FIRST RESPONSE

On listening to the presidential debate in Mississippi between Obama and McCain my first reaction was utter frustration. Stupidity and ignorance reigns.

The debate has on important consideration become bipartisan and narrow with no alternatives. Onward with the American Empire, and everybody else, including the American people, do not matter. Big Brother forever! More, more war and murder. Actually as a matter of elementary logic, if the the amount of money spent has not made them safe, then it ought to be spent more wisely. The issues related to the Pentagon budget were not considered, although McCain took time out on his ridiculous nonsense on earmarks, which while not insignificant are not the major budget items. No discussion whatsoever about the causes of terrorism.

Compared to what I have just heard, in particular from McCain but Obama as well, Palin improves in comparison. They are either ignorant or lying, and they have no excuses as Palin plainly does.

McCain claimed, more than once, in effect that I have ability, knowledge and judgment to begin in the job of President without on the job training.

Neither he or Obama seem to understand that the invasion and occupation of Iraq is a crime by the standards of Nuremberg. The claimed success of the Surge in Iraq is a fiction, in large part because of ethnic cleansing and creation of the walled city of Baghdad. What about the numbers of Iraqis murdered? What of the refugees (at minimum 2 million people)? The stupid conflation of Al Qaeda and the Taliban, without any apparent comprehension of the Pashtun resistance to outside invasion. The failure to understand that border between Afghanistan and Pakistan was a fictitious creation of the British imperialists.

And on it goes. The failure to recognize that the Georgians launched attacks effectively on a Russian population on the border of Russia. How would the Americans have responded in a similar case. Is the Texas Republic an analogy? Of course, American history is such a memory hole, it is probably pointless to remind ourselves what happened in the past, and is set in concrete it seems to continue in the future.

The debate was so narrow and so ignorant that it was pointless, other than to suggest more murder, more war, more imperialism. Stop the criminal behaviors. Indict the criminals. Address the needs of the American people for health care and other social investments and act as an imperative of atmospheric pollution and the threat to all life on the Planet.

Where was Ralph Nader?

(Fingers crossed via Democracy Now)

To think that James has been telling this story all the time. He is right. The choice is effectively between Obama-Biden and McCain-Palin, and I still believe that the BO choice is superior to the PM dream team. Or must that be nightmare?

Anger without action is self destructive. Action combined with action is simply destructive, now or in the future. Anger, as Martin Luther King told us has to be channeled into a constructive purpose.

ELSEWHERE:

Political Animal and Kevin Drum went in for live blogging.

The BBC seems to suggest that the rating of the debate depends on ideological disposition – surprise!

Fact checking is claims made in the debate by the participants.

Juan Cole disputes five of McCain’s foreign policy claims.

1. Pakistan is a failed state.
2. The surge.
3. Kissinger advised direct talks with Iran.
4. Torture of prisoners.
5. Warning of the mortgage crisis.

The NYT team does the close reading of the claims made. McCain turns out right on some matters, such as the amount of Fed Bonds owned by the Beijing.

The Boston Globe also undertook fact checking.

At Truthdig, Bill Boyarsky, has his peice up before even Senator McCain and Governor Palin could blink, suggesting would you know that Obama was truly a cool cat – a consistent feature of his personality, which combined with his intelligence is a plus for him. The writer observes:

McCain emerged as a die-hard advocate of the neocon philosophy that mired the United States in a senseless war in Iraq, insisting that the nation will attain its goal of coming “home with victory and honor.” It was as if he did not know that thousands of American troops had died in a war that was started under false pretenses.

Days earlier, Marie Cocco, in Truthdig, had repeated the Kennedy dictum that the unerring eye of the television camera would identify for the viewer four characteristics: “honesty, intelligence, vigor and compassion”.

Now the question might be what is the anticipation for the following debate between Biden and Palin. Biden waffles, but it is not accurate to describe what Palin has done as waffle is it?

When people in the media, supported by the vox populi of the internet, start piling in on Sarah Palin as unfit (as I believe she is too) they should remember that the people responsible are Senator McCain and his advisors. Just remember most of us would be out of our depth, and the intensity of scrutiny, is something we would not be familiar with, let alone be able to cope with. I think it was very foolish for her to accept the offer in the first place, and more foolish to offer the VP candidature to Palin. Naturally, Mudflats has the inside dope on the run along the yellow brick road. You can watch the debate again as well.

Rupert Cornwall in The Independent expresses the opposite opinion that the debate  “was one of the most high-quality exchanges ever between two American presidential candidates”. I am sticking to my first-up assessment with a little fine tuning.