Butch Cassidy

If the shoe etc...............................

Alberta_Rose

Well Sarah Palin is Governor of Alaska and possible runner for American V-P (I think)

They were talking about her in the office this week ... she sounds a bit of a dork. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/0..._n_129318.html

Novocastrian

D'you know, I think Souv might've already known that.

Could be wrong of course.

Steve_P

Anyone going to bother watching the English language debate tonight?

I have a hockey game to attend...lucky me.

Butch Cassidy

<butch sits hammering his keyboard and muttering obscenities under his breath>

Novocastrian

Unfortunately, I'm in a difficult time zone. For both debates.

No doubt I will form an opinion tomorrow.

It will be that Harper should resign and Palin should be put down (not necessarily painlessly).

That's for tomorrow of course.

Mikey B

I didnt watch it I was busy watching paint dry

dbd33

I watched some of it. I thought Biden's dentistry unfortunate. His profile view with that pronounced grin made him look like an old lecher about to devour the plucky young woman who was giving it her all in the next window. I didn't watch it to the end as the Young American began to have something in the manner of a bad trip. "It's all too close to home! That's my country! Turn her off, turn her off, turn her off!".

The VPILF is certainly a horrific figure. While one might individually enjoy submitting to her cane the idea of her wielding it upon world leaders is surreal.

fledermaus

I watched some of both, then started losing the will to live.

Palin looked as if she was being fed her answers by an ear mic. I coudnt see one but they make those things pretty small now. Maybe she has an implant?
Whatever it was she didnt look natural at all, definitely had the look of someone listening.

Canadians, much better format, sit down nicely, then trash each other while smiling. Layton reminds me of the spiv from Dads Army. Got irritated with that too especially as we don't have a vote. The votes will be spread amongst all the parties and so Harper will be back in.

Souvenir

I don't think there was ever much doubt that Harper would get back; the issue was whether or not he'd get a majority. The polls this morning are suggesting that the Conservatives are not doing too well in QC. Contrary to what some posters have said, arts funding and child incarceration do appear to be things that Quebeckers care about. "Lead balloon" was the term used by one.

dbd33

I struggle to decide between hating him most or hating Harper most.

Layton's policies in Toronto caused me grief; the agenda of big development, concreting over the east end, the ban on children in restaurants, miserable stuff. I thought it was personally dishonest of him to draw a salary for working in Toronto while drawing another for working in Ottawa and disreputable in the extreme to occupy housing that would otherwise be available to poor people while he and Big Liv drew three taxpayer funded salaries between them. I think he's a bit of a crook and his actions have been harmful to ordinary Toronto residents while benefitting people in the suburbs. I think his actions generally cause the opposite result to his stated intent.

Harper otoh has the stated intent of doing the things Layton does through haplessness and he wants Canadians to die in the service of the Star Spangled Banner.

A grim choice.

fledermaus

I hope there is enough interest in the arts. One of the things that attracted me to this area was that there is a thriving artistic community, that one day I could join.

Sadly though I don't think its enough to swing a vote, most people vote with their wallets.

Souvenir

It's interesting to see how well Elizabeth May is doing (in both debates). The Ipsos Reid poll had 17% of respondents declaring her the winner last night. That's better than Dion.

She hasn't got a cat's chance, of course, but the media, for sure, like the fact that she's taken up sniping and is quite a good shot.

Oakvillian

I was at a work dinner last night so didn't get to see either debate, but from the reports and snippets this morning it seems one of the best lines in "our" debate was from Duceppe, when asked what would be the first thing he'd do as PM: "well, I know I'm not going to be Prime Minister. Three of you are not going to be either, but not all of you know it yet."

As to the US VP debate, it seems some commentators are trying to paint Palin's appalingly folksy turn as some sort of grand masterplan: a couple of disastrous interviews with Couric set the expectations of her debating performance so low that just by not making a total balls-up she comes out with a "did better than expected" mark. Strange game, this politics stuff.

iaink

The little I saw of the canadian debate left me feeling sorry for Harper over the format that basically left him to be ganged up on, although he did seem rather non engaged...just going through the motions. I though Elizabeth May did well, but I sort of expected that from a few other media bits of her I'd seen. Ultimately though, like Jack Leighton, she's in no danger of gaining power. For me the thing I took from it was how passionate Dion seemed that we were heading in the wrong direction and how we needed to shift policies NOW. He did seem genuine and a bit pissed off that Harper didnt get it. I was actually impressed.

The other thing that registered was in the analysis afterwards how the fact checkers weighed in several times to point out that a lot of what Harper had said was incorrect in attacking Liberal positions, and given that I really hate negative campaigning that was probably enough to push me off the fence into the liberal side of the "ABC" voting that is required in my riding. I guess its similar to last time, the threat of maybe there being a Conservative majority, but a larger probablility of another Conservative led minority government, which begs the question why bother pulling the plug on the old one.

As for the US VP debate...no clangers unfortunately. I thought Palin was a bit vapid...sticking to her hot button quotes rather than answering the questions answered, and mangling the language with horrendous run on sentences like she didnt have a clear idea what she was going to say before she opened her mouth, but she did avoid swallowing her shoes at least, so that was a victory of sorts. If she was being fed answers, the person feeding her them should be fired immediately!

Biden I thought did very well, coherent answers, avoided the pitfalls, got some good blows in on McCain. Overall though I dont think the debate will change much, but as one presidential candidate will be a target for white extremist loonies, and the other is in gods waiting room already, I do feel there is a good chance that the VP could end up taking over at some point, and Palin still scares me in that respect. Biden does not.