Time to switch channels from jeopardy.

I cringed too...

Hillary's outclassing them all. Just by sheer force of will. But Kucinich is still the only honest one among them.

I watched "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!" instead.

Sheesh, and you're missing a surprisingly good Portland/San Antonio game to kick off the basketball season, after which we get the first game of the Kobe Farewell Tour.

'Nothing is as terrible to see as ignorance in action.'
--Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Weakness of Dems Iran policy: Iran may get the bomb
Weakness of Repub policy: Muslim extremists get Pakistan bomb

Dems were raked over the coals for the potential weakness in their policy.

Can you imagine Tim Russert asking the Republicans how they would prevent extremists from getting Pakistan's bombs if invading Iran destabilizes Pakistan?

Na ga hap pen.

I watched a very brief segment of the debate. Russert was asking about the Rangel tax proposals. Why does he feel obligated to attempt to restate a candidate's answer.

More important, when he does so why don't the candidates tell him to shut up and listen to what they say instead of attempting to make their answer something it is not. No more Russerts Matthews and other jerks as moderators. Instead get professional people who will ask a question, accept an answer and move on.

If Obama hadn't opened his yap about Social Security in a bad way to try and one-up Clinton, Russert wouldn't have as much of an opening to ask a question about it.

Kucinich may be honest, but let's face it - the guy also hears UFOs.

If Obama hadn't opened his yap about Social Security...

What kind of statement is that?!
"Gee, if they'd only avoid the issues we wouldn't have to hear them talk about them."

Yeah, much better that we debate Edwards' haircut versus Hillary's cackle versus Obama's relationship to Cheney. You know, the important stuff.

If only we could find some mad scientist to combine the best of Obama with the best of Edwards, then and only then would we have an actual Democratic contender who could seriously challenge HRC for the nomination. Where's a mad scientist when you need one!

Alton Brown is making banana splits. Sort of.

God forbid the Senator from MBNA/BofA becomes Veep.

If Obama hadn't opened his yap about Social Security...

What kind of statement is that?!
"Gee, if they'd only avoid the issues we wouldn't have to hear them talk about them."

The only thing we need to hear them say about Social Security is, "It's not a problem. Next question?"

Hillary's dual eyebrow thing was getting to me. I don't know what was up with that. Lighting? Otherwise, she handled the attacks pretty well, and she is an able foil to Tim "gotcha" Russert. But still, all the debate ability and message polling in the world couldn't beat back the Kyle-Lieberman self-imposed one-two punch to the head.

Unfortunately, I didn't see any questions on FISA and telecom immunity- that is what I was hoping we would get some answers on. Did I sleep through it or did our corporate debate lackeys filter the message again?

Hillary's dual eyebrow thing was getting to me.

Yes, the uni-brow conveys much more strength. Very Cro-Magnon.

God forbid the Senator from MBNA/BofA becomes Veep.

Yep. Sorry Joe, you fucked up...

As long as Hillary Clinton continues to portray herself (and taking credit)as co-President during the Clinton years, quizzing her about Bill Clinton quotations is fair game.

I think Hillary came across as evasive. I am not sure who that helped.

Biden made the most sense. His comments about an attack on Iran destabilizing Pakistan was down right persuasive. The idea of nuclear tipped missiles in the hands of Al Qaeda is a little more than I want to contemplate, but I wish the people around George would.

I wonder if anybody in the Bush administration had a "doh" moment listening to Biden's observation? I wonder if they will tell Dick Cheney?

Hillary will probably still be the nominee, but tomorrow morning a lot of folks are going to be taking another look at the field.

Although I would hold my nose and vote for GWB in pantsuit and pearl over the GWB or any of the Republican candidates, I think it will be a hard sell to many others.

Good luck Hillary.

MMM, Turgid. Like week-old dishwater. Makes you want to vote the dead for Hillary for sure, doesn't it?

Kucinich is also the candidate who brought a poster to a radio interview on NPR in 2004.

Somehow - call it a miracle - Hillary's meltdown puts her recent past in clear perspective. Consider the following:

On August 19, '07, speaking at the Veterans of Foreign Wars 108th annual convention in Kansas City she talked about the surge, ''It's working. We're just years too late in changing our tactics...We can't ever let that happen again. We can't be fighting the last war. We have to keep preparing to fight the new war.''

And that new war? Just ask her good friend Joe Lieberman, or for that matter one of the Neocon strategists she sympathizes with. It's WWIII, which accelerates after the U.S. bombs Iran. That's, of course, if you're paying attention. She's been counting on the fact that most Americans only respond to the buzz words she uses so frequently, such as "negotiate." Yeah, she's not telling you about the fine print, which says that she wants to negotiate after the bombs have fallen. It'd go something like this, "Hey suckas, now that you're in shambles, kick your leaders out of office and turn democratic." Sound familiar?

Or consider her recent appearance on This Week on whether she would withdraw all the troops before the end of her first term. To George Stephanopoulos: "You know, I'm not going to get into hypotheticals and make pledges, because I don't know what I'm going to inherit, George. I don't know and neither do any of us know what will be the situation in the region. How much more aggressive will Iran have become?" Clinton said. "What will be happening in the Middle East? How much more of an influence will the chaos in Iraq have in terms of what's going on in the greater region? Will we have pushed al-Qaeda in Iraq out of their strongholds with our new partnership with some of the tribal sheiks or will they have regrouped and retrenched?

"I don't know, and I think it's not appropriate to be speculating. I can tell you my general principles and my goal. I want to end the war in Iraq. I want to do so carefully, responsibly, with the withdrawal of our troops, also, with the withdrawal of a lot of our civilian employees, the contractors who are there, and the Iraqis who have sided with us."

You got that? She wants to end the war, but she's not sure when, or how, and exactly what she would then do about the "War on Terror." Well, in an open society, in a true democracy, isn't this obfuscation a form of terror? Isn't it akin to the same imperious attitude W has shown for the Constitution?

We don't have to know. When you're ready, when you feel good about the circumstances, then maybe, if you're in the mood and you're sure you can't fail - like Kissinger call it Peace with Honor - then perhaps you'll end this fiasco. Yeah. We just fell off the turnip truck so we'll take whatever you've got, 'cause we're all just idiots. Well, my fellow Americans, the idiots got a good look behind the curtain of Hillary's imperious aims last night and they'd be fools to back it.

Her pretzel logic was thus: Pass a bill calling the Iranian guards terrorists and then you're in a better position to negotiate. OK, I'm one of the millions of idiots out there - I'll admit it - so let me dumb this down so I'll be able to understand it. Let's use the playground for an example. You've been picking on me for as long as I can remember and I want you to stop without whipping you butt so, let's see, I'll call your mother a whore and we'll go from there.

That's the foreign policy strategy that's going to save America from the folly of W. What's she's not telling you is that her focus-group gurus gave her a bum steer - a fatal miscalculation: Vote yes on the bill in order to look tough. After all, they told her, no doubt, you're a lady in pastel colors and you've got to work against that, so above all, in this tough-ass world we've got going now, thanks to the Neocon nightmare, always look tough. Take no shit.

Oops. Somehow, her brilliant team of managers presumed that the people - who are passionately against the war - weren't watching, that her opponents would remain asleep and conciliatory. But autumn brings change. And her actions must bear requisite consequences. Yo Hillary, she'll be hearing more often now, we don't need your brand of "leadership."

Oddly, the nail in the coffin last night had nothing to do with the "War on Terror." She was asked about the New York proposal to provide illegal immigrants drivers' licenses. "I support it," she said. Then Chris Dodd gave an impassioned defense for not extending the privilege of driving to illegal immigrants, and wouldn't you know it? Just as Obama and Edwards have been saying about her penchant for twisting in the wind, she flipflopped. Right there on the record for millions to see. Russert asked her, "Do you support the measure?" And she said she didn't exactly support it. Huh? Well, it was a whole minute later, and as we know a lot can happen in a minute - a New York minute nonetheless - that'll inspire a shift in views.

It was the Exhibit A her detractors have been pointing to ad nauseum. It was the smoking gun, proving that she lacks conviction, and despite the bellicose tone, doesn't exhibit the kind of authority it takes to run a major city much less a world-class country.

If you didn't see it; please make a point in doing so. It's tantamount to Howard Dean's whoop in the night that returned him to political oblivion - an arena Hillary now belongs in.

She was definitely even more ambiguous and turgid than usual.

Oh please, Hillary has always been vague and aloof. We don't know if she is leaving Iraq or staying. And is she for torture or against it - she is waffling quite a bit.

I have to say, I think Edwards won that round. Iowa could serious vote for this guy, they certainly like him last time.

Me-again:

I hope so. Although I didn't watch the debates live last night, the video excerpts remind again me of why Hillary is the wrong choice. I do like Kucinich's latest tactic of questioning Bush's mental health. I think every Democrat should be publicly asking whether Bush is mentally ill - they need to keep pounding into the American public's noggin that this man is defective, dysfunctional and damaged goods. That way, the planned attack on Iran becomes a platform for impeachment and Bush will become such an albatross around the Republican Party's neck that the Democrats could run Bozo the clown and win.

TCD

Is Bush mentally ill?

How long have you waited for an opportunity to get "turgid" into a post about Clinton (even if it is Hillary)?????

Hey, jerry, don't be so hard on Joe. Joe Biden is my kind of Republican.

"Good riff from Joe Biden on Rudy Giuliani. Maybe Hillary will choose him as her running mate, and he'll fulfill the traditional veep role of being the attack dog who says stuff the president herself can't afford to say."

If Giuliani is the nominee, what Biden said needs to be the main attack against Giuliani. It easily sums up everything that is wrong with his candidacy. It's far from personal and tangential. And it helps that it's entirely true. So yes, it should be spoken by the vice presidential nominee, but it should also be said every day by the presidential nominee.

Time to switch channels when I hear "and now to the lightning round." What an idiotic, A.D.D. way to host a debate.

Anyone who knows that LBJ commingled the social security fund with the general fund during Vietnam and knows that the US is bankrupt, knows that the answer is: SS is in a huge lot of trouble. But no one will ever say it because, god help us, it will create a panic. Maybe it would even create enough of a panic to cause the dullards in America to seriously oppose the war even if their own kids aren't dying now.

Posting from Egypt, where I've gone back to work after realizing that the war is going to bankrupt America and that I won't get my SS or Medicare in America....boomers are cooked.

Dodd looked like the clear winner to me. Smart and strong.

No christine, it was Reagan's massive tax hike on the working class in the 80s that gave us the Social Security Trust Fund. That's when Republican presidents started using that trust fund to minimize the apparent size of their wild overspending. I say Republican because, by the end of his term, Clinton had eliminated the deficit (the year to year shortfall, not the debt which is the accumulation of all that overspending under Republican presidents).

There is no Social Security problem. There is only a General Fund problem. If you loan me money and I have plenty but refuse to pay you back the only problem you have is enforcing our contract. Since, in this example, I am the full faith and credit of the United States backed by the tax collections (most income tax comes from the top 50%) there is no problem except how much the Republican debt will cost the taxpayers.

I groaned out loud and scared the dogs.

What types of ratings are these debates garnering? My impression is that nobody outside of political junkies is actually watching. Heck, I'm a political junkie, and I haven't watched a single minute of a single debate.

"Yes, Bill (Richardson, that is), we know you've negotiated a bunch of stuff. The schtick is getting old, and frankly, I'm not sure it was even all that great a talking point in the first place."

Really, Kevin? After the debacle of Bush-era "foreign policy" do you honestly feel this way?