Oct 08
15
The Second and Third Debates
It’s taken a while but I’m just getting around to writing about the second and third debates. I’ll just give my overall impression.
The VP debate, I think, disappointed a lot of people who wanted to see Sarah Palin fall flat on her face. After mediocre appearances in some interviews with the media, there were really low expectations. Her biggest problem in those interview was she was over-coached. She tried to answer the questions how she was coached to do it. Sarah Palin isn’t that kind of politician and she and the McCain campaign quickly realized it. She can’t say things in a rehearsed manner. She is genuine and has to say things in a genuine way. Luckily that’s exactly how she did the debate. Her performance wasn’t perfect but it was very good and much beyond the expectations. Joe Biden came off slightly smoother because he’s been doing this for a very long time. His performance would have been a lot better if it weren’t for the bold-faced lies he told, for example, saying that 3 weeks in the Iraq war cost more than the whole 6 to 7 years spent in Afghanistan. He was only off by a factor of 20 when comparing the average of the most expensive year in Iraq. The fact that he can state such a bold-faced lie and come off truthful tells us more about Biden than anything else he’s ever said in this campaign.
On the second Presidential debate, I was much less enthusiastic. McCain chose to use the debate to roll out a plan to renegotiate and change the terms of sub-prime loans of people who are facing foreclosure. I’m already unhappy with McCain’s position on the bail-out package that the Senate passed. It was completely hypocritical for McCain to vote for that given the over $150 billion dollars of pork and earmarks included in that bill. I’m also very much against any bail-out bill that rewards bad behavior with huge payouts. Nevertheless, this is perhaps better said in its own post.
Now McCain wants to take loans of people how made stupid decisions and fix them for them. So if my neighbor is in foreclosure because he took out a 125% no-doc ARM that he couldn’t afford because he didn’t qualify for a more traditional loan, he can go to the federal government and they’ll reduce his principle to the current market price and give him a fixed 30 year mortgage at the current interest rate. My neighbor could end up with a better loan than I have simply because he was in default and I’ve honestly made my payments. Now if that saves his home from getting foreclosed, I might be able to swallow it just to maintain the value of my home. The thing is, my neighbor could still end up foreclosing if the new terms of the loan are still something he can’t afford (remember he got a sub-prime loan to begin with because he couldn’t afford a traditional loan in the first place). I’m a firm believer that the government should have no place in rewarding bad behavior. It should not go in and tell someone, “oh, you poor thing, you were merely a victim of the mortgage broker. It wasn’t your fault. Don’t worry. I’ll fix it for you.” People are not victims. They made these decisions of their own free will hoping to get a big payday at the end. The risk of foreclosure is supposed to temper bad decisions like that. If the government takes away that risk, what keeps them from making risky decisions in the future?
Anyway, back to the debate. McCain’s new financial plan is almost as dismal as the bail-out package he voted for in the Senate. So that didn’t endear him to me much. Nevertheless, he did well and was pretty hard-hitting without hitting below the belt. In another post I’ll talk about what I think McCain should do if he really wants a chance to win.
The funniest thing I heard said in the debate was when Obama talks about the dangers of getting oil from Russia and Venezuela and that’s why he wants to eliminate our dependence on middle-eastern oil. I do hope Obama knows that Russia and Venezuela are not in the middle east. Maybe one of his foreign policy advisers can coach him on that one.