My Guy Won!

Let me start by saying that I too am wearing a bracelet. It was given to me by a store clerk, and it’s made out of candy. It’s delicious.

First, flag pins on the lapels became a requirement, and now it’s bracelets. Who knew that Talbot’s would end up playing such an important role in presidential politics? I predict that full-knuckle rings saying “U.S.A.!” will be the next mandatory showing of patriotism the candidates must display.

I’m certainly not trying to make fun of those individuals who lost their children and gave these keepsakes to the presidential candidates. Rather, the bracelet moment from Friday night’s debate was a microcosm of something that pervaded the rest of the discussion. It’s one thing to make sure you have an adequate retort, but it’s another thing when that retort is basically a mirror-image of the initial comment – whether it’s Obama comparing bracelets with McCain, or McCain responding to Obama’s comments with phrases and slogans frequently used and made popular by the Obama campaign. This is one of the reasons why the only way to lose a debate nowadays is to really fuck something up.

Friday night’s debate was what I like to refer to as a “My Guy Won” debate, as in, unless you support a third party candidate, you could probably watch the debate and find a way to say, “My guy won!” It seemed to me that McCain’s strategy was to make Obama look naïve and inexperienced, while Obama’s strategy was to appear poised and confident (or “presidential,” if you prefer that dumb term). In that regard, I think we can agree that McCain’s bar was set a little higher, since making someone appear naïve and inexperienced is tough to do without a “knockout” moment and/or a big mistake by your opponent. Obama’s goal, while less ambitious, was something that was under his control and could be achieved fairly easily, unless McCain out-poised or out-confidence…ed him. But then again, McCain is down in the polls (obviously, not by a large margin, but still down), so he should be setting the bar higher for himself.

But while there was no signature moment in the debate, that doesn’t mean that there weren’t anecdotes that I could ridicule as I got drunk watching it. Here, in no particular order, are a couple of moments that stuck out to me:

McCain: We gotta cut government spending!... what was your question again?

Pretty much every one of John McCain’s answers to economic questions contained a reference to his plans to cut government spending. I realize that cutting spending is his big crusade, but considering the current economic situation, did anyone else find this move to be ironic? After all, here we are in the middle of an economic crisis that was caused by private actors who were basically free from government regulation, and the essential consensus to solve the problem is for the government to step in and spend a crapload of money.

My other problem with the “cutting spending” talking point is that it’s just a simple crowd-pleaser. I always laugh* when I see polls showing that a large majority of people say that the government should reduce spending. Well of course people want the government to spend less money – the answer lies in the wording of the question: asking if you think the government should cut spending implies that they have the ability to do so and simply lack the motivation. I’m sure the same majority of people in favor of cutting spending would be in favor of the government creating more jobs if you asked them. I’m not saying that I don’t want the next president to try to reduce government spending; I’m just saying that it’s clearly not the central solution to our economic problems.

Several of the analysts I saw after the debate talked about how John McCain did a really good job of “framing” the economic discussion by making it about cutting spending. Really? So, let me get this straight, he framed the debate just by repeating something over and over, regardless of whether it answered the question? That’s like saying “Dustin Hoffman really framed the movie Rain Man to be about The People’s Court because he kept talking about Judge Wapner.”

*I don’t actually laugh at polling data. That would be pretty pathetic.

Obama Sexy Talk

In a response to one of McCain’s fist-clenched lectures about government spending (and getting “those damn kids” off his lawn), Obama used the phrases “orgy of spending” and “hard to swallow.” Yeah, down-home folksy colloquialisms like those should play really well in Ohio – “Whelp, we have a sayin’ ‘round these parts: you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t have an orgy with it!” Seriously though, you can’t.

Listen, Barack, we’re already a little worried about the prospect of you being able to nail everyone in Hollywood if you become president, so lets try to avoid the sexual innuendo as much as possible. Unless of course you were going after the coveted Deliverance vote, in which case, feel free to tell the moderator he/she has a “purty” mouth in the next debate.

The Lesson of the Iraq War

Jim Lehrer stated that we had learned many lessons from the Vietnam War, and he asked McCain what he thought the lessons of the Iraq War are. McCain stated, “The lesson of the Iraq War is to not have a failed policy.” Gee, too bad we had to learn that one the hard way, huh guys? And who says Americans don’t pay attention to history? I feel comfortable knowing that with John McCain as president, he will never institute a policy that we already know is failed. If one of his advisors encourages a failed policy, McCain will say “Nay, sir. I do not endorse your policy of failure.” He will strike that policy with his trusty pen, and you will know their name.

Now, I’m not an idiot. I realize that if McCain had been given time to prepare an answer to that question, he would most likely have listed the specific, boneheaded moves by the Bush Administration in the preparation and execution of the Iraq War. Still, both answers underscore his unwillingness to recognize that going into Iraq was a mistake.

Obama Cops Out

McCain was pressing Obama about his lack of visits to the Middle East at several points throughout the debate. At one point, Obama’s response was something along the lines of, “I’m very proud of my Vice Presidential selection of Senator Joe Biden who is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee…” While most people would agree that Obama did indeed pick Biden to fill the gaps in his foreign policy resume, you never want to straight up admit that as a presidential candidate. Obama was sort of like, “Foreign policy? Yeah, that’s why I got Biden, remember? DONE.” That would be like John McCain saying of his pick, “I’m very proud of my Vice Presidential pick of Sarah Palin: She’s half my age, and I needed someone to show me how my Tivo works.”

McCain Compares General David Petraeus to Osama bin Laden!

Alright, I’ll admit that I’m just kidding about that headline, but in some bizarre wording, McCain stated, “The only thing General Petraeus and Osama bin Laden have in common is that they both think that Iraq is the central front in the War on Terror.” If you happened to turn on your TV at that precise moment, you would probably have thought, ‘Holy shit, did Barack Obama just say that General Petraeus is like Osama bin Laden?! That is FUCKED UP!’

I’ve heard the ‘bin Laden thinks Iraq is the Central Front’ defense of the War before, and it’s always interesting hearing it from certain people. If you suggest that we should wash our hands of the Middle East altogether, these are the same people that often say something like, “We shouldn’t take our marching orders from al Qaeda!” But apparently they have no problem taking strategic military recommendations from Osama bin Laden. Fair enough.

Obama Makes al Qaeda Sound Kind of Playful

See? I can make misleading headlines about both candidates. But I’m referring to the moment when Barack was talking about al Qaeda’s resurgence in power and influence. He stated, “al Qaeda is still out there, sending out videotapes.” Apparently, Senator Obama thinks that al Qaeda has become some sort of terrorist Netflix-type organization. But it makes al Qaeda seem like loveable losers because they’re stuck on VHS tapes, and they haven’t caught on to DVDs or Blu-ray yet.

I actually thought that Obama’s line was a clever way to convey his idea. However, I’m a petty man, and I take comfort in tearing people down.

Did You Know McCain is Old?

John McCain, like Barack Obama, has several fine lines to walk in this election, and the one that I find most amusing is that he has to cite his involvement in specific historic conflicts in order to emphasize his experience, but he has to do it in a way that doesn’t make you go, “Dude, that was, like, 60 years ago!” So, he ends up saying things like, “My friends, I’ve been involved in every national security conflict since the Lost Colony of Roanoke!,” and you’re left with a lukewarm feeling of assurance.

Conclusion

Those are pretty much all of my anecdotes from the debate. Like I said, I was drinking throughout it, so my comments eventually devolved into things like “McCain looks constipated,” which, while true, didn’t really lend itself to political commentary.

I was sober enough to see the ad that the McCain campaign quickly put out after the debate ended, mashing up the clips of Obama agreeing with McCain. I’m not surprised by the tactic, but I was surprised by the words that came across the screen: “Is Barack Obama Ready to Lead? No.” And I thought to myself, ‘Oh my God, John McCain has lost so much confidence that he’s criticizing Obama for agreeing with him! He’s going after the anti-McCain vote!’ I’ve got a new ad idea for the McCain campaign:

“Barack Obama and Joe Biden on John McCain: [cut to clips of Obama and Biden speaking of McCain’s sacrifices for the country]. We can’t afford to be led by two men who speak so highly of John McCain. That’s not the change we need…”

Anyways, in conclusion: My guy won!