Posts Tagged ‘debate’


Consistency Is A Measure Of Thickness

August 24th, 2007 by Oskar Kennedy

Dear Little Bald Bastard,
  Have you ever thought about politics?
- Will Vote For Food

Dear Will Vote For Food,
  I burn a lot of brain cells fuming about how modern political discourse sounds like an elementary school playground. Contentious issues are debated in a more verbose version of “nuh uh!” “yuh huh!” and there’s a remarkable amount of noise that carries very little information.

  However, I suspect that the thrust of your question is whether or not I’ve ever considered running for office. I have considered it, and pretty much ruled it out. I’m appalled by the the money-driven campaigning process. I find the personalities and people who are attracted to politics irksome. I can’t stomach the necessary pandering to every group and interest that it takes to get elected. Finally, there’s enough questionable conduct in my misspent past that I doubt I’d survive the public vivisection that awaits a candidate for any office higher than dogcatcher.

  But the thing that turns me off most about American politics is the way that anyone who has the temerity to allow their opinions to be influenced by actual events is labeled a “flip-flopper.” Seriously? The whole of scientific and intellectual pursuit is grounded in the proposition that you have to be willing to scrutinize your beliefs. You base your opinions on the best available evidence, but if new evidence undermines those beliefs, you have to be willing to abandon them, no matter how compelling or comfortable they are.

  That’s why science is inherently progressive. You can believe as hard as you want that the Universe revolves around the Earth, until somebody points out that the other planets move in a way that only be explained if they and the Earth are all orbiting the sun. At that point, I want the people in charge of my country* to have the intellectual fortitude to not jam their heads in the sand and insist that the Universe is heliocentric.

  If, to use a purely hypothetical example, you support a military action due in part to evidence that the target is trying to build a nuclear weapon, and later it turns out that the nuclear weapon bits were incorrect, withdrawing your support for that military action wouldn’t make you indecisive. It would make you a person who values truth over slavish devotion to an erroneous idea.

  And yet, for some unfathomable reason, the American voting public relates to its elected officials like a four-year-old to its father. Daddy knows everything; he can answer every question you pose, and he’s never wrong. Why would he ever need to change his mind?

  All of that is a long way of saying that I don’t think I could get elected to political office. I don’t believe I have a soul to sell, but I do value what’s left of my brain, and I pride myself on a modicum of ability to think critically. Until being a successful politician doesn’t necessitate coating one’s brain in intellectual cement to block out new information, I’ll have to stay on the “despondent voter” side of the political equation.

* For purposes of America, assume these people are old, rich white men.

[x-posted from Ask The Little Bald Bastard]

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Debate Liveblogging

September 26th, 2008 by Oskar Kennedy

EDIT: Wow, that was an experience. I’m not sure if it was successful or not, but kind of fun. Although it made it hard to actually pay attention to what the candidates were saying. I’ll have to think about whether or not I want to watch or type next time. 

(more…)

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Reader Opinions Wanted

October 1st, 2008 by Oskar Kennedy

I can’t decide if it’s worth it or not to try liveblogging the Vice Presidential debate tomorrow night. Joe Biden has a solid track record of at least one completely insane statement per public appearance, and Palin appears to be a big, flaming bag of whackjob incompetence. It could be comedy gold, and a lot of fun to write about. On the flip side, the candidates’ aggregate bat-shittery should be impressive enough on its own, and might not gain much from my commentary.

It might be worth it just to wait and embed the video of the best moments.

What do you think?

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Decision Reached

October 2nd, 2008 by Oskar Kennedy

I won’t be liveblogging the Vice Presidential debate tonight. It turns out I’ve got too much else to do tonight. If I come up for air long enough that I can even watch the debate, the last thing I’ll feel like doing is typing the whole time.

I hope that Biden is his usual crazy self. I really hope that he doesn’t go soft on Palin because she’s a woman. The misplaced chivalry that leads a male politicians to back off a female opponent is well-intentioned, but ultimately does her a disservice.

If Palin is qualified to be Vice President*, she has to be capable of holding her own in a debate without any special treatment. Let her succeed – or crash and burn like the Tunguska meteor – on her own terms. We can’t coddle her, and we can’t let her get away with any bullshit that we’d set on fire and ram down the throat of a male opponent.

Enjoy the spectacle, folks. I expect at least one new catchphrase to enter the cultural continuum by tomorrow morning.

* Very few sentences simultaneously make me want to laugh, puke and cry. Good show, Senator McCain.

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Waldorf’s Week in Review

October 3rd, 2008 by Waldorf Van Buren

Sorry, dear reader(s) for the long-ass break. I could come up with tremendous excuses, rants, lies, and otherwise made up stuff about why I was out for so long, but the truth is I just haven’t found anything compelling enough to write about.

Until this week, however. . .

Thus Waldorf’s Week in Review–

Like many of my other ideas, I’m sure this one will plummet from the heights I aspired to into the depths of reality, but I shall press on and beat a dead horse. If I’ve learned anything from TV, it’s that I need to pound my points home relentlessly and make my opinion seem like fact, which shouldn’t be too hard. That, and giving up is for Democrats (see note below).

So I give you my take on the week’s events with or without facts. You know, biblically.

(–) To Sarah Palin and the Republicans. I heard so much about how expectations were lowered for the debate Thursday evening, and lowered, and lowered, and lowered. Then, this morning, the Repunditry showered her with glowing reviews because, basically, she didn’t fuck up as much as they thought she would. She just needed to show “basic competency” at the debate. Well, that’s just super-fantastic. Can I have that job? Since when does No Child Left Behind apply to Presidential Candidates?

(-) To Democrats waiting to see if Biden would fuck up by speaking his mind. What the fuck? Why not just pretape messages spoken by computer synthesis instead of actually having candidates with views, opinions, and thoughts not quite mainstream? Come on, Dems, you are better than that, aren’t you?

(-) To Palin at the debates. I couldn’t get past the “Fargo Factor” (she sounds like an extra from the movie) or the snarky, smug grin.

(+) to Biden, for showing class and poise at the debates even while stretching the truth (comparatively Biden’s truth-stretching was like trying to fit into a pair of jeans two sizes too small while Palin was trying to put Jumpsuit Elvis in a condom). But seriously, I thought he looked and sounded and acted a lot more. . . “Presidential” than any of the other three.

(+) To the Obama Campaign for recently showing two ads in the Greater Philadelphia Metropolitan area that did not attack his opponent. I think that’s FANTASTIC that the ads were issue and policy based. Well, one does have a dig or two about McCain, but they are far from the venomous attack ads put forth by the Republicans.

(–) Boo on the McCain camp for pulling out of Michigan. You’d never cut and run in Iraq!

(—) Boo on Republicans and Democrats for that crappy-ass “rescue” package. What the fuck are you thinking? I’m all for more regulation (I guess that means I’m for big government) of industries, and now so is John McCain (I guess that means he is for Big Government, too!), but I’m also for not screwing the Middle Class on a daily basis. The whole thing stinks like three-day old smelt and it distracts from the real issue – people are losing jobs. Normally companies sheds jobs near the end of the year to give their stocks a boost and their CEOs a bonus. This year the stocks will go nowhere but the CEOs will still smoke cigars wrapped in Franklins. (See, I’m so Middle Class that I think burning a Hundred is a travesty!)

(—) BOO on the idiots who keep chanting that the economic crisis is because of deadbeat mortgage holders (b-Prime Debtors). Hey shit for brains – all of you – turn off Fox News for a second. The economy has been shedding jobs for a few years now, the economic stimulus went to savings accounts, the tax breaks did NOT create any new jobs or stimulate the economy, and we are still getting raped daily by high insurance premiums that won’t cover a lot of what ails us. Excuse me, I’m foaming. . .

(+) I taught some fifth-graders yesterday and they were awesome!

(-) To anyone who says “Joe Six-Pack” in an unsatirical way.

(EVEN) To Fox for the first cancellation of a Prime-Time show this season – Do Not Disturb. While the cast looked promising, I admit it was Down the Shore bad and my only boo to Fox is that they should have axed it sooner, like before the first episode aired. My prediction is that the next three cancellations will be Worst Week, Gary Unmarried, and My Own Worst Enemy.

(-) Neil Diamond. Seriously. Come on. I don’t care if he is considered “hip” to a generation raised on Nick Hornby. I can’t stand him.

(—-) Broadway stealing from movies for the next hit vehicle. High Fidelity, now? Come on, Big Wig Producers, get someone to write something original! I understand Rodgers and Hammerstein (and Sondheim) also stole a lot of material, but at least they put new clothes on the stories.

That’s all I’ve got for this week. I’m sure next week will be more of the same.

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