General Politics Thread

[F34R]

Both of them were crap last night. Not enough questions? Sure there were. The real problem is there weren't enough answers. They spent more time arguing and trashing each other than actually answering the questions that were asked. Pretty poor for two people that could become president. There's no hope really... unless you just support one or the other instead of supporting what needs to be done for America.

[Soldier 95B]

hthen says "act of terror" in that context talking about the original 9/11/01 attacks and the subsequent wars.

To quote Obama. "That's just not true"

Pulling a Mitt?

[Soldier 95B]

Both of them were crap last night. Not enough questions? Sure there were. The real problem is there weren't enough answers. They spent more time arguing and trashing each other than actually answering the questions that were asked. Pretty poor for two people that could become president. There's no hope really... unless you just support one or the other instead of supporting what needs to be done for America.

Everything you have just said has summed up all of the Presidents we have had in my 40 years of existence. Those things will never change.

[Sub-stance1]

Both of them were crap last night. Not enough questions? Sure there were. The real problem is there weren't enough answers. They spent more time arguing and trashing each other than actually answering the questions that were asked. Pretty poor for two people that could become president. There's no hope really... unless you just support one or the other instead of supporting what needs to be done for America.

I agree there weren't enough questions just like the first debate but Obama clearly got the best of Romney last night and his camp knows it. That's why they are bringing up the Libya thing. This kind of debate favored Obama because he connects with people much better than Romney does. Romney wasn't able to take charge and run over the moderator like he did in the first debate. I think when a person lies he should be called out on it whether he is democrat or republican. Romney did a lot of lying in that first debate and now it has come back and bit him in the ass. He lost on almost every issue brought up. He is not the same guy who we saw in the primaries. I don't think neither tackled the issues that concern most people but Obama came across more factual on each issue and Romney just stood there and really didn't dispute hardly any of it. For example, he totally exposed Romney on his claim of getting tough on China.

[F34R]

There wasn't a debate. The actual content seems to be going well for the reasons they do it the way they do though. I can see from the comments on here about "he did better than the other" kinda things.

[Sub-stance1]

There wasn't a debate. The actual content seems to be going well for the reasons they do it the way they do though. I can see from the comments on here about "he did better than the other" kinda things.

It wasn't much of a debate like last time. Obama did exactly what Romney did to him in the first one. He took control from the very beginning and pretty much stayed on him the whole time. It was moderated much better because she wasn't completely run over like the first one was. I knew this townhall thing would favor Obama, especially after he got spanked the first time. I guess he learned from Biden that when the truth isn't being told to step up and challenge them. Last night it worked in his favor.

[F34R]

It wasn't much of a debate like last time. Obama did exactly what Romney did to him in the first one. He took control from the very beginning and pretty much stayed on him the whole time. It was moderated much better because she wasn't completely run over like the first one was. I knew this townhall thing would favor Obama, especially after he got spanked the first time. I guess he learned from Biden that when the truth isn't being told to step up and challenge them. Last night it worked in his favor.

Seems like reading the fact checking sites, there all over the place between both of them.

If someone is on a side at this point, it's pointless anyways. Things will get done by whichever wins, and a lot more won't get done. That's how it works I guess. I do enjoy the perception people have on either side of the fence. If you add up all the things that each one has/will do, and hasn't/won't do, coming from pro/con sides, then really, we will have a President that sits in his office and plays solitaire.

[Sub-stance1]

Seems like reading the fact checking sites, there all over the place between both of them.

If someone is on a side at this point, it's pointless anyways. Things will get done by whichever wins, and a lot more won't get done. That's how it works I guess. I do enjoy the perception people have on either side of the fence. If you add up all the things that each one has/will do, and hasn't/won't do, coming from pro/con sides, then really, we will have a President that sits in his office and plays solitaire.

Both sides are definitely guilty when it comes to keeping certain promises. I just go on the facts and do research for myself. I didn't vote for Obama his first term but all i can do know is go buy what i see before me. When I look at both I still have more questions about Romney and where he stands on certain issues and he still isn't clear on his tax plan. Yea, we do have a bad economy but what are you gonna do? He was a business man for 25 years and has a MBA, but yet he still can't do or explain the numbers on his tax plan. Having this "i will explain that after the election' stance isn't gonna cut it.

[F34R]

My concern isn't what they have done. It's what they didn't do, and won't do. four years of putting people in place that continuously give money to businesses that don't fulfill the reason they get the money, is damn near enough to say, GTFO of office please. Add on the amount of other things... well, it sucks to be a citizen here most of the time lol. I'm thinking about moving to Sweeden or something. I told the wife that we were moving because of the "debate" last night. She said I am not going to win an election either. lol

[ps3freak18]

Both of them were crap last night. Not enough questions? Sure there were. The real problem is there weren't enough answers. They spent more time arguing and trashing each other than actually answering the questions that were asked. Pretty poor for two people that could become president. There's no hope really... unless you just support one or the other instead of supporting what needs to be done for America.

This right here sums up how I saw the debate as well. Just a bunch of bickering and not much answering the questions that were being asked. The biggest issue I had was the mediator injecting her thoughts. Mistake me if I'm wrong but isn't a mediator's job to ensure the debate doesn't get off topic and stays clean? Instead she tells Romney he is wrong. That isn't your job, let the press jump all over him. That was very unprofessional in my eyes. She flat out called him a liar on national tv.

But the way I saw it was that Obama did better this time around. Romney did about how I expected but they both acted quite childish during. Both cutting each other off, completely ignoring time, and bringing up points that had nothing to do with the topic at hand. Overall it was a loss from both sides imo.

[Soldier 95B]

but they both acted quite childish during. Both cutting each other off, completely ignoring time, and bringing up points that had nothing to do with the topic at hand. Overall it was a loss from both sides imo.

Reminds of me of every debate for presidency since at least 1971. Sad but true.

[Sub-stance1]

This right here sums up how I saw the debate as well. Just a bunch of bickering and not much answering the questions that were being asked. The biggest issue I had was the mediator injecting her thoughts. Mistake me if I'm wrong but isn't a mediator's job to ensure the debate doesn't get off topic and stays clean? Instead she tells Romney he is wrong. That isn't your job, let the press jump all over him. That was very unprofessional in my eyes. She flat out called him a liar on national tv.

But the way I saw it was that Obama did better this time around. Romney did about how I expected but they both acted quite childish during. Both cutting each other off, completely ignoring time, and bringing up points that had nothing to do with the topic at hand. Overall it was a loss from both sides imo.

The way i look at it is.......what's worse, lying to people or interrupting someone lying to people? I think Romney tried to get some foreign policy points when it back fired on him. Both candidates were aggressive and I think she did a pretty good job.

[F34R]

I don't think anyone is lying per se. I think its how the other takes one comment that the opponent made, and puts it into a scenario that makes it seem like a lie. They both change the way the other mentioned things, etc. It's despicable on both.

[ps3freak18]

The way i look at it is.......what's worse, lying to people or interrupting someone lying to people? I think Romney tried to get some foreign policy points when it back fired on him. Both candidates were aggressive and I think she did a pretty good job.

Yeah sadly enough, lying is one thing that politicians do best. But that is just not her place to say anything, simply because of the job she is performing. As I said, the media was going to rip him for saying what he said anyway so why bother. Just poor judgement on her part to participate in the debate and not trying to be mediator in the situation. Two wrongs don't make a right.

[Sub-stance1]

Yeah sadly enough, lying is one thing that politicians do best. But that is just not her place to say anything, simply because of the job she is performing. As I said, the media was going to rip him for saying what he said anyway so why bother. Just poor judgement on her part to participate in the debate and not trying to be mediator in the situation. Two wrongs don't make a right.

The only thing the moderator was guilty of was letting them go past their time limits. No need to blame the ref. Mitt should know by now to get the facts before he shoots off.

[F34R]

The only thing the moderator was guilty of was letting them go past their time limits. No need to blame the ref. Mitt should know by now to get the facts before he shoots off.

Both of them should know by now.... ffs

[Sub-stance1]

Both of them should know by now.... ffs

Both of them should, but last night only one was smart enough to step over a land mine instead of stepping on one.

[Sub-stance1]

delete post

[-Kwesnoth-]

The only thing the moderator was guilty of was letting them go past their time limits. No need to blame the ref. Mitt should know by now to get the facts before he shoots off.

Obama does the same thing if not worse, difference is, everybody..except you I guess. Know that Obama is lying since he already has, for four years.

[weskurtz81]

You guys are too funny!

[Sub-stance1]

Obama does the same thing if not worse, difference is, everybody..except you I guess. Know that Obama is lying since he already has, for four years.

yea, but we get the same Obama every time. Mitt morphs into a different person when he needs to. . Even nasty Newt called him a liar. Mitt was losing and he got caught lying trying to score points. Plain and simple.

[-Kwesnoth-]

yea, but we get the same Obama every time. Mitt morphs into a different person when he needs to. . Even nasty Newt called him a liar. Mitt was losing and he got caught lying trying to score points. Plain and simple.

So its ok to lie all the time like Obama does..but its bad for Mitt to lie sometimes?

[weskurtz81]

Interesting article from a Huff Post blogger...

NEW HAMPSHIRE—Are Barack Obama and Mitt Romney so different after all? Despite the media’s portrayal of Romney as a uniquely craven politician, the recent controversy over Obama’s views on gay marriage highlights the ways that both candidates—like nearly all politicians—have adjusted their positions over their careers for political reasons.

On Sunday’s Meet the Press, Vice President Joe Biden made unexpected news by saying he is “absolutely comfortable” with gay marriage—a remark that seemed to contradict Obama’s stated opposition to same-sex marriages. Though Obama adviser David Axelrod promptly denied that there was any difference between the two men’s views, many observers interpreted Biden’s statement as the latest example of the administration’s hedging of its position on the issue. President Obama indicated support for gay marriage in a questionnaire as a state senate candidate in Illinois but has opposed it since his 2004 US Senate campaign. As public support for gay marriage increases and the Democratic base’s demands grow more insistent, the President has acknowledged their concerns,stating last year that his views were “evolving” and that he “struggle[s]” with the issue.
In the wake of Biden’s comments and Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s open declaration of his support for gay marriage, White House spokesman Jay Carney wasbattered during his press briefing Monday by reporters who are frustrated by the administration’s doubletalk on the issue.

What’s striking, though, is the way in which the controversy has been framed. While reporters acknowledge the political concerns facing the administration, few have personalized the issue as providing some insight into Obama as a person. In Monday’sBoston Globe, for instance, correspondent Callum Borchers notes that Obama’s “position on same-sex marriage has vacillated over the years,” but does not portray the issue as one that reveals some weakness in the President’s character. Borchers even adopts the administration’s preferred framing of Obama’s changing views in the kicker to his report (though perhaps derisively), stating that “Some Democrats have called on Obama to include support for same-sex marriage in the party’s presidential platform,… [b]ut Obama campaign officials have given no indication that the president’s policy on the subject will evolve further before November.”

The second wave of coverage of the debate Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning was more critical (see, for instance, this report from the AP’s Julie Pace), but with the exception of The Huffington Post’s Sam Stein, journalists still generally refrained from framing the issue as providing some insight into Obama’s character or psyche. (Disclosure: I sometimes blog for HuffPost.) If anything, Obama has been faulted not for his shifting views, but for failing to flip on the issue before the election (ABC’s Jake Tapper: “Why not just come out and say [that he supports gay marriage] and let voters decide?”).

By contrast, the press has treated the changing positions of Romney, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, far more harshly. Consider the Globe, which has probably written more about Romney than any other publication due to his stint as Massachusetts governor. Reporter Glenn Johnson, for instance, has written of “the numerous flip-flops undertaken by Romney before, while, and since he served as governor of Massachusetts,” and suggested that they raise “character questions” about Romney. Like most of the press, the Globe thus gave significant coverage to the reference to “an Etch a Sketch” by Romney adviser Eric Fehrnstrom despite the ambiguity of the statement in question. Johnson himself wrote that “the Etch a Sketch comment affirmed… basic truths about the candidate, his staff, and the nature of the campaign they have run for the nation’s highest office,” including the fact that “there appear to be few core beliefs that bind Romney to any governing or political philosophy.”

Why have Obama and Romney’s “evolutions” been covered so differently? As Joshua Green of Bloomberg Businessweek noted on Twitter, the difference between the candidates is far less clear than the media coverage would suggest. In both cases, electoral incentives are the primary factor shaping the positions that candidates publicly profess. When those incentives change, so do their positions.

The reason is that it’s necessarily difficult to win election if you hold unpopular views. Our political system selects for candidates who have appealing messages and platforms and creates incentives for them to further adapt those messages to the preferences of the electorate. When candidates don’t adapt—e.g., Jon Huntsman in the most recent Republican presidential primary—they lose. (Which is not to say that they are consciously lying: politicians also face strong incentives to sincerely adopt the views that are necessary to receive a major party nomination and/or win a general election.)

In this case, Obama and Romney each adopted an initial set of positions that were helpful in seeking office given the constituencies to whom they were appealing—primary voters in a liberal state senate district (Obama) or general election voters in a Democratic state (Romney). As they ran for higher office, they changed and adapted those positions to better match the preferences of primary and general election voters at the state and national levels. The mismatch between Obama’s state senate district and the national electorate was quite severe, but he was protected by the fact that his position changes were mostly made under relatively little scrutiny during his freakishly easy campaign for the US Senate in 2004 and were considered old news by 2008. By contrast, Romney has been forced to revise his initially moderate positions under the hot lights of the 2008 and 2012 presidential primary campaigns, which caused him to develop a reputation as a flip-flopper with no “core.”

The difference in their circumstances—and Romney’s lack of skill at glossing over his changed views—help explain the disparity in media coverage. The underlying problem, though, is the media’s authenticity fetish. Reporters should of course fact-check false and misleading claims from political figures and pressure candidates and their surrogates to be truthful. Journalists have an important role to play in pushing back when candidates dissemble about their opponents or their policy proposals. But in a system in which politicians must adapt their own views to a shifting electorate, the media’s focus on discovering the “real” person behind the candidate’s public statements frequently produces pathological coverage. The straight-talking politician who always says what he thinks and never changes his mind for political reasons is a fiction. In a democracy like ours, true honesty is the price of representation.

[Sub-stance1]

So its ok to lie all the time like Obama does..but its bad for Mitt to lie sometimes?

Neither lies all the time but it looks bad when you get caught in front of millions of people and get corrected on the spot. I think Mitt had a bad night like Obama had last debate. Like I said before its gonna come back and bite him and it did.

[-Kwesnoth-]

Neither lies all the time but it looks bad when you get caught in front of millions of people and get corrected on the spot. I think Mitt had a bad night like Obama had last debate. Like I said before its gonna come back and bite him and it did.

Mitt doesn't have four years of lies that have shown to be lies, that Obama promised. That will do more damage then any amount of lies that Mitt might say.