The questions were very easy but she was very smooth and does know “stuff” — which critics keep saying is the end-all and be-all of vice president-dom. What this shows is that interviewing, like most of campaigning, is an acquired skill which a bright person with decent communication skills can master with some effort. Those campaigning skills have a lot to do with being elected and much less to do with governing. That’s part of why the discussion about these outings is so divorced from reality. In “real life” you sit, gather data, make decisions, meet with other leaders and hire/fire advisors. None of that has much to do with learning a briefing book and spitting it out in an interview, no matter how tough or easy the questioning.
So when people argue about “experience” and “prudence” it is good to remember that those very qualities are revealed by what the candidates have done rather than what they say in an interview. That said, it’s better to do better than worse in these things because the chattering class takes them very seriously. Whether voters do is unclear.
In 1897, troops from the greatest empire the world had ever seen marched down London’s mall for Queen Victoria’s diamond jubilee. Seventy years later, Britain had government health care, a government-owned car industry, and massive government housing, having become a shriveled high-unemployment socialist basket case living off the dwindling cultural capital of its glorious past. In 1945, America emerged from the Second World War as the preeminent power on earth. Seventy years later . . .
Let’s not go there.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OTdjMzQ0MTg3MDZkMWM0YWE1MGNiOTZhZTVkN2JhZmY=&w=MQ==
Here’s a bit of good, if perverse, news about one non-stimulus project. Brought to us by Senator Patty Murray.
As one of the most senior Dems in Congress, she could have had her choice of pork projects for the state of Washington. Instead, true to her reputation as the stupidest person in Congress, she chose a $3.25 billion “grant” to the Bonneville Power Administration.
Patty held a presser yesterday, announcing that the project would deliver a “swift jolt” to the Northwest’s economy. Turns out that, even without the grant, the BPA was going to start construction on the project this year. Per the Seattle Times: A BPA spokesman “said there is a benefit to the new spending authority — the equivalent of having your credit-card spending limit raised.” It’s a swift jolt, Patty, but to another part of your anatomy.
Two points from this fiasco. First, God help us when Patty is one of the economics geniuses directing us out of this recession. She can’t even deliver on the pork she thought she was sending home. Second, with luck, the next Congress might be able to reverse some of these programs — such as Sen. Reid’s “railroad to nowhere” — and maybe the BPA will never get to max out Patty’s new credit-card debt limit.
Happy Valentine’s day Jen!
This is the type of insane rhetoric from the left that makes this porktastrop happen:
“The GOP is borderline autistic in its understanding of the necessary to-and-fro of democratic government. Or rather: its ideological nature prevents it from engaging in the actual tasks of pragmatic government.”
Andrew “The Conservative Soul” Sullivan
“A Republican party that added more than $30 trillion to the future debt in a time of boom has no credible answer but raw partisanship for opposing $800 billion in the swiftest downturn in employment since the Great Depression. That’s the bottom line.”
Andrew “The Conservative Soul” Sullivan.
We are not doing Valentines Day at our home. We refuse to be manipulated by displays in supermarkets for flowers, cards and candy that now rival those for Christmas and other major holidays. Instead my wife and I just look at the stimulus bill each night and read it to our kids, telling them that a brighter future is coming. Given the size of it, we have a lot of reading. And on the bright side, they tend to fall asleep really fast too.
1100 pages of pork-laden spending can really put children to sleep.
Politicians are corrupt, vile and evil.
Not So Happy Days reported in the NYT Op-ed:
CONGRESS has made a terrible mistake. Amid a rhetorical debate centered on words like “crisis,” “emergency” and “catastrophe,” it acted too fast. While arguments were made about the stimulus bill’s specific components — taxpayer money for condoms, new green cars and golf carts for federal bureaucrats, another round of rebate checks — its more dangerous consequences were overlooked. And now the package threatens a return to the kind of stagflation last seen in the 1970s.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/14/opinion/14ryan.html?_r=3&ref=opinion
#3, I live in South Boston!! You have at least one ideological compatriot in this borderline communist state!
Oh boy! More reasons to see how my state of Washington, which once had Warren Magnuson and Henry Jackson as Senators, has fallen, when someone like Patty Murray can be “our” Senator.
President Obama is shifting next to the budget deficit for the same reason they designed and rushed passage of the stimulus package: pure politics.
He knows that the main criticism he now faces is the national deficit so he is swinging into deficit reduction mode. I would pay particular attention to the Democrat’s favor target: Defense, especially R&D and space.
Ritchie,
It could be worse, we could be living in California.
Does anyone think Obama let Pelosi write the stimulus bill so she could look like a total @ss in front of the entire nation?
Furthermore, I think that Snow, Collins and Specter (the idiot that wanted to investigate the NE Pats for spy gate), voted for the bill with the acquiescence of the Republican party. If the bill didnt pass the GOP would be criticized by the MSM for years. This way the bill passes and for the next two years the GOP points out where the money really went, into government workers and unions pockets.
#11, Good point. I agree that Specter is an idiot and spygate is one of the reasons (and I’m not even a Pats fan – DC raised, Redskins fan). When I fantasize about term limits for Congress, Specter’s name is one of the top 5 that come to my mind. (Our beloved Barney Frank and Ted Kennedy precede the buffoon from PA).
Anyway, if I happen to run into you, we can lock ourselves into a soundproof booth, get a 6-pack and discuss the vagaries of national politics without fear of mindless ridicule from our co-residents in this state.
“if Hillary rund in 2016…” How about 2012? If this turkey called the stimulus package works out like I think it will, Obama will be four and out – unless they buy the vote.