Live Blogging the Palin-Biden Debate

TPM has five minutes of Palin's greatest hits. Can I make it through 90?

I haven't been able to find what this damn debate topics are? Anyone?  Maybe just ask her to name the capitals of each state and a bonus question the state flower?

I'll give you my prediction I gave the comcast forums earlier.  Palin make at least three dumb statements, Biden will make at least one gaffe.  Somewhere along the line Palin will realize she is losing, run back stage and retrieve her secret weapon, a moose.  She will proceed to shoot the moose on live television and field dress in record time.  Ifill will be speechless, the audience will be appalled, and John McCain will proclaim it a "victory" tomorrow on Morning Joe.

I also pedict that she will do well enough for this debate to be declared a turning point  by the idiots in the traditional media.

Palin is good at getting folks to reach for their wallets.

"Can I call you, Joe? Oh, great!!"

while it's generally assumed in the media and the blogosphere that everyone and their hamster knows Joe Biden, that is far from the case. Most undecideds and many soft Obama supporters don't really have any impression of him, and they're going in tonight expecting a generic boring old white guy who is smarter than Palin.

What they're not expecting is a witty, charming pol with more fire in his belly than a blast furnace. Palin may 'survive' and not exacerbate McCain's free fall, but Biden has a much bigger opportunity to actually surprise people and solidify those Obama numbers. Contrary to what the media would have us believe, Palin is not debating a wall. She's debating Joe Biden, and as much the media wants to ignore him (MSNBC actually declared him irrelevant today), he won't let them and the possibility of a brilliant "A noun, a verb, and 9/11" quip far exceeds that of a gaffe. People forget that Biden smoked the other candidates in the primary debates. This is his element and if Palin thinks surviving is enough, she's in for a brutal surprise.

Half Baked just told us we were!

so far.  she really really wants two Mavericks in the White House.  Does it have a garage?

It's like a disastrous blind date where you are counting the minutes until you can get out the door.  She's talking about 'Meracans hurtin' and we can learn a "heck of a lot" about blah blah,

darn right. folksy talk.  blah blah.  I'm thinking definitely bipolar.  (and she would think I was telling her that she is attracted to female bears)

Can the debatee set the rules?

If my kid tried that in the classroom, he'd be sent to the office.

As he tries not to hit her off the stage. Ahhh there he goes. She did not answer the question.

run out of dialog already?

The same coaches as McCain told her to repeat, repeat, repeat.

"Patriotic is to get out of the way of private interests."

Interseting, the debate, despite the questions, keeps turning to taxes. I suspect that's by design on one side, similar to the last debate. Hmmm

[but joe does know taxes ... from the blue collar point of view]

Joe is getting to hit down all the McCain plan(s).

The woman makes me need to scratch places I can't reach.

Like Joe Biden I don't even know where to start. She lost me when she winked at the camera. Directly at the camera. Am still recovering.

Love it. Love it. Love it.

that there was corruption and greed on Wall Street?!?!  And it has a head that rears too?  OMG.  This woman could not be more ignorant if she lived in an igloo with no communication with the rest of the world for the past 40 years.  At best, she has read only People and Us magazine for the past 10.  And whatever the name of the NRA magazine is.

I'm a huge fan of Biden's gaffes. Seriously, they're enjoyable in a certain way - every Democrat I know trades them around with glee. They're fond of Biden. They add a goofy element of fun to the ticket. And they add some warmth to the (reputedly) cool Obama. And they're never mean.

And you know, after eight years of Cheney, some yucks with the Dems' fave crazy uncle Joe is a net positive, in my view. Plus, he's got real policy chops. I know a lot of libs and big-time change-maniacs hated the choice, but I think it's worked beautifully.

He'll take it easy tonight, and he should. Though a friendly gaffe would be make it more interesting!

She does know how to talk to a camera. You can tell she's been a broadcaster. That's a weapon, if only in this medium, in this type of broadcast.

Please put the endings on your words...

as a former English teacher and communications specialist, the way she leaves out the ends of her words drives me crazy!

Is that some kind of dialect?

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

America leads against climate change?

I feel like I'm watching a character from Alice in Wonderland:

The Mock Turtle
Reeling and Writhing, of course, to begin with, and then the different branches of arithmetic -- Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision.

That was very cool! Gotta understand the cause in order to figure out the solution! Biden is staying very focussed. Palin is moving off topic.

On optics, Palin is coming across well.  But gawd -- what is the McCain/Palin theory - more regulation or government out of control?  Are they populists or are they for the wealthy? 

I find it ick that Palin is saying "Barack".

Wind her up and hear the bromides, spin and facial movements that present like spunk. It is quite amazing. She is the closest thing we have seen to date to a "virtual candidate".   

looks like women are being more sensible and teh stoopid men are thinking with their you-know-what.

amk

Am I correct in my observation the when Palin looked at Biden and addressed him sle slowed her speech and spoke each word distinctly like he was slow or hard of hearing. 

d-oh! She said Nucular!

Biden, out of the park on same sex relationship! No hesitation. Awesome.

Some of my best friends are gay?

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

where's that?

Ooh, now Biden's started calling McCain "John."  More effective even than her callin Obama "Barack."

Why are we going over the same stuff over and over and over?

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

...to say "nuclear" instead of "nucular?"  Dunno, maybe I'm old-fashioned and our language is changing?  Or, am I discriminating against learning disabilities?

but she can't say "Nuclear"

I found my blood pressure going through the roof at the start of the debate, so I decided to mute it so I don't have to listen to Palin's whiny, grating, artificially folksy voice, and turned to CNN.  Now I'm so busy reading the closed captioning and watching the audience ticker-thingie that I don't have to look at her scary-pretty face.

They sure did a damned good job of prepping her.  Joe Six-Pack will be very, very impressed.  I expect to hear a lot of gushing from pundits on all points in the spectrum.

Gender is a very real issue. The gender issues in this election are fascinating.  A black man represents the most "feminine" outlook (stop a war, compromise, interconnectedness).  Many men respond well to Palin because she interacts first as a female.  Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, is somewhat beyond gender in terms of her public presentation or professional dealings. She interacts first as a professional.   When a woman interacts first as a female, this psychologically puts men at ease because they can fall back on traditional roles.  This is not sexual, per se, but keeps in tact comfortable gender roles.  

Too much looking back by Obama/Biden. Change is coming with McCain/Palin.

Palin's smile is false. She is angry but smiling to cover.

John's answers on Lebanon were freakishly wonky.  I know what he's talking about (see title of post for a clue) but I doubt that a tenth of the viewing audience does.

Am I showing some moral weakness by loving the gender-separated CNN audience response thing?

She keeps on smiling her face off during Biden's empassioned answers. Gosh darnit she's playing that cute game again! Is she going to get the "giggles"?

Too much of a starry-eyed look from Gov. Palin?  I'm so biased, I don't know if I'm being too subjective to think that.  It seems strange to me.

I have counted 7 times she has said "nucular"

And we are building SCHOOLS there, y'all! For the sweet little democracy-loving brown children.

 Joe Biden is a heck of a lot smarter than Bridget to Nowhere.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosniaks  but its real!

I love Joe Biden.

She's doing pretty well. Makes you wonder at the insanity of hiding her away so that every interview gets major attention.