And the comedy just keeps on coming.
So, McCain wins and Gwen’s book comes out on Inaugaration Day. The employees of Borders Books put the book out, take a coffee break, then move those books to the Bargain Table, the limbo of the remaindered and forgotten.
Obama wins, they move Gwen’s book to make room for Oprah’s The Obama I Know and Love and Glenn Beck’s Hussein Obama and the Whore of Babylon: The Truth!
Feh, as they say in Lubbock.
She reads all of the papers, she just doesn’t read all of each she only reads the important stuff like hunting and comic sections.
- No, I do not deny that POTUS is always going to be one of the best-known people in the world.
- Celebrity sells certain types of books, but not others - putting a blurb by Britney Spears on a Richard Dawkins book would not help to sell it.
- Not having read the book, I really can’t say. We can speculate that her publisher pushed her to have an accessible, eye-catching title.
There, your three questions are answered. Please take the time to consider a few of my observations, then do me the courtesy of answering three of mine.
First, you have made the assumption that Ifill wrote the book for money. Um, Danielle Steel writes books for money. Tom Clancy writes books for money. People who write books that have “Politics and Race” in the title frequently have other motivations, like a genuine love of their subject matter and a desire to inform/share ideas.
Second, you have mixed up the concepts of “bias” and “opinion.” Allow me to explain. Let’s say I am a rabid lefty, and I teach a high school course. Two of my students are the children of prominent right-wing Republicans. If I give those students lower grades because I don’t like their parents, I am biased. If I grade everyone even-handedly, do not impose my views in the classroom, and express myself only outside of the classroom, I still have an opinion, but I’m not biased.
Third, you have never addressed the interesting point by DoctorJ that each candidate’s tax proposals will have implications for the debate moderator. In fact, all moderators will be affected by the tax proposals of the candidates.
So here are my questions:
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What evidence do you have that (a) Ifill’s motivation for writing the book was primarily to make money, rather than to inform people who are interested in the issues; and (b) the topic of the book, which appears to be on how race affects politics, will become less relevant to people interested in the subject if Obama loses?
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Based on the distinction made above between “bias” and “opinion,” do you think Ifill is biased? If the answer is “no, but we know she has a book out about Obama, so the appearance of bias is there,” explain how this is logically different froam saying “no, but we know that moderator X is planning to vote in November, so the appearance of bias is there.”
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Do you think that the tax proposals of Obama and McCain will have identical impacts on the pocketbooks of Americans? If no, should the debate be moderated by a Canadian, so that the outcome of the election will have no influence on the moderator’s finances?
Aww, little Snipey is back. Perhaps you’d care to take on the task yourself. At the same time you can see what it feels like is like to contribute to a discussion. Maybe you’d like it. I won’t hold my breath, though. Your spots aren’t changing at this point.
Yeah, Glenn Greenwald at Salon has it nailed:
Dude, I don’t care what you do, or think, or anything, really, on this or any other subject. I could not possibly give less of a shit. You could crazy-glue a cork into my asshole, and I still wouldn’t be able to give less of a shit. If you forced me to fast for a month and then scrubbed out my colon with a bottle brush and a gallon of OxiClean, I still could not give less of a shit than I do. If you stitched shut my butthole and installed a colostomy bag with the output routed into a supermassive black hole, the barest fraction of a molecule of a shit I would be capable of giving in that situation would be a veritable mountain of feces compared to the shit I do not give about you or what you think.
But as a tee-off point for golfing punchlines into orbit, your posts are solid gold. So you’ll just have to forgive me if I keep whacking your balls.
Republicans like pretending to be the victims, so they intentionally picked a woman whom they know was writing an Obama book.
But on a serious note, they just weren’t paying attention to anything. They’d know Ifill for years as serious and fair and didn’t vet her any more than they vetted Palin. It’s amateur hour.
Its ‘plausible deniability’. If she manages to do well (pennies land on their side too, ya know) she’ll have overcome great obstacles in Liberal Oppression.
If she runs head-first into Biden like Fossett into a mountainside, well, we all know how ‘prejudiced’ that unfair moderator was.
[LethalWeapon2]“But…but…she’s Bleech…!”[/LethalWeapon2]
Its like arguing with an umpire to the point of ejection in baseball: Its done so the following ‘calls’ will all go your way. And all of Magellan’s Drama-dy is happening right before the debate.
But of course this is all sheer coincidence. Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain… pops pocorn for Palin’s train-wreck debate
I think the one thing so far from the debate is that IT MATTERS NOT ONE BIT what the moderator asks, does, or prompts, Palin is not going to answer a question. Hell, the moderators could be Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Biden himself asking questions and it would be no different.
First the urination, now this? Whew. And ew. I find such a fixation with the body’s expelling functions more than a little troubling. But whatever floats your boat. At the very least it makes sense that my impression of you is simply that you’re an asshole.
And a shithead. 
Now, I’ll leave you to go back to your…your…well, not being into what your into, I’ll just leave you to your rather odd infatuation.
magellan01, did you find any bias in Gwen Ifill’s moderation tonight?
I have wondered why she allowed one debater to substitute other questions for those that the moderator asked. Perhaps if she hadn’t had the book in progress or if so much noise hadn’t been made so late in the game about alleged bias, the moderator would have kept the participants on task. That was very poor moderation indeed.
I thought it was basically good, though a little light. Definitely fair. I like it when they make the politicians answer what was asked. But they were both guilty of that—as are all politicians. I think the main skill they share is the ability to deflect-and-segue.
As I tried to post in GD (but it was closed when I hit “submit”), both candidates did really well. Biden did what he had to do, perfectly, and reminded me of why I liked him all these years. Palin saved the ticket and herself from being replaced on the ticket. She was the SP from the convention, not the one from the Couric interview. I’m sure most people here probably think she didn’t do so well. But even if you don’t think she “won”, as I do, I think you have to say she did really well. After all, she stood up there with a guy who’s lived and breathed this stuff for 35 years.
Yeah, loved that “white flag of surrender” line, the pert and perky way she has of insinuating cowardice and/or treason. Adorable.
The way magellan01 has carried on through this thread, one would think you are talking about Gwen.
I wish Ifill had been firmer about trying to get both candidates to actually answer the questions – but that’s been true of every campaign “debate” I’ve seen over the years. I didn’t see any sign of favoritism.
Palin successfully memorized her talking points. Here on the SDMB she’d be pathetic, but for a VP candidate “debate” she had what she needed. She also benefited from lowered expectations.
I have the most firm confidence in General McClellan and the Army of the Potomac. Al-Qaeda will never take ‘Little Round Top’… 
Straight Dope fact insertion. McClellan had already been removed eight months prior to Gettysburg, so he will not be in charge when al Qaida attempts their next assault on that ridge.
There are pervasive rumors that Gen. Jubilation T. Cornpone (Cornpone’s Defeat, Cornpone’s Rout, and Cornpone’s Utter Humiliation) may be coaxed out of retirement.
And it’s a fairly safe bet that, having failed of election in 1864, he will also fail of election in 2008. For one thing, he makes McCain look like a spring chicken!
ETA: For another thing, he’s dead.