Early notes: The opening half-hour was a complete wreck for everyone involved. Tim Kaine is finding a hook about how he can't believe Pence would defend this, that, or the other. It might work. Donald Trump presents an alt-right internet argument. Mike Pence is presenting something that sounds like a less alt version of the right wing internet argument. Kaine is trying to meet him there. That's what the can't believe he would defend line is about. Whether or not that works is an interesting question; when Kaine ticks off policy points, Pence skips over and presents the older-school "self-righteous and clueless" argument. Watch his eyes. You'll know he's in trouble when his eyes start to remind you of George W. Bush.
I think it's going pretty much as expected - facts and logic vs bluster and duplicity. Extra points for anyone that can guess who's who...
I think I expect more, in general. But that's just it, I'm probably considering an idyll, not an expectation compared to reality. It's an undignified spectacle, but Governor Pence seems to have at least partially collapsed. Notice he's actually letting Kaine strike, and not putting much into pushback; it stood out at the ninety minute mark, as they went back and forth, and Kaine hit again with Trump's words and Trump's words and Trump's words and Pence just couldn't figure out how to steer this back to his trad-right internet stump. In terms of the shitshow, though, Kaine is kicking Pence into the ground. I have no idea what the rest of the nation and world thinks it's seeing.
I haven't watched it yet. But then again, the Republican National Committee released a statement before the debate began announcing Pence had won and why. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!. So who needs to watch it? Before the debate began the RNC told us what happened, who won and why. So why does anyone need to watch it?
Well, I understand Pence didn't do so well. I hear Pence did better than Trump, but that's a pretty low bar. I understand he was evasive and he put distance between Trump and himself. Pence didn't attempt to defend some of Trump's positions. That's something you don't normally see. In fact, I've never seen it. Pence declined to defend Trump on numerous occasions and that was and remains his job. You just don't see that, but tonight we did. To me it sounds like Pence lost and gave Democrats a lot of material to discredit him with in ads. Pence lied his ass off.
It depends on how you score it. Kaine came out like a vampire rabbit on adrenochrome, and that really did hurt him in that first part when the whole debate was a complete wreck. Chris Matthews gave the debate to Pence on style, owing to his Beltway-insider perspective reminding that substance doesn't matter. And it's true, as ridiculous as Pence's "composure" looked, he maintained it. Still, though, he handed everything back to Kaine―says me―because by diverse opinions―out there―Pence buckled and broke under the impact of Kaine's attacks. By the end, as Pence failed to actually answer the question about faith―even more ridiculously than he ducked other questions, all things considered, because I also agree with the observation via someone on msnbc that this was the most genuine discourse of the night―and Kaine went on the attack one last time, the Indiana governor had nothing left. He actually graciously shut the hell up to let Kaine throw a few more punches. It's true, Kaine jumped out of the gate like an electrified hare mainlining caffeine, but the stylistic deficit he invoked might well have proven out as an investment, because he bloodied the hell out of Pence, who in the end looked like he couldn't even muster one last feeble denial of reality. It seems almost strange how, in this outlook, with Kaine damaging himself on style, all Pence had to do was hold the line, yet the hardline conservative who is said to be not so bright↱, could not manage to muster one last denial of reality. The question seems to be what the wider audience noticed. Kaine's demeanor would hurt in any other year, but this is a really weird cycle; and there is also the fact that he appears to have at least pulled off the part about thrashing Mike Pence into submission.
Didn't watch the entire debate, but it seemed like both did fairly well (as compared to the Trump and Clinton's debate, anyway). I found them both to at least be respectful towards letting the other speak, seems Pence is classier than Trump. Maybe that's not saying much. lol And on the sidelines, rumor had it that Trump was tweeting insults about Kaine, while Pence was busy trying to defend Trump's incessant need to insult people. lol #awkwardmoment
It depends on how you define "defending". Either Pence defended Trump by claiming this or that never happened, or else he didn't really do much defending of Trump. There is, though, one point I'm watching toward the end, when Kaine started in again, and it's almost like Pence just got the hell out of his way. I'm wondering how that plays in tomorrow's analyses. Oh, right. Yeah, apparently Trump was tweeting throughout. I haven't picked up the content, yet.
This take: On substance, Kaine had an unopposed dunk and eventually made it, bouncing the ball off of his face but into the hoop. On style, Pence reassured the "undecided" that there is a pro-life law-and-order Reaganesque (complete with quotes - "There you go again") adult on the Republican ticket, and "Trump's choice" (ok, but that's how it plays) in that regard was not an incompetent one - to some degree shoring up two major weaknesses in Trump's campaign. It says here that the polls will show that brings significant numbers of evangelicals on board the Trumpwagon, on top of the shitforbrains "independent" and "T-Party" bigots, as not only Trump voters but likely voters. That flips Ohio, and also means it's going to the wire in the popular vote. The combination raises the specter of voter suppression, which is a near certainty but in practice can have only localized effects - it needs a tippable race. At this plateau, then, the electoral college map saves the country from voter suppression - too hard to tip. http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/ Four more weeks - since the Clinton-slide countdown started six weeks ago, Trump has shot off a toe each week, as hoped. Cross your fingers.
I just want this farce to be over... shit, at this point, I think "Cataclysmic Meteor 2016" is our best option...
This is just another quadrennial mass insanity. Consider it poorly scripted entertainment.("reality tv")
It appears Pence received a lot of points for simply being calm even though he diverged significantly and even contradicted Trump's policies. So now we have a policy split on the Republican ticket. We have a Republican vice presidential candidate at odds with the party's presidential candidate. I've never seen that before. That just hasn't happened in my lifetime. So while Pence gets "style" points for simply being calm, the party has some explaining to do in the days and weeks ahead. How does the party reconcile the policy differences between Trump and Pence or does Pence flip back to Trump's policy? It's a strange thing. In my book, you don't get points for being calm and evasive. You get points for being honest and accurate. That's not what Pence did last night. Pence did give the Clinton campaign a lot of ad material during the debate. They can very easily point out the differences between what Pence said last night and what he and The Donald have said before. Clinton can easily expose Pence's lies for what they are in the coming days and weeks. So while some folks, mainly media folks, give "style" points to Pence for being calm and evasive, I think substance and honesty win over style, at least in my book they do.
Poorly scripted indeed... it's harrowing to think of how low our "two party" mindset has brought us Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Pretty much... though I wouldn't mind a small (okay, tiny) meteorite taking out... well, no, I guess that's mean... Heh... honest and accurate hasn't exactly been a core principle of this election cycle... on either side of the party lines.
Pence did a lot of lying last night and he wasn't fact checked. By diverging from Trump's policies Pence is apparently attempting to set himself up for a future presidential bid. That brings us to Trump. The questions are, will The Donald learn anything from Pence's performance last night, and is The Donald threatened and angry with Pence for upstaging him? The big loser last night was Cruz as he now has a rival. Pence lied his ass off. And as for the debate moderator, what moderator? The moderator was incredibly weak.
A 2 party system run by the elites(Tweedism) A standing land army Almost constant Foreign military entanglements We seem to have traveled a far piece since 1776-1789 ......................................... Ancillary? Long ago and far away: I once wrote a paper on social/political darwinism as re The history of Chinese empires. Wherein I postulated that after some disaster or another, they would start off with a free peasantry. Slowly, power would migrate to the center, then taxes and corruption would increase. The local powerful politicians would find a way to not pay their share of the taxes while the total tax burden was increasing. When the taxes became unsustainable for the small farmers, they would sell,or give/surrender, their taxable land to a local lord and work the parcel as tenant farmers, then a serfs, and finally as "serfs attached to the land" = slaves who could be sold with the land, and who could not even marry without the permission of the lord. The average life of the polities was about 200 years. And then another disaster/famine/flood/invasion/etc... repeat above
Given that in the 1790's we had: -Two political parties (Federalists and Democratic-Republicans) -Elites represented in government (Senate; to replace the House of Lords in England.) They were given "more authority to ignore mass sentiment in favor of the country's broad interests" - they would "restrain, if possible, the fury of democracy." -An army, navy and marine force fighting at least two wars (American Indians and French) I'd say we're in the same general territory.
ok cool feeling better now thanx couple things standing land army? foreign military engagements/entanglements? ... oh yeh and taxes?
