Per the conflict-of-interest thing, even Stephen Spruiell of National Review conceded that ‘Gwen Ifill did a good job’.
Gavin adds: Say, even Stephen Spruiell of National Review conceded that “Gwen Ifill did a good job.”
Do you like Dick Cheney? Then you’ll love Sarah Palin:
Of course, we know what a Vice President does. And that’s not only to preside over the Senate and will take that position very seriously also. I’m thankful the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the Vice President if that Vice President so chose to exert it …
Like stove-piping? You’ll luuuurvvve Sarah Palin:
IFILL: Governor, you mentioned a moment ago the Constitution might give the Vice President more power than it has in the past. Do you believe as Vice President Cheney does, that the Executive Branch does not hold complete sway over the office of the vice presidency, that it it is also a member of the Legislative Branch?
PALIN: Well, our founding fathers were very wise there in allowing through the Constitution much flexibility there in the office of the Vice President. And we will do what is best for the American people in tapping into that position and ushering in an agenda that is supportive and cooperative with the president’s agenda in that position. Yeah, so I do agree with him that we have a lot of flexibility in there, and we’ll do what we have to do to administer very appropriately the plans that are needed for this nation.
Like Macbethian ambition? You’ll laffervvurraffff Sarah Palin:
IFILL: … Probably the biggest cliche about the vice-presidency is that it’s a heartbeat away, everybody’s waiting to see what would happen if the worst happened. …
PALIN: And heaven forbid, yes, that would ever happen, no matter how this ends up, that that would ever happen with either party.
As for disagreeing with John McCain and how our administration would work, what do you expect? A team of mavericks, of course we’re not going to agree on 100 percent of everything. As we discuss ANWR there, at least we can agree to disagree on that one. I will keep pushing him on ANWR. I have so appreciated he has never asked me to check my opinions at the door and he wants a deliberative debate and healthy debate so we can make good policy.
Or perhaps you like the Constitution. Then Joe Biden’s your man:
IFILL: Vice President Cheney’s interpretation of the vice presidency?
BIDEN: Vice President Cheney has been the most dangerous Vice President we’ve had probably in American history. The idea he doesn’t realize that Article I of the Constitution defines the role of the Vice President of the United States, that’s the Executive Branch. He works in the Executive Branch. He should understand that. Everyone should understand that.
Ha, Ha, Ha: Even Andrew Sullivan Say Palin “Steam-Rolled” the “Dreadful” Biden
—AceSafe link to Dan Riehl.
Sarah Rocked: Sullivan – She Steam-rolled Biden
Sarah rocked the house. Actually, I think she took the house and shoved it up the media’s snout! heh
I had to look in to see what Andy had to say, him being her most deranged critic.
* Cf.
Welp, since I don’t have a freaking laptop anymore, I can’t liveblog the VP debate. Open liveblog debate thread snorgle woohoo!
Above: More cogent than people seem to think
P.S.: Palin Bingo here!!!
Quod Atrios:
Simple Answers To Simple Questions
Has there ever, ever been a sorrier, more discredited asshole than Glenn Reynolds? Ever? In the entire history of discredited sub-moron-level pompous assholes?
No.
This has been another edition of simple answers to simple questions.
And that’s not even counting the…
[Hanx! ifthethunderdontgetya™³²®©]
Appearing at The Corner with the usual abruptness, it’s legal expert Mark Levin, as usual declaiming a sentence-length thought in a tone suggestive of statements such as “My feet are killing me,” “Aah, quit your yapping,” and “The Puerto Ricans ruined this neighborhood”:
re: Free Palin [Mark R. Levin]
I would LOVE to question Katie Couric about her knowledge of the Constitution, let alone Supreme Court decisions.
10/02 03:14 PM
Disappearing from The Corner with the usual sound effect of Archie Bunker’s toilet flushing, and with the familiar lingering odor of Bay Rum and sock feet on the ottoman, it’s legal expert Mark Levin.
You know, we would LOVE for. . .oh, let’s say Dahlia Lithwick for instance, to question Mark Levin — the right-wing talk radio zealot and wingnut welfare author, the character who used the National Review to falsely claim that he had nominated Rush Limbaugh for a Nobel Peace Prize — about his knowledge of the Constitution, let alone Supreme Court decisions.
The Limbaugh Code: The New York Times best seller no one is talking about
By Dahlia Lithwick
Posted Friday, April 1, 2005, at 6:21 PM ET[…]
I use the word “book” with some hesitation: Certainly it possesses chapters and words and other book-like accoutrements. But [Mark R. Levin’s] Men in Black is 208 large-print pages of mostly block quotes (from court decisions or other legal thinkers) padded with a foreword by the eminent legal scholar Rush Limbaugh, and a blurry 10-page “Appendix” of internal memos to and from congressional Democrats—stolen during Memogate. The reason it may take you only slightly longer to read Men in Black than it took Levin to write it is that you’ll experience an overwhelming urge to shower between chapters.
It gets more scathing from there. Luckily, Mr. Levin is also a financial expert.
Schadenfreude? Yes, that’s the word for what you experience at the spectacle of a free-market glibertarian tying herself into a macramé tea cozy trying to justify her support of a $700,000,000,000 government bailout of the financial industry.
[…]
It is worth noting, in answer to the libertarians who are wary of government intervention in the economy, that if there is a serious crash, we will get even more government intervention in the economy–and intervention that is much less to our liking. That cost has to be weighed in your assessment. On the other side, to those who are averse to bailing out Wall Street rather than Main Street, it’s worth noting that Main Street will suffer worse than Wall Street. Because of the way that their compensation is structured, Wall Street bankers tend to do things like buy their houses for cash.
It is also worth asking: Contextually speaking, with McArdle being McArdle, how does this make a single freaking iota of sense? It’s not sufficient to recall that she’s a rich kid from a New York bubble world that requires no work or responsibility of its sons and daughters besides that of self-empowerment. It certainly doesn’t explain anything that she’s devoted her career as a public intellectual (i.e. as an over-rewarded blogger) to emitting the flapdoodle insights of an adolescent Ayn Rand devotee — such as the famous argument that health insurance is immoral because it rewards bad lifestyle choices and penalizes the strong and healthy.
No, the canny observer would suspect from this new massive-government adventure of McArdle’s that the market crisis threatens in some way to affect Megan McArdle.
Coming soon: Libertarians sneer at the right of habeas corpus. Oh wait…
Oh lordy:
This Is Not Spin, Honest Question [Kathryn Jean Lopez]Ask most Americans: Other than Roe, name a Supreme Court decision you disagree with? Off the top of your head? Sure, you’d come up with one. There’s Kelo.
Which would, in fact, have been one more than what Sarah Palin came up with.
My mind would then wander to “that child rape case.”
Which would have been two more than what Sarah Palin came up with.
Then, during these split-second deliberations, would realize I may not want to say “that child-rape case” on the national TV.
Well sure. But that’s because you’re K-Lo. We expect that sort of goofiness from you. We don’t expect it from someone who could soon become the most powerful person in the world.
And incidentally, K-Lo? You still would have done a lot better in this interview than Sarah Palin did. That is not a compliment.
And, then, decide: “I just am not going to play Katie’s quiz-show game.” I think the campaign has decided “Sarah Palin doesn’t do game shows. And we’ll ‘expose’ the media for every one of those questions.”
Jesus Christ on a bike. Being asked to name one freaking newspaper that you read is a goddamn “quiz-show game” question? Are you serious, K-Lo? What other softball questions will the Right’s delicate flower be unable to answer? If I asked her to name colors she liked, would she say “all of them?” If I asked her to name a number between one and ten, would she just give me a blank stare? What questions are we lowly mortals permitted to ask St. Joan of Juneau?
To put it more bluntly: could Sarah Palin say or do anything that would make you think twice before eating a crap sandwich on her behalf? Don’t you feel insulted that John McCain nominated someone who is less qualified than you are to be vice president? Let me repeat that: K-Lo, you are more qualified to be vice president than Sarah Palin is.
UPDATE: Malkin spells it out:
The Beltway/Manhattan crowd seems to have forgotten that her appeal to the base was not that she was a slick intellectual, but that she was one of them.
A.k.a., ignoramuses.
Why oh why can’t we get a smarter opposition ideology?
When earlier this morning I read a Glen “InstaHayseed” Reynolds post praising someone for being “progressive,” I figured that something must be terribly amiss. Perhaps one of the Ole Perfesser’s underpaid and harassed research assistants had swiped the password to Instapundit and was engaged in a little payback. But then, upon rereading the post, I saw that Reynolds had set the bar for “progressive” so low that even K-Lo could leap over it without a trampoline assist:
SARAH PALIN ON HER GAY FRIEND: “She is not my ‘gay’ friend, she is one of my best friends.” Funny that she … get[s] so little credit from the gay community for what have actually been quite progressive attitudes.
Sarah can go to a church that “prays away the gay,” can have a snit over a copies of “Pastor, I’m Gay!” and “Daddy’s Roommate” in the Wasilla Coloring Book Warehouse Library, can be opposed to state benefits for same-sex partners of state employees, but still be “progressive” about gays if she can rustle up one lesbian friend somewhere. You probably won’t be shocked when I tell you that there are more lesbians in Alaska than sled dogs
Using this standard, you might say that Sarah is “progressive” because she’s opposed to shooting gays from airplanes.
As my exile in the Extranet continues (i.e., in the place full of physics and people through which one blunders when not online, for instance when refilling one’s beverage), I’m heartsick at the wonderful right-wing frenzies that I’ve been unable to delve into, save shallowly and in passing.
The wonderfullest has been the bug-eyed shrieking about the Nazi-Stalin thuggery of the Obama campaign, as seen here. I keep worrying that I’ll miss the chance to write about it, but then day after day, the victimological bedwetting — and the utter nullity of self-awareness and historical memory — just keep going and going, like some metaphor similar to, but not as hackneyed as, that of hte* Energizer Bunny.
But now it’s the Gwen Ifill thing as well. Here’s Malkin:
Try as she might to deflect questions about her impartiality, her biases — and her conflict of interest — are clear. But don’t you dare breathe a word about any of this. You know what will happen if you do…
RACIST!
Meanwhile, a sort of synthetic Cubism has been achieved with the following astonishing piece of writing, which deserves far better treatment than time permits:
Who-What Are Obama Supporters?
It is not Obama and his gang of thug Socialists who confuse me. I clearly recognize the principles of socialism and Communism in all of Obama’s “silk purse” speeches. It isn’t hard acknowledging right from wrong. In my last essay “Is any thing in America Sacred to Obama?” which lists many of Obama’s criminal friends, actions, and intentions which reveal a ruthless and desperate character. There is nothing I wrote in that piece that isn’t already known to all of the Democrats currently in office and the general public. There is nothing I wrote in that article that hasn’t already been written in long, scary detail by better writers than I. All of the information that keeps coming forward about Obama is disgusting, shameful, and proof he is unworthy to be a dog catcher let alone president. It is obvious no patriotic American will vote for Obama. He should be in jail.
What confuses me is how many people choose to support this silver plated turd in spite of the facts that has been exposed about Obama. Why?
Well okay, that’s a fair question. What I believe is happening is that each of us is voting for Barack Obama thinking that we’re the only one.
As I might’ve mentioned, I’m here and there on borrowed computers until I get my laptop back from the shop, so let me get this in here while chance permits. Scheme: Ruining the VP Debate.
Doop-de-doop, sendin’ email to all my friends. Dear Friend: Hey, whilst watching the debate tomorrow, do not at any time think of this song:
Above: The Pixies – Official Gwen Ifill Theme Music (2:57)
Excelsior!
* ‘Hte’ is the new ‘teh.’
DA adds: Hey! I resemble that remark!