Palin
because they are right there. They are right next to-- to our state
My God, they are right there!!! right there!!!
It almost makes you wish for Dan Quayle back talking about the canals on Mars.
God help us.
Can you think of some examples of high level politicians not understanding a question? I can’t think of any myself, except maybe very temporarily. Dodging, definitely. In fact, like the question about support for Israel, some dodging would have been very appropriate. She’s not skilled enough to dodge, which I think is a big problem. Remember how we’ve been told what Bush really meant? She would be 10 X worse.
You know, I’m actually starting to feel sorry for Palin in a way. While I disagree with her on most major issues (and while I admit her voice annoys the hell out of me) watching her on interviews I don’t get at all that she’s empty headed or shallow by any means. I think she’s very smart and savvy and determined, but just in waaaaay over her head. It’d be like taking your average bright American Doper and saying “alright, I need you to be a walking talking expert on Canadian provincial and Federal politics by noon Monday- have a good weekend”.
There are things you have to know to be a responsible VP that you just don’t have to know to be mayor of Wasilla Alaska. (I don’t consider myself stupid or uninformed, but I’d look like a complete imbecile if I were running for Pres or VP (though probably no worse than Bush.) Pres/VP is a job you have to prepare yourself for over years. It’s not a really big final you can study like hell in a two month cram session and then go for the gold.
While Obama seems inexperienced to many (and frankly I always thought that line of assault by Hillary and McCain was a smart one- it is his most vulnerable tower) and it’s true he has no executive experience, he is incomparably better prepared to be President than Palin. As a constitutional law professor he knows the Constitution and the legislative process up one side/down the other/through the middle, as a double Ivy League grad he’s proven his ability to think and to perform, as a scholar he knows at least intellectually world affairs and diplomacy, and as a legislator and Senator (for however brief a period of time) he knows lobbyists and their tactics and he knows D.C. firsthand.
Palin’s literally been as far away from all these things as you can get and still be in a North American city. She’s never had any reason to know what the Bush Doctrine is (when’s it going to be relevant in Alaska?) or the ins and outs of national level lobby groups or McCain’s connections. I’m guessing she could beat 80% of America on an IQ test and probably 95% in terms of work ethic but she’s just a total salmon out of water in this.
OTOH, if McCain loses, I think she’ll be the Ernest T. Bass we ain’t heard the last of on the national scene. She’s wet her beak now and will have years to prove herself and get some notches in her gun and “learn up” on national politics. if there’s a second chance she’ll be a very formidable presence. But she’s not there yet.
Oh wow, is that painful to watch. Worse than the Couric interview, I’d say. How did I miss that?
I agree that she doesn’t seem like a dunce (a la Dubya Bush or Quayle), but she is waaaaay over her head, and doesn’t have the sense to admit it.
To be fair, his interpretation was more or less in line with my OP - I was pointing out the the clip was really short and made her look extremely bad. I can see where the confusion comes from. It was not my best work, I was just shocked by how unprepared she seemed for the interview.
so you meant “shortest amount of time” as in “only a few minutes of interview”, not as in “only on the national stage for a brief time”? ok then
Originally spewed by Caribou Barbie
Can someone please attempt to parse this nonsense so that it makes a shred of sense? Is she confusing Putin with Santa Claus?
I’m not sure how you could make it any clearer: Putin’s a peeping Tom who won’t stay home and one day he’s gone break into the wrong goll durned rec room.
My 2 cents.
From experience I can say that if you know what you are talking about a TV interview goes smoothly and effortlesly. I’m a very introverted guy and I never felt like a deer in the headlights every time I’ve been stuck a camera in my face to talk about what I do and what I know.
That video is a disgrace, the woman looks like a dumb student trying to read from a cheat sheet in front of the class.
Hold on, I’ve been doing this all day.
It’s very important to remember the threat Russia still extends, with Putin raising the ugly spectre of the Cold War, flying into US airspace. When (or if, not sure here) he flies over US airspace, where will/is he flying? Why, right over the fair state of Alaska! Russia is right over the border and somebody’s gotta be keeping an eye on them! They’re right there. RIGHT THERE!
Ooh, Chicago! Good reference.
I’ve been having My Fair Lady run through my head whenever I think of Palin, but that’s just too easy, somehow. (Although thinking about her likely pronunciation of “The Rain in Spain” makes me want to gouge out my eardrums with a fondue fork, so there’s some amusement there.)
I’ll admit it - I couldn’t make it past the first two minutes. I can’t watch Borat, I have trouble with some of Jason Jones’ meaner interviews, and this was just too similarly painful. Only, y’know, real life and the possible leader of our country in about 2 months. :smack:
I’ve never seen anyone translate from Idiot into Nostrodaman Couplet.
No, she’s not. She’s out of her league, which is a different thing entirely.
I’m a lead auditor in a company of about 120, 130 people that punches above its weight in terms of industry influence. I am very, very good at my job, and I am a reasonably smart guy. But if you asked me to be the president of the company I’d look like a complete moron in the first industry conference I went to, or the first time I had to deal with the board. They’d think I was a retard. But I’m not a retard; I’m just not qualified for that job. My buddy is a senior manager at Cisco and is evidently excellent at that job since he’s soared through the ranks in short order, or if he was suddenly asked to stand in for John Chambers (Cisco’s head honcho) he would be just hopelessly outclassed; the people Chambers has to deal with would think he was a nitwit. There are a lot of smart people around who’d be hopelessly awful VP candidates. Most smart people wouldn’t even be as good as Palin.
Sarah Palin was evidently a pretty good small town and small state politician. She basically stomped over her own partymates to get there; she can’t be stupid. But she’s out of her league now. It’s like a baseball team drafting some 18-year-old kid out of high school, he plays well for a month in the lowest minor league, and then they call him and say “Well, you’re now our starting shortstop and cleanup hitter. Here’s your plane ticket.” Then he gets to the big leagues and fails. Is he a totally inept athlete, or just rushed out of his league? That’s Sarah Palin; she’s a good ballplayer, but in the majors good isn’t good enough.
Maybe had Palin run for the Senate after her governorship and served a term she’d have developed into a seasoned politician. Instead she got rushed up from the minors and she’s striking out and making errors. Quelle fucking surprise. McCain blew it.
I don’t get how the second sentence follows from the first.
There’s nothing about being a small town and small state politician and stomping on people that requires brains. Now, I’m not saying she’s stupid, but I don’t understand what the evidence is supposed to be of her intelligence. She’s apparently pretty vicious, but so are lots of things that aren’t known for their smarts.
My armchair analysis of her is that she’s incurious. And she’s taking longer than some people might to get up to speed because she didn’t have anything to build upon because she wasn’t ever paying attention to anything outside of her very limited sphere.
I sometimes start to think this, but she could’ve turned down McCain. There’s some political ambition there that drove her to agree to join the campaign despite her complete lack of qualifications. So, no, she gets no sympathy from me.
Mere physical foibles that induce giggles, but nothing more. None of those things mean the person involved was an utter fool.
None of those things would make the yawning pit of disbelief and despair open up in me, as it does now at the thought that this woman could possibly be the President in a few years.
Still nothing like it. Promises made by politicians are statements of what they would like to do or the values they would like to uphold. They are not binding, nor can be in the unpredictability of the democratic process. I’m not a huge fan of GHW Bush, but this isn’t worth bothering about.
And Canada too!
Alaska could find itself fighting a two-front war.
You must have watched Jon Stewart last night. No one else seems to be talking about the recent Biden gaffes. I don’t get Fox News.
You certainly have provided the counterpoint to the OP’s question.
Look, as someone who was hoping for big things for Palin (as I was hoping for Clinton) I’m saddened and disappointed by her performance in interviews.
I don’t understand why Biden gets a pass. If I use my own intellectual capacity, foreign affairs knowledge, and public speaking skills as a baseline, I’d probably do worse than Palin, but I sure as hell know that Roosevelt didn’t appear on television or was in office during the stockmarket crash. That’s a no-brainer. You’d think with Biden’s experience he’d know better, but I’m beginning to wonder if he has Alzheimer’s.
Plain imbecile if you ask me. How can the VP candidate for the Republican Party ramble incoherently and possibly think she is getting ‘away with it’? These aren’t talking points bromides, it’s just utter non-sense – as with the Putin crap above. I mean it only takes a couple of minutes of reading the MASSIVE headlines to fuckin’ know what “The Bailout” is, or watching TV, or simply being er…alive in America (or most of the literate people in the world today) today! Never mind being a heartbeat away from the Most Powerful Job In The World.
Palin: Bailout is about healthcare!
There aren’t enough :rolleyes: for this. Simply not funny anymore. Pathetic is more like it.
The look on Couric’s eyes says it all…
If you have not figure it out it is because it is amusing, but not the problem that many in the right assume. It would be a problem if Biden would be **repeating **those blunders, It is a problem when blunders McCain and Palin have because they deny they took place, repeat them and even worse: instead of acknowledging the goof they turn it into an even bigger blunder by making it an attack point like when McCain “cleverly” put Spain in South America.
Heck, even Biden apologized on the spot to the guy that was crippled, and IIRC he already said he was mistaken on the Roosevelt remarks. McCain and Palin have a problem when confronted with their blunders.