Debate - Round 2 Options

[Robert]

I can tell you 5 minute in an they have both already pissed my off.
Both spouting facts which were proven wrong after the 1st debate, an they still repeat them because they know most people won't know they are wrong.
Obama - tax cut for 95% is a lie
McCain - $700 billion sent outside the US for oil is a lie

I swear to god I'm seeing red right now





Fantastic question from the audience.
How can we trust either one of you when it was both parties which got us in the mess.
Obama ignored the question an blamed bush.
McCain did a little better but it was a perfect question for him.






so far obama has repeated 2 lies from the 1st debate
McCain has repeated 1





One issue Obama brought up which I do agree with is civil service.
The whole idea is contrary to my base conservative beliefs but I would completely support some form of near compulsory civil service.




McCain just caught up to Obama by repeating his 2 lie from the 1st debate.
But Obama retakes the lead by repeating the 95% tax lie for the 2nd time just in this debate.




Brokaw gets a cookie for holding both accountable to their time limits.




I did get a little laugh from McCain saying "I'll answer the question" in reference to Obama going off on a different subject.
I'm getting sick of McCain an his broken record "my friends"





Does this debate just suck more than normal. There is to little direct answers to the questions from either of them.






Both have again repeated more lies from the last debate. They do this because they think most people won't know the difference, what's really sad is they are right.

[Robert]

The questions
1) Whats the fastest solution to the bailout.
Both failed as they used this opening question for their stump speeches.
I think McCain stayed a little more on topic, then failed to explain his idea for using part of the bailout to buy homeowner mortgages. Could have been a good idea but failed to get the idea across.
2) How will the bailout help regular people
Obama was better on this question right up until he clouds the subject an basically lies about McCain.
Obama says McCain has always been for deregulation which caused the financial mess.
McCain's the one who co-sponsored a bill to increase regulation an oversight on F&F 3 years ago, it's part of the senate record. Obama then goes on to claim he's the one who really tried to prevent it because he wrote a letter addressing his concerns to Paulson an Bernanke. Sorry but I think that a cop-out. He wrote a letter???
Private citizens write letters to officials to voice their concerns. Obama is a member of congress, he could have done a hell of a lot more that right a letter. For instance, maybe introduce legislation, or did he forget he's a legislator.
Obama won on the initial answer to the question but totally failed when he tried to follow up.
3) How can we trust either of you when BOTH parties got us into this crisis.
Obama fails to answer the question, says you're right there is a lot of blame to go around, then does nothing but blame in on Bush. No doubt it was an effective answer considering Obama's strategy is to blame Bush an then compare Bush to McCain.
McCain did a much better job answering the question.
4) What sacrifices will you ask America citizens to make?
To me McCain clearly wins this question but the problem is he was honest. There are government programs we will have to cut ( we're broke, we have to cut spending or at least be more effective about it )
The bad thing is nobody wants to discuss this because talking about cutting government programs loses vote while talking about new government entitlements is a way to buy votes.
So while he was honest to admit this, it did zero to help him an probably hurt him.
Obama gave the typical politicians answer. Be smarter about how we use energy, then goes right back into more government subsidies, we're going to help you buy a more fuel efficient car, we're going to help you weather proof your house.
I really disagree with Obama's response during the follow up discussion. Goes on the attack about how McCain wants to give a big break to these corrupt CEO's by lowering the corp tax rate, It's plays into the anger everyone feels right now but cutting corp taxes goes way beyond helping Mr CEO, it will be the single quickest way to help recoup the losses by every American's 401k an retirement plan.
5) When will you reform Social Security and Medicare?
Obama refuses to answer the question, instead he repeats his lie about his tax plan an again attacks McCain taking advantage of the current anger at wall street to points his finger at McCain an labels his plan to cut corporate taxes as a tax break for CEO's
While McCain didn't offer a clear solution he at least responded to the question with possible ways to fix the problem.
McCain defiantly won this question.
6) How fast will you propose new environmental policy?
McCain offered a fair response as I agree with his energy plan more than Obama's.
Unfortunately this is a perfect question for Democrats an would probably score better with this regardless of his answer.
I don't agree with it but this one almost by default goes to Obama.
I also tend to agree more with McCain on the follow up question.
When it comes to developing clean energy, should be fund a Manhattan type project or 1000 garage style projects. I would lean more to McCain's answer by doing both. Start out with the Manhattan type to get the initial science out of the way, then hand the project over to the private sector to improve it.
7) Should health care be treated as a commodity?
Again neither person actually answered the question.
This is a hard one to judge, with fact checking both candidates lied on their answer. If you ignore they both lied an fail to answer the question, Obama offered the better fictional story.
The follow up discussion I would give to McCain but I'm sure must people would disagree with me.
"Is health care a privilege, right or responsibility"
I 100% agree with McCain's answer that it's a responsibility ( poor term but fairly accurate )
Because I disagree Obama's answer that it is a right. His answer was bogus because he says in a county as rich as ours we should be be able to supply health care to everyone.
Two problems, 1st it's not a right, 2nd our country is on the verge of economic collapse so I don't see how he can say in a country as rich as ours. We as a country need to learn some sense of financial responsibility. I believe the government is responsible for providing a safety net for those who can't do for themselves but I absolutely disagree with the idea of 100% government sponsored health care. If you want to know why just look at the $30 billion in Medicare fraud last year.
8) Will the economy affect America's role as peacemaker?
I think McCain wins this one. I'm sure Hamma/HF is going to roll his eyes on this one but I liked McCain's answer better. Obama did a good job using this to attack McCain, bad thing is he had to repeated a lie from the previous debate. ( the size of surplus in Iraq )
The follow up discussion was "What is the Obama Doctrine an what is the McCain Doctrine"
Obama offered a good answer, McCain failed to offer a direct answer, weak effort to attack Obama.
9) Should America pursue it's enemies in Pakistan?
Obama won this not because I agree with him but because McCain totally failed on his answer.
Obama also won the follow up, but barely
10) What will your strategy be in Afghanistan?
Tie on the answers, this would be one of the few questions where neither brought up previous debate lies.
11) How will you deal with Russia
Both gave reasonable answers
The follow up question was "Reagen called Russia an evil empire, under Putin would you agree. A yes or no answer please"
Obama gave a 20 second speech without really answering the question. McCain answered maybe.
I thought maybe was a great answer. McCain did go on to clarify his answer after the MOD asked.
12) Will you support Israel militarily if Iran attacks them?
Both offered good answers. This would be one of the rare occurrences when McCain really identified with the audience ( shaking hands with the petty officer )
I think McCain won this one on both sides, a better answer an a effective attack on Obama.
13) What don't you know an how will you learn it
While this was kind of a silly question, it's also what makes town hall style debates great.
I'm sure a lot of people liked Obama's answer but I hated it.
Talking about how he was so fortunate an wants those same great opportunities for todays young people. On the surface this sounds good but he then acts like America as the land of opportunity was lost because of Bush.
Sorry but to me it came across as America use to be good but now it no longer is.
I wish I could say I like McCain s answer better but I didn't .


Overall they both failed to answer the questions in a open, honest an direct way.
I disagree with Obama's platform on most topics so it makes it hard to be a fair but I tried my best. I would have to count this as an Obama win, not because I agree with him or he did better. It's a win for Obama because with McCain down by more than 5 points, anything less than a big win for McCain translates into a Obama win.


Thoughts, questions, comments?
Think I should switch careers or keep my day job?
LOL

[HammaTime]

"Is health care a privilege, right or responsibility"
I 100% agree with McCain's answer that it's a responsibility ( poor term but fairly accurate )
Because I disagree Obama's answer that it is a right.

Wow, phenomenal debate analysis, guys! Your insights are terrific, and a lot more balanced than some of the post debate discussions I saw last night.

Robert, I thought the question about health care being a right or a privilege was a fantastic question, and I would hope that this lousy debate will spark some national discussion over some of these issues. For instance, I'd love to learn more about McCain's plan to help homeowners as they face foreclosure. Certainly, we need a plan to keep honest people in their homes. There is no better solution to this crisis than to keep the homes out of foreclosure. This is what happened, in essence, during the Keating 5 - S&L crisis. I haven't studied that issue enough to speak in detail, but I do know the government held the paper long enough for real estate prices to rebound, and then they were able to recover their "losses." I don't believe they fixed the problem on a mortgage by mortgage basis, however. I worry that McCain's idea would be risky and very, very expensive and practically impossible to legislate something that would solve the problem on a per mortgage basis.

But, back to health care.

If you are driving down a busy street with your wife beside you and your kids in the back seat and suddenly another driver runs a red light and plows into your car, severely injuring everyone, I don't believe you would, at that very moment, feel that health care is a responsibility. You would rightfully expect the police, firefighters and paramedics to arrive, triage the scene, extract your family members from the car and race them to the hospital. If we were to live in a society where health care is a privilege, we'd expect those emergency workers to ascertain whether you had a policy that would properly cover your injuries before working to save your life, would you not? Isn't that a right as an American, as a human?

How about firefighting? That is certainly a right. If I accidentally light my house on fire, my taxes ensure that firefighters will arrive and put out the fire. I would expect nothing less. Some might say this is a public good, fighting the fire prevents the fire from spreading to another property. Well, what about an isolated rural house? Why not eliminate the fire departments in smaller towns that don't have connected structures? Sure as hell would save us billions in annual taxes.

We don't do that because the majority has decided that having fire protection is not a privilege given only to those who can afford it.

How is health care any different? If you have a decent job, I would expect that you feel health care is a right. Prisoners in the United States have a right to health care. Hell, even McCain has a right to health care because he has reached retirement age and he now can rely on Medicare. All of our retirees view health care as a right.

We certainly should view health care as a right and we should extend that right to all citizens.

Right now our country spends more on health care per person than any other nation in the world, but we consistently are ranked as one of the lowest in quality of care by the World Health Organization.

According to a recent Reuters story, American's are the least satisfied with their health care. The money quote in that article is: "Given that all countries other than the U.S. have universal health care systems in place, this may invite questions on why the U.S. remains the only wealthy, industrialized country without such a system," Harris president George Terhanian told Reuters.

Why indeed.

This post has been edited by HammaTime: 10/08/08 10:39pm