Presidential Debate Episode II: Attack of the Clods

The second of three Presidential debates took place on Tuesday, and I can now officially say that I am no longer anticipating the third. This pseudo-town hall debate failed to reach expectations, and I see no reason to expect the third debate to be any different. A few days prior to the second debate, I saw a REAL town hall debate on CNBC2 between Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, and Ross Perot from 1992. I think this is the only time a Presidential debate has featured 3 people. Anyway, due to the more "relaxed" nature of the debate, the moderator, as well as the guests, were free to take the candidates up on their vague responses. No candidate was allowed to give a half-ass answer that failed to address the question. There was a moment when a guest asked one of the candidates how something specifically affected them, and the candidate gave a "political" answer that didn't really answer the question. The guest said "No, I said SPECIFICALLY YOU..." I was hoping for this sort of candor during this second debate between Barack Obama and John McCain.

Unfortunately, I did not get what I was hoping for. This debate was nothing more than a nationally televised opportunity for the candidates to recite the same old stump speeches and slogans we've been hearing on the campaign trail for the past several months. The guests submitted their question to Tom Brokaw, the moderator. Brokaw, I guess, reviewed the questions, and selected which ones would be allowed to be asked. Also, this debate was not as informal as I had hoped. The guests read their cards with their question on it, then the candidate RECITED his speech. There was no response by the guest. There was no dialogue. Brokaw did not take either candidate to task when failing to answer a question. I learned nothing new from this debate, and I saw nothing new from either candidate. I am GREATLY disappointed. Maybe on Wednesday we'll get some different questions that will prompt new responses, but I doubt it.

We did, however, witness some fairly controversial moments. The most talked about moment was when McCain referred to Obama as "that one." A lot of people, not surprisingly, are calling racism. I fail to see how that comment, while fairly disrespectful, could be construed as racist. I've been sick the past couple days, but while I was confined to my bed, did "that one" all of a sudden become a racial slur? Maybe if he said "that boy," (lol) I would understand. He didn't, though, so I don't see the big deal. I'm actually kind of surprised that the reference has been such a big deal over the past couple days. There was another moment that I found much more controversial.

One or two questions into the debate, a black man asked a question about the housing crisis. Prior to insinuating that because the man asked a question about housing that he must be losing his house, McCain said, paraphrasing him here, "I bet you never heard of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac before all this happened." I, for one, would have been pretty offended if I were that guy. Whether I'd heard of them or not, you should not assume anyone to be ignorant of anything. I'm surprised this didn't bring forth many "Oh, because he's black he must not have heard of them, huh?!?!" This comment, however, went largely unnoticed.

This all does go to show that McCain really is out of touch and is just simply too old to be President. He frequently slips up and says inappropriate things. He displayed EXTREMELY poor judgment in selecting his running mate. He is without a doubt the least cunning strategist I've seen in a long time, making COMPLETELY OBVIOUS political moves in an attempt to pass them off as being a "maverick." He's just too old and senile to realize how stupid and out of touch he is. Hopefully on the night of November 4th, he'll be put out of his misery.