Redstate

By Remington Steele Posted in 2008 — Comments (8) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

Promoted from blogs: the man's noble self-sacrifice in actually watching this requires some sort of notice. Although the Biden thing was funny; maybe it'll be YouTubed. - Moe Lane

I enjoy listening to the opposition, but I was underwelmed at this first debate. The only ones that really pushed through with a heart beat were Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel, a Senator from Alaska. Everyone else was playing nice. How ironic it was for Kucinich, a true foreign policy dove, to wage a war on the other candidates along with Senator Gravel. Too bad dove is on the menu for the Thanksgiving after next.

Gravel is a dark horse running a lap around a black hole. He accused Brian Williams of making him feel like a potted plant on stage due to the lack of questions. He had quite of bit of fiery advice for the other candidates on how to shut down the war and follow through with what they say. Yet after making a joke using Ronald Reagan's exact words without quoting him, I was ready for him to take another lap around the singularity.

Bill Richardson, whom I like the most if I was ever forced to vote for a Dem, came across the worst. The poor guy had the furthest spot away from Brian Williams, and he couldn't hear many of the questions. I blame MSNBC's audio crew for messing up this debate as Edwards couldn't hear one of the questions too. Brian William's guest questioner couldn't keep the candidates in line with the time allotted. Which brings us back to Richardson; he just couldn't share his message concisely. I'm wondering if any of his answers were in the time allotted. Towards the end he looked like he could use a powder (he was sweating). I wasn’t sure if it was his game face or a bad dinner, but the look of consternation on his face made me want to hand him a roll of Tums. Bill, it's ok to smile during a debate.

Pundits were saying that Obama did a good job, but I just didn’t see it. I’m sure he’s a good guy, but as a communicator, I just didn’t follow. I’m not sure if it was his style, but after many of his answers I just sat there saying, “wait… what was he trying to tell me?” I heard the words, but the core of his answers didn’t seem coherent to me. The one thing I did like was when Kucinich was off explaining that foreign policy is about Utopia, Obama correctly explained that the Military is a tool to use against evil bad guys. Kucinich then explained that Obama’s statements were frightening away the Unicorns ;-)

Hillary did alright until the end when she started raising her voice a bit. Yet, Brian Williams interupted everyone pretty forcefully on time except Hillary. She often seemed to get a pass. Edwards did a rather good job, but had to admit to many mistakes. I especially liked the question posed not about why he spent so much money on his haircut, but why it was paid for by campaign funds. Oops... another mistake. I enjoyed his answer about who formed his moral influence in his life, but the uncomfortable 30 seconds waiting for him to answer made me think, whoa... I guess he doesn't have a moral influence... next question please.

Was Christopher Dodd even there? ;-) Nothing much stood out. Joseph Biden had the best answer of the night, when asked by Brian if he would stop making so many gaffes and long winded mistakes picked up by the media, he answered, "Yes." And silence ran out the clock until the laughter kicked in.

It was a long diluted 90 min debate, so much so Brian started asking candidates to raise their hands to answer group questions. The sad thing is the camera angle they used made it tough to see all the hands before it cut away.

I sure hope MSNBC gets their production act together by next week for the Republican debate.

Nathan W.