Vice-Presidential Debate: David vs. Goliath

This is the debate of a life time, better than John McCain versus Barack Obama. Better than John Kerry versus George Bush. Better than Snickers versus Musketeers.

Palin's two years of experience as governor will go up against Biden's multiple years of senatorial experience...I have my doubts about David's success in this case.

Recap on Palin: She was a mayor for eight years before acting as chairman of the Alaska Oil & Gas Conservation Commission. She was elected governor of Alaska in 2006. Her work on building bridges in Alaska and improving the budget is noted, but the controversy over her reasons to fire Police Chief Walter Monegan is disputable. Some of her most well known political views include anti-abortion, right to bear arms (gun safety as well ironically enough), capital punishment and is strongly against same-sex marriage. Her foreign policy is...very questionable. I'm really trying not to laugh at Mrs. McCain's comments...borders Canada and Russia my foot. She's the rightest of the right wings.

Recap on Biden: He's been a senator for about 36 years. His efforts on the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations have shone, especially with his advocacy of combatting hostilities in the Balkans. He has run for president twice, and accepted the vice presidential running position despite previous comments that he wouldn't. His work on crime resulted in the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, which is known as the Biden Crime Law. He may not always agree with Obama, but he offers strong observations and has multiple years of experience. He's not the leftist of lefts, but he holds his own.

DEBATE:

Palin came into the debate and surprised multiple people, Republicans and Democrats alike. I wrote an article for the Standard Examiner stating that many women in Utah were excited by the positive attitude she exhibited and the way she countered Biden's comments with force and respected disagreement.

Instead of showing her inexperience, she showed Americans that she had knowledge about the War in Iraq, other foreign policy issues, the economic catastrophe, energy issues people are concerned with and even former policies of Biden. She tried to be professional in her disagreements with Biden, and looked him straight in the eye on multiple occasions.

Nonetheless, she exposed a weak point in her economic policy, which Biden quickly used to his advantage. She supported Sen. John McCain R-Ariz.'s health system policy to set aside money for the people to use, but wasn't able to explain herself or fight back against Biden's argument that the policy would drown people in debt instead of help them.


My knowledge on economic policy is not strong, but on such an important issue that the polls are proclaiming Obama's advantage, Palin needed more to keep her argument that McCain would bring the American people forward standing.


I've tried to be fair and not be biased in my view of the debate. But one obvious point was Palin's argument was repetitive. She used the same reasonings over again, which worked to convince many of her background knowledge, but didn't work out very well. She tried to make up for it, but you could tell she was a tank fish out in the ocean...lost and in much bigger waters than she was used to. In another 20 years, she could have a good deal more experience, but for now...Biden had years of advantage...and clearly made use of it.


When both candidates discussed the best way to handle talks with American "enemies", they each had different view points, but surprisingly, seemed to reach a middle ground. Palin wavered between meeting with the Castro brothers and other malcontent political "dictators" as she put it, and not meeting with them at all. She said it was only responsible to have standards set ahead of time.


Biden seemed to win that round in my book however. A policy that gives the other party the idea that America can only meet with them under certain conditions, ones that are most likely insulting and assume American importance, is foolhardy. Biden is right, we need to meet with them. The George W. Bush administration would be better off with stronger foreign policy.


As one woman I interviewed Thursday night, Jan Zogmaister, said, Biden and Palin seemed to agree that the middle class needed to be taxed less, which I entirely agree with. They argued that their opponents actually did the opposite, but neither would admit anything less than middle class support as the best proactive economic solution.


I was able to talk to Jan, Pat Iannone, Ava Painter and Suzanne Ferre Thursday. They gave me varied opinion about the debate, all saying that Palin did an amazing job in holding her own against a senator with so much experience.


I did wish the debate had brought more up about same-sex marriage and abortion. The candidates mentioned same-sex, and both seemed to agree that although marriage isn't supported, hospital visitation and property rights are absolutely necessary for same-sex couples.


As to abortion, neither candidate discussed the topic, but Suzanne Ferre did mention it to me Thursday. Her comments weren't able to run in my story that ran in the Standard Examiner Friday, but I want to post them here. This includes all the things she said, plus a few things I paraphrased. Her points were valid and very intelligent.


Suzanne:
"I thought both of them did much better, and were more civil than I thought they would be. We're so used to so much mud slinging. They did a good job on defending their running mates.


Joe Biden, I thought one of the best things he did was appear more humanistic when he shared his personal life.
(Note - here's what I recorded of what Biden said on his personal life after he listened to what Palin said about being a mother and dealing with issues the average middle class family deals with day to day:
"I understand what it's like to be a parent," Biden said. Biden lost his wife when his two sons were young and discussed what it was like raising them and maintaining his job. He was an only parent for at least two years, a hardship that many people go through every day.
Biden said he lives in a nice house now but knew what it was like to struggle and not see his kids as often, or move for work.


Back to Suzanne:
I appreciate Joe Biden for sharing that.


Sarah Palin talking about her situation and being the mother. I think so many politicians, they're not living like the rest of us here.

Overall, I think a lot of people were thinking, Joe Biden, because he was such an experienced speaker there is going to be a big gulf here, he is going to pin her down. He didn't.

She came on strong, she has folksy way to talk. I think she does an excellent job in speaking to Americans and kept pulling the debate. I thought he might swallow her. She carried on.

I was very pleased with her performance. She's an entirely different politician than Joe Biden, but her message remains clear.


Also, they both, in their own ways, were talking about the very same issues. Both for the middle class. That's our focus, at least, at this point in the campaign. The McCain/Palin ticket is saying: we're for the middle class. Joe Biden is saying, hey, we're for the middle class too.


It's interesting on the Biden/Obama ticket, Biden has all the experience and Obama is the maverick...McCain has all this experience and Palin comes in with this new outlook.


I'm in her corner based on the principles of the Republican platform. One of them, her keeping that baby and standing up against abortion. I thought was courageous. I'm strongly pro-life. She made a choice that I thought speaks of her character.


Suzanne asked me about my opinion on the debate and we chatted for a while. She was very insightful and gave me a lot of interesting information.


I sat down and listened to the debate, expecting to see Biden crush Palin. I was very surprised. I still, personally, believe that Biden had some better points he brought up, and had more experience. I trust him as vice president more than Palin. Nonetheless, Palin is not the disaster I originally thought she would be.


She is a smart woman, and her experience on oil committees would be an asset to the United States. I'm not sure how I feel about the way she argued with Biden. She undermined him in what seemed to be a respectable way by often implying that she thought Biden was wrong in switching his ideas, without any proof he did this.


I would like proof on the accuracy. I respect Biden for not bringing up her lack of experience or implying that she may or may not be cut out to be vice president. It's something that ran through a lot of people's minds, and I'm impressed it didn't come up.


I'm going to try to post more blogs about stories I've written. Please let me know what you think everyone!