VP Debates Thread, or "Beauty and the Beast"

[divemaster]

@BrainGlutton

For what it’s worth, this is from http://www.electoral-vote.com/:

Yeah, but what kind of “poll” has a sample size of 178?? I have never seen a political survey of only 178 people be considered valid for anything. That’s got to have a margin of error that makes 41-28 look rather suspect.

Also, I would think that the person running the electoral vote site should know enough about polling that referencing a dot-click internet survey doesn’t go very far to support the idea that Edwards won the debate.

I find it telling that this person cherry-picked a couple of surveys that support what he wanted to hear (for instance, why not cite the ABC poll of 500 people that has Cheney as the winner by a good-sized margin?).

Makes me now wonder about how he incorporates polls into his electoral map…

[Proles]

@Brutus

Answer me this: Did he link to the NYT, or did he link to some fucking blog. You really should read your own ‘cites’ once or twice. (certainly not ‘cites’ in the traditional sense, but ‘The Daily Kos’ is about as good as can be expected from you.)

You are never amusing, just desperate.

As the purveyor of that particular “fucking blog”, I find it incumbent on me to point out your fallacy. While it is true that certain sources are more reputable than others, a source does not need to be well known to be correct, nor is a well known source automatically correct. I assure you that the email sent out by the Bush campaign to some 6 million registered members is as quoted on my website. Or, if you don’t believe me, check the New York Times (it’s on CNET but it’s a NYT article).

Your assertion, it seems, is nothing but bravado and mayhaps a bit of ad hominem. Perhaps you take after the esteemed vice president…

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Proles

check the New York Times (it’s on CNET but it’s a NYT article).

Thanks for your input, Proles! Here’s a direct link to the story.

@The Goddamn New York Times

Ken Mehlman, Mr. Bush’s campaign manager, delivered the request in an e-mail message to supporters early Tuesday morning.

“Immediately after the debate, visit online polls, chat rooms and discussion boards and make your voice heard,” he said in the note, sent to the six million supporters on the campaign’s e-mail list. “People’s perceptions are shaped as much by their conversations around the water cooler as by the debates themselves.”

The note - which is a mirror image of one sent out by the Democrats just before the first presidential debate last week - also exhorted supporters to follow up by writing letters to their local newspapers and by calling in to radio talk shows.

Note that I include the Democrat’s own peccadillo in this matter: neither side is blameless. But it’d be goofy to deny that it happened.

Daniel

[dropzone]

@Left Hand of Dorkness

I’ve not seen this mentioned elsewhere. In the dirty tricks department, try visiting the website to which Cheney referred people: factcheck.com.

Oh! That is priceless!

[zut]

@divemaster

Yeah, but what kind of “poll” has a sample size of 178?? I have never seen a political survey of only 178 people be considered valid for anything. That’s got to have a margin of error that makes 41-28 look rather suspect.

FWIW, ABC News had a poll of 500+ debate-watchers that called if for Cheney, 43 to 35 (with the remainder calling it a tie). However, as they note, their poll included more Republicans than Democrats (reason: “more Republicans tuned in”). Interestingly, the proportion of Republicans to Democrats (38:31, 1.23) is exactly the same as the proportion of people who called Cheney over Edwards (43:35, 1.23).

[Proles]

The actual FactCheck site on the debate is pretty interesting. A few highlights:

Cheney got our domain name wrong – calling us “FactCheck.com” – and wrongly implied that we had rebutted allegations Edwards was making about what Cheney had done as chief executive officer of Halliburton. In fact, we did post an article pointing out that Cheney hasn’t profited personally while in office from Halliburton’s Iraq contracts, as falsely implied by a Kerry TV ad. But Edwards was talking about Cheney’s responsibility for earlier Halliburton troubles. And in fact, Edwards was mostly right.

Edwards twice accused the administration of having “lobbied the Congress” to cut the combat pay of troops in Iraq, when in fact the White House never supported such a plan. Rather, the Defense Department proposed allowing a temporary pay increase for all troops worldwide (even those not in Iraq or Afghanistan) to expire, and promised to maintain current pay levels for troops in Iraq and Afghanistan with separate pay raises if necessary.

Cheney repeatedly said Edwards had voted “for the war” and “to commit the troops,” when in fact the Iraq resolution that both Kerry and Edwards supported left the decision to the president and called for intensified diplomacy.

The article goes on to highlight other “misstatements.” Both Edwards and Cheney made a number of them, but I’d say Cheney stretched the facts a tad further (at least his name seems to come up more often on this site as having said something erroneous).

[Gangster_Octopus]

Can someone give some links to actual times that Cheney said there was a 911-AlQueda connection. I need them to convince a non-believer.

[Jonathan_Chance]

Debate Referee by the Washington Post (may require registration) has a decent sidebar on the topic.

[ElvisL1ves]

Start here, then go hereA year ago September on Meet the Press he said that in invading Iraq we had “struck a major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists who have had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11.”

And shortly before that he had this exchange with Russert …

MR. RUSSERT: The Washington Post asked the American people about Saddam Hussein, and this is what they said: 69 percent said he was involved in the September 11 attacks. Are you surprised by that?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: No. I think it’s not surprising that people make that connection.

MR. RUSSERT: But is there a connection?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: We don’t know. You and I talked about this two years ago. I can remember you asking me this question just a few days after the original attack. At the time I said no, we didn’t have any evidence of that. Subsequent to that, we’ve learned a couple of things. We learned more and more that there was a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaeda that stretched back through most of the decade of the ’90s, that it involved training, for example, on BW and CW, that al-Qaeda sent personnel to Baghdad to get trained on the systems that are involved. The Iraqis providing bomb-making expertise and advice to the al-Qaeda organization.

We know, for example, in connection with the original World Trade Center bombing in ’93 that one of the bombers was Iraqi, returned to Iraq after the attack of ’93. And we’ve learned subsequent to that, since we went into Baghdad and got into the intelligence files, that this individual probably also received financing from the Iraqi government as well as safe haven.

Now, is there a connection between the Iraqi government and the original World Trade Center bombing in ’93? We know, as I say, that one of the perpetrators of that act did, in fact, receive support from the Iraqi government after the fact. With respect to 9/11, of course, we’ve had the story that’s been public out there. The Czechs alleged that Mohamed Atta, the lead attacker, met in Prague with a senior Iraqi intelligence official five months before the attack, but we’ve never been able to develop anymore of that yet either in terms of confirming it or discrediting it. We just don’t know.
[/quote]
Well, yeah, they did know.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@dropzone

Oh! That is priceless!

The plot sickens

@georgesoros.com

We do not own the FactCheck.com domain name and are not responsible for it redirecting to GeorgeSoros.com. We are as surprised as anyone by this turn of events. We believe that Vice President Cheney intended to direct viewers to FactCheck.org. [LINK: www.FactCheck.org]

So apparently this is just a prank by the cybersquatter who owns factcheck.com. That’s good: as I said, this was dirty politics and kind of disgusting (albeit funny), and I’m glad to see it’s not Soros who’s doing it.

Daniel

[Cervaise]

@Hentor the Barbarian

I’m having a hard time with this interpretation, and you aren’t the first person to see it this way, Cervaise. Essentially, it says, yeah, Cheney lied, but he lied well, so he won the debate. First of all, I hope that most people aren’t comfortable with liars, regardless of whether they flinch when they lie. Secondly, I thought that it was very effective for Edwards to call him on it, face to face, several times. I appreciate that you saw it differently, but I certainly can’t even see how it could be seen as taking Edwards to the woodshed.

In a nutshell, I try to watch these things from two different points of view: my own, and my mother’s.

I follow politics closely, and am a committed Kerry voter. (After last week’s debate, I’m no longer voting against Bush; I’m voting for Kerry.) I frankly don’t understand, after so many months and years of divisive fearmongering and real-world blowback on unworkable ideological fantasies, how anybody takes seriously anything that comes out of that smirking little troll’s mouth.

But that’s just me — which is why I also try to imagine what my mother would make of the same material. She doesn’t follow politics closely at all, and she’s probably one of those classic middle-of-the-road average suburban older-baby-boomer voters, vulnerable to emotional appeals from either side. She bought Clinton’s “I feel your pain”; she’s buying Bush’s “vote for me or everyone you love will be burned to death in jet-fuel ovens.”

And as I watched Cheney vs Edwards, I couldn’t help but think that she would shy away from the latter’s rather obvious Clintonesque routine, and be impressed with the former’s no-nonsense get-things-done attitude. She doesn’t know enough to recognize the shit Cheney was spewing for what it is. That’s why I said his style, his delivery, is different enough to make the bullshit unrecognizable as such. He seems to be plainspoken and blunt. Of course, he’s anything but, as you know and as I know. But my mother doesn’t. She reacts viscerally against what she perceives as political manipulation, and Edwards is following so closely the Clinton model that she would recognize his politicking and cringe. Cheney has such a different style that his politicking would slip under her radar.

These debates, I think, are not designed for us, the people who put the current political season under the microscope. They’re for my mom, and people like her. And while I haven’t spoken to her, and while I don’t believe she actually watched the debates, I’ll bet any amount of money that she would say Cheney gave Edwards a sound thrashing. That’s where I’m coming from on this.

[John_Mace]

@Cervaise

These debates, I think, are not designed for us, the people who put the current political season under the microscope. They’re for my mom, and people like her. And while I haven’t spoken to her, and while I don’t believe she actually watched the debates, I’ll bet any amount of money that she would say Cheney gave Edwards a sound thrashing. That’s where I’m coming from on this.

That’s a very good point. And Cheney’s remark about not meeting Edwards gets translated, for those folks, thusly: “I’m a busy man, who has important things to do running this government. You haven’t even finished one Senatorial term yet, and you think you’re qualified to be VP. Come back and see us again in 5 or 6 years when you have more experience.”

[Psycho_Pirate]

@Proles

The actual FactCheck site on the debate is pretty interesting. A few highlights:

The article goes on to highlight other “misstatements.” Both Edwards and Cheney made a number of them, but I’d say Cheney stretched the facts a tad further (at least his name seems to come up more often on this site as having said something erroneous).

Emphasis mine.

Imagine that! I’m SHOCKED!

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Psycho Pirate

Emphasis mine.

Imagine that! I’m SHOCKED!

Psycho, you DO understand which site he was referring to, don’t you? The very site that Cheney attempted to refer to last night?

Daniel

[Guinastasia]

@Harborwolf

So much build up for so little. If it wasn’t for the MST3K style debate thread, I would’ve gone to TNT to watch a law and order rerun.

I don’t think that this will have any impact at all on anything in particular. All in all, kind of a waste.

Yep, same here. Jack McCoy for president!

Brutus, you brought up DU. While I agree, it’s an annoyance, might I point out that Free Republic does the same thing? They call it “freeping”.

[rjung]

@Left Hand of Dorkness

Note that I include the Democrat’s own peccadillo in this matter: neither side is blameless. But it’d be goofy to deny that it happened.

I don’t think anyone denied that both sides were doing this – it was merely Brutus’ naive-beyond-belief assertion that only the Dems were doing this. Then he gets called on it, gets petulant, and gets PWN3D big-time as a result.

And as long as we’re talking blogs and the Cheney-Edwards debate, here’s another tidbit: it turns out that in the last four years, Dick Cheney presided over the Senate a whopping two times – the same number of times Edwards did (and less than Hillary Clinton, to boot).

[fessie]

Can I bring up another debate issue that’s bugging me?

Do the debaters have to pee in a cup?

I think they should.

If amateur athletes have to be held accountable for everything they ingest, then shouldn’t candidates for public office follow the same standard?

'Cause I’d love to know which tranqualizers they’re gonna give Bush to try to keep him calm as he faces the riffraff he’s been keeping at bay.

Plus when Cheney couldn’t give a sample that whole “robotic” issue would be settled once and for all.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@fessie

Plus when Cheney couldn’t give a sample that whole “robotic” issue would be settled once and for all.

Cheney: Here’s your sample, fuckers.
Doctor: [pause] Sir, this is . . . motor oil!

Daniel

[Monocracy]

I thought it was pretty much a tie. Edwards made a couple of really good points which prevented Cheney from running away with it.

For one, he successfully explained the “global test” remark, which has been pretty much the only talking point that conservatives could twist from the first debate. His explanation was articulate, intelligent, and it made sense. Of course, this won’t stop the Republican Attack Machine from hammering away at this point with their dishonesty, but anyone who watched the debates will know the actual truth.

Also, he had a very good answer to the malpractice question. Although it’s not a hugely important topic, it was the only time in the debate that one of them laid down a specific, detailed policy. It helps to get rid of Edwards’ ambulance chaser" label.

Other than that, they traded barbs fairly equally, although Cheney’s one-liners were probably more memorable than Edwards’. Edwards also did at least a decent job of defending some of his almost indefensible flaws, such as his inexperience and his low attendence in the Senate for the past year.

I thought the factcheck.com thing was kinda funny. When Al Gore invented the internet. he made sure that old fogies like Cheney wouldn’t be able to understand it.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Monocracy

Also, he had a very good answer to the malpractice question. Although it’s not a hugely important topic, it was the only time in the debate that one of them laid down a specific, detailed policy. It helps to get rid of Edwards’ ambulance chaser" label.

Yeah, that reminds me. Did anyone buy Cheney’s line that he wasn’t familiar with Edwards’s specific court cases?

Bullshit. You’re telling me that the same campaign that counted up the number of votes against taxes didn’t go through every one of those court cases looking for something to ding Edwards on? Pure bullshit.

Cheney didn’t address those particular cases because–newsflash–many malpractice cases are legitimate. Including every single one of Edwards’s cases that I’ve read about.

Daniel