "likability"....that can the distance with the general public.

Then again, it was just a VP debate...but if McCain can get his likability number up by that margin, he still stands a chance.

That poor woman. Half the time, she sounded like she was reading from a Doctor Suess book.

I can't believe people actually think she's a good choice.