As I said yesterday, I was lucky enough to volunteer to help facilitate UNLV’s Debate Watch event yesterday. You can read about the debate itself from the LVRJ:
Hyped as the single most anticipated night of the long presidential campaign thus far, Thursday marked the first time in history a presidential debate was held in Nevada.
Perhaps appropriately, given the location, the event was high-stakes. The candidates, particularly Clinton, Obama and Edwards, each had something to prove.
Panelist John Roberts of CNN confronted Edwards with issues on which he’s changed position. “You were for the Yucca Mountain nuclear repository before you were against it,” he said. “You were for the Iraq war before you were against it. … If it is fair for you to change your position, is it not fair for her to change hers?”
Edwards said it was one thing “for people to learn from their experience and grow and mature and change.” What Clinton has been doing, he charged, was trying to take more than one position on the same issue simultaneously.
Later in the debate, Edwards claimed, “There’s nothing personal about this,” saying it ought to be an issue that “Senator Clinton defends the system, takes money from lobbyists.”
Tellingly, the audience booed him. “No, wait a minute,” he implored the crowd.
ReviewJournal.com – News – FACEOFF IN THE SILVER STATE: Clinton strikes back
I don’t like to get into politics too much because it’s usually too ridiculous even for me, but I’ve got a few thoughts about the debate. This is just random thoughts…at least until I turn it into an LVBP column.
First of all, the candidates showed enough tact to call this state “Nevada” (“a” as in the second “a” in “Sahara”) and not “Nev-ah-da,” which is how most people outside the state say the word. Good thing, really, because I’ve seen people booed for doing this, and it’s one of the first things Shannon Bybee educated me about when I started at UNLV. So they’ve been around the state long enough (or listened to enough locals) to know that this is good form.
How about Obama going for the cheap pop hometown right out of the gate: “Well, first of all, I’m really happy to be here in Nevada, and I appreciate this opportunity,” were the first words out of his mouth.
Seriously, when Mick Foley used to do this with wrestling audiences it was with tongue planted firmly in cheek–how naive does he
think we are? It’s one thing when a fat guy who gets paid pretend to fight says how happy he is to be here…right in LAS VEGAS, NEVADA for a cheap pop, and it’s quite another when the prospective leader of the free world does it.
Also, Obama got that deer in the headlights look during the next question when the heckler wouldn’t shut up. He just had a look on his face like, “Someone please help me.” Not exactly the kind of instinctive response you’d want from a wartime president. It would have been great if he’d have paused, let an expression of grave concern wash over his face, and then said, “Don’t tase him, bro!” The laughter would have downed out the heckling, and he would have shown some improvisatory wit. Eh.
Kucinich seemed like a wannabe demagogue, blathering on and on about how he was the only working class guy on the stage, and calling Edwards a “trial lawyer” like it was a schoolyard taunt. Judging from the opinion poll, “Congressman” is about the dirtiest name you can call someone these days, so I’d think twice before calling names.
I liked Biden’s “No! Don’t make me speak!” after Clinton and Obama dominated the first ten minutes.
Seriously, the first question was almost like, “Hillary, tell us why you’re so great. Follow up: everyone else, tell us why she’s not.”
Nobody seemed to advocate free trade (NAFTA-bashing almost by rote, and Clinton called for a “trade time-out,” whatever that is), but amidst the protectionist ranting also implored Mexico to improve its economy…without access to American export markets, I guess.
On the foreign policy side, it was amusing how the candidates agreed that the greatest threat to the US was not the rising economic power of the euro, the threat of a Russian revanchist movement, China’s rising military and economic power, or the Islamic fascist fundamentalists who have said, time and again, that they’d like to kill us all, but the sitting president of the United States. Because sitting at home and not provoking anyone worked so well in 1939, didn’t it?
Immigration: with all the talk of who was legal and illegal, I was waiting for Ali G to take the stage and ask for a definition of “barely legal” (watch that clip if you haven’t seen it–it’s worth it).
More talk, more counter-talk…nothing that memorable, but a few mentions of Yucca Mountain and a faith that, no matter how bad things get, science will bail us out with “renewable resources.” And if you don’t think so, you’re a pessimist.
Then onto the “real questions from real people,” and boy, were those scripted or what?
There was a gaffe that absolutely no one picked up on. When a self-described 30-year casino booth cashier asked a question about Social Security and Medicare, Obama got to answer. Once again going for the cheap pop, he started with, “thank you for the question, and thanks for the great work you do on behalf of the culinary workers, a great union here.”
One problem: casino cashiers aren’t members of the Culinary Union.
It’s as if someone patted Obama on the back and said, “thank you, Congressman, for all the great work you do on behalf of the Republican Party, a great political organization.”
And I what about the idea that you work “on behalf of” your union. Aren’t you working to make a better life for yourself and your family? Or, at the worst, lip-syncing to an awful Loverboy song and working for the weekend?
No, you’re working for your union. And Obama wasn’t the only one–there was a big collectivist bias among all the candidates. “Seek safety in groups” was the implicit message that, sometimes, wasn’t so implicit. For example, Clinton chimed in with her thoughts on merit pay for teachers. In her view, it shouldn’t be given to exceptional individuals, because individuals don’t matter–it’s the “team” that’s important. So the entire “team” at a challenged school should be given merit pay…which gives them absolutely zero incentive to make it less “challenged,” lest they lose their merit raise.
But it’s a happy vision, Better Living Through Government. Neil Peart may have said it best:
We’ve taken care of everything
The words you hear the songs you sing
The pictures that give pleasure to your eyes
Its one for all and all for one
We work together common sons
Never need to wonder how or why
Look around this world we made
Equality our stock in trade
Come and join the brotherhood of man
Oh what a nice contented world
Let the banners be unfurled
Hold the red star proudly high in hand
What a nice contented world indeed.
Then there’s the final question, which introduced millions of Americans to a real UNLV undergrad:
MARIA PARRA SANDOVAL (ph): Maria Parra Sandoval (ph), and I’m a UNLV student. And my question is for Senator Clinton.
This is a fun question for you. Do you prefer diamonds or pearls?
(LAUGHTER)
(APPLAUSE)
CLINTON: Now, I know I’m sometimes accused of not being able to make a choice. I want both.
(LAUGHTER)
(APPLAUSE)
MALVEAUX: Do we get to ask any of the other candidates or I supposed just Senator Clinton?
BIDEN: I’m for diamonds. Diamonds.
SANDOVAL (ph): It’s the only thing — it’s the only thing shiny up there.
MALVEAUX: OK. Thank you so much.
BLITZER: All right. So on that note, diamonds and pearls, I want to thank all of the Democratic presidential candidates for joining us here this evening. Let’s give them a big round of applause.
Wow. I guess she was the “plucky comic relief” or something, but I’ve got to think that the UNLV administration would like that one back. I guess they’d already talked Medicare, Social Security, and that little war on terror to death, so why not some irrelevant question about precious gemstones?
And Clinton didn’t even answer it, though Biden did. No, it’s not that he has a diamond fetish–Delaware is the Diamond State, so he’s obligated.
Still, it would have been nice to have a student ask a penetrating question about the future, or something that drew out the candidates’ character. But no, just diamonds and pearls.
The only way that works at all is if it’s some kind of Gen-whatever sexual reference that most of the audience didn’t get. Then, that would be the best question ever, at least for everyone under 20 who gets the joke. If it is taken at face value, though, it’s the lamest question ever.
So those are my thoughts on the “Sin City Showdown,” as CNN called it. I say next time give each of them $100,000, sit them down at a poker table, and let them place no limit Texas Holdem. With the hole card cam and the right commentary, it’d be better TV.
