I can't recall a presidential campaign in which all of the candidates were not considered by the majority of citizens to be no better than dolts, with voters lamenting the necessity of either casting their ballots for whom they consider to be the lesser of two evils, or not voting at all. Some have gathered around a "third party" candidate, largely to no avail.
If this is true, if all the candidates have been less than stellar, whose fault is it? Shouldn't we look to ourselves as the ultimate culprit? It is all of us collectively through our involvement, or actually in most instances our lack of involvement, that produces the party nominees. If we are unhappy about the results, isn't it then owing to our own failure?
We can complain that candidates are produced by party power brokers. If so, then perhaps complainers should endeavor to become power brokers themselves; to gain access through whatever means to those centers of power.
Some say, well, most of the power within the respective parties is held by the rich. But don't we hold the rich in awe? Aren't they the embodiment of what our economic system is all about? Aren't they the winners of the game? If that is true, then isn't it also proper that these "winners" should be awarded the privilege of wielding political power as well? Shouldn't their apparent business acumen allow them access to the centers of political power, and major influence over who is to run for what office?
Continuing; if these rich power brokers are, by default, the best equipped to carry out the task of selecting and promoting our political candidates, then how is it that they appear to do such an unerringly bad job of it?
A number of people who post and comment here at BC look upon our current crop of major party candidates as clowns or lightweights. Well, if that's the case, how in the hell did they get where they are? It didn't happen with a puff of smoke. They didn't suddenly appear on the horizon with us blinking in dismay. They were selected through our system functioning rather painstakingly over an extended period of time, just as it was designed to do. Those who are unhappy with the results can only look askance at each other and shake their heads at their own apparent failure.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Media Tycoon
I think the intelligence thing is overplayed. I think John Kerry is dumb. Democrats think Bush is dumb. It is actually just a childish way to disagree with someone who has different political ideas. Stupidity is the least of our problems with our politicians.
Also, some people are unrealistic and expect too much or are too rigid to vote for someone they don't completely agree with. In other countries the voters vote for parties and the parties come together to form a coalition. In the US, it is up to everyday people to make their own compromises and form their own coalitions. That is why we have only two major parties, both of which are big tent parties.
You can argue which system is better, but we have what we have and people need to adapt to our system as long as we have it.
2 - Dan Miller
Baritone,
I agree that it is far easier to bitch than actually to do something constructive, and that we ourselves are largely to blame for not getting the best and the brightest as our candidates. We can't even realistically blame the media all that much. If, as seems to be the case, we would rather be entertained than informed, or to snack on potato chips and dip than to eat better (and probably less expensive) food, those who accommodate our desires are behaving rationally and we are not.
The U.S. belongs to its citizens, who by and large would rather pay attention to fluff than to substance and, to the extent that we have ideologies, to see things as filtered through them.
Is there a viable solution? Or multiple viable solutions? Possibly, but I haven't thought of even one. We could try to improve the education system, and have civics classes which teach how the Government actually functions, and have far better history classes which might provide a very necessary historical perspective, but I am concerned that these are little more than fantasies. What percentage of history and civics teachers could provide such instruction even to attentive students? What percentage of those (few, I fear) could so without inculcating their own ideologies and biases? I question whether the situation is much better at the college and university level than at the secondary school level.
I fully recognize that the above reeks of pessimism, and would be delighted if someone could provide a more optimistic perspective.
Dan
3 - Baritone
With a few exceptions, I actually feel that while most of our nominees have been (and are) adequately capable, if not altogether the "best and brightest." The chief exceptions in recent memory, IMO. have been GWB for president and good ole Hoosier homeboy Dan Quayle as VP.
While from a political standpoint there are many who have problems with both Obama and McCain, I actually feel that they are both adequate to the task of being president. I am miles away from McCain, and there are a number of reasons why I do not want him as my president. However, I doubt that he lacks the ability to handle the job.
Many carry serious doubts about Obama's experience level, considering him to be a lite weight as I noted above. No doubt he is more of an unknown quantity than is McCain, but I feel reasonably confident that Obama has the wherewithal and political acumen to deal with even the most extreme situations. In the end it comes down to ideologies.
B
4 - Clavos
Anybody see the Saddleback event last night?
What did you think about the format? The respective performances of the candidates? The questions? The demeanor and presence of Rick Warren?
5 - Lisa Solod Warren
I have been planning to write about the Saddleback event; time constraints have thus far prevented me. I was extremely sceptical of both Warren and the forum but was very pleasantly surprised. Warren is smart and asked wonderful questions (apparently gathered from many thousands of contributors); the kinds of questions, I believe, many Americans want to ask the candidates. They answered well, and even though I disagree with everything McCain avows, I found him much more articulate than he had been previously. Obama, too, did an excellent job of having a "conversation" with Warren that, to my way of thinking, gave those still on the fence about him, a lot more information. I thought it worked well, better than traditional debates, certainly covered more than "faith-based" issues, and allowed each man to reveal important things about himself. Interesting concept that Warren pulled off. I was impressed by the whole thing.
6 - Andy Marsh
I liked the format of the Saddleback event. I like the ability to compare and contrast both candidates based on the same set of questions.
I saw the Saddleback event and came away with two opinions. My first opinion, after Obama was on stage was...man, he's a smooth talker. I noticed he won't answer a question directly if he doesn't want to.
I liked how when asked what legislation he had helped get enacted against his or his party's wishes it just happened to be a piece of legislation that McCain was one of the co-sponsors on. And I was also very impressed with the fact that he didn't think welfare reform was a good idea at the time, but he likes it now.
The only question McCain seemed to dodge was the one asking to define rich. But the fact that he doesn't want to raise taxes on anyone kinda makes that a moot point anyway!
And Dan - to comment #2, I think you can blame the media for a lot of this....the way they dig into peoples' personal lives probably keeps a lot of very qualified people from running for office. They don't want the world to know of the stupid things they did in their twenties. Or the ugly divorce and settlement that happened who knows how many years ago. So instead of an extremely dynamic individual running for office you get the president of the HS chess club! And as I remember it back in the day, that dude was a dweeb!
7 - Dan Miller
Andy,
Unfortunately, "About one-third of those younger than 25 said they get no news on a typical day, up from about 25 percent in 1998."I agree that the media do a poor job, and appealing to our prurient tastes is part of it. Doubtless, that and other efforts to provide exciting but uninformative programming discourages many good people from running for office. I haven't watched U.S. television for years, but even a decade ago the otherwise potentially informative talking-head "discussions" were difficult to follow because they continuously interrupted each other mid-sentence or even mid-word.
I can only surmise that they do this sort of thing because it helps their ratings and hence the advertising revenues upon which they rely to remain in business.
According to a recent Pew survey, more people continue to get their news from television than from any other source, although the internet is becoming more popular among the younger and better educated.
Although the increased reliance on the internet is encouraging, due to the more in-depth coverage than is available via television, the apparent disinterest exhibited by those under 25 is disappointing.
Dan
8 - Clavos
I, too was skeptical of the Saddleback event beforehand; not least because I'm very leery of the type of church Pastor Warren runs, and I prejudged the "interview" (it wasn't a debate, obviously) in that context.
It was anything but what I expected.
Warren stayed well out of it, except for asking the questions; unlike the media types who usually preside over these candidate showcases. He even backed completely away from following up when McCain gave his strongly worded, unequivocal answer to the question, "When does life begin?"
I thought the format was excellent, and ought to be used again. The idea of asking each candidate the same question, and their being unable to hear each other's answers, was brilliant. It prevented them from shaping their answers as a response to the other's answer, a major flaw of the "debates," and gave us a much better idea of each individual's real stance on the issue.
All in all, a very successful and informative session.
9 - Baritone
I watched most of Saddleback and actually felt that McCain came off the clear winner. He was sharp and concise whereas Obama's answers were often long and drawn out and at times seemed tortured.
That being said, on balance this was McCain's crowd. McCain didn't mince words especially on the hot button issues of abortion and same sex marriage. I thought the audience was receptive to Obama, and there clearly were some Obama backers in the house, but McCain held sway as would be expected.
I thought Warren did do a decent job of presenting a stable of questions that were difficult but answerable.
I just completed reading an article in the latest issue of The Atlantic by William Safire about all of the primary debates - mainly those of the Democrats. Saffire lives in Beijing so it took a good deal of effort to obtain watchable video of them. His analysis of Obama in particular was born out at Saddleback.
Obama thinks as he talks. Typically, in answering a question, he lays out all sides of an issue and only then begins to address his position. In the debate format, he winds up being out of time before he fully states his answer. Again, McCain is usually far more concise and less rambling unless he gets caught trying to respond to a question for which he has no real answer.
Fallows also holds up a light to the various primary debate moderators and is critical of many of them. He felt Wolf Blitzer was far and away the worst of them, being far too aggressive and, as Fallows put it "too self-aggrandizing."
He criticized Brian Williams, who in the very first debate had the candidates raising their hands to answer various questions. Fallows felt that was demeaning to all of the candidates and unnecessary.
Surprisingly, Fallows was most critical of Tim Russert's questioning. Among all of his questions he asked the candidates to state their favorite bible passage, and on a number of occasions asked various candidates if they could or would as president "pledge" to do one thing or another. These questions involved a great deal of hypotheticals which, for the most part the candidates rightly refused to answer. Russert also used a number of what Fallows called "gotcha" questions. One such was Russert first reciting a quote about definitions of torture to Hillary, asking her response. She stated that the definition was wrong, to which Russert announced that the author of the statement was her husband Bill.
Hillary responded saying "Well, he's not standing here now."
I digress.
Getting back to Saddleback, again, I felt that McCain carried the evening. He was obviously far more comfortable, more in his element. He knew this was his crowd. His "stories" worked very well and he was relaxed and engaging - even funny at times.
Obama needs to reassess how he performs in these situations. Fallows recounts how well Obama performed in debates against Allen Keys in the Illinois senatorial campaign. In those, Fallows says that Obama was generally relaxed and loose, more often than not, responding adroitly with concise, often witty responses. For whatever reasons, Obama seems to have left that behind him.
In the coming debates with McCain, Obama had better sharpen up his game and leave most of those thoughtful, well reasoned responses in his gym bag.
B
10 - Andy Marsh
I really wasn't skeptical of this beforehand for only one reason. I didn't believe that Obama would put himself in a situation where he was going to get beat up by a dunch of bible-bangers. These "interviews" were anything but that. Like Clav said, I hope they use this format more often.
11 - Lisa Solod Warren
Oh, yes. What we DON'T want is a thoughtful, well reasoned president.
12 - Baritone
Lisa,
On the contrary, I find Obama's thoughtfulness very appealing and preferable to the knee jerk responses of the most recent White House lease holder. (I wonder if the Bushes will get their deposit back?)
My last statement above was to say that Obama should restrain from those kinds of responses in the coming debates. By comparison, McCain looks far more decisive. It's all black and white for McCain. Obama sees the gray, as do I. But, by and large, many voters unfortunately take to the quick, easy answers like "Bomb Iran, bomb, bomb Iran."
When it comes down to it, though, it's mainly a matter of style. One hopes that in preparation, the candidates and their handlers have anticipated most of the questions likely to be asked, and that the answers should be emblazoned on the candidate's brain. I just think that Obama will help himself in the coming debates if he can make his responses less rambling and more concise.
If he succeeds to the Oval Office, then I hope he ponders things far more carefully than his predecessor.
B
13 - Lisa Solod Warren
FYI all. News reports have it that McCain was not in a soundproof booth while Obama was being questioned, but was riding in a car; there is speculation he was prepared for many of the questions. Interesting, of "character."
14 - Clavos
"News" reports from whom? Citations/links? All I can find are left wing blogs "reporting" the story, no recognized media. Sources like Huffpost, and freerepublic are pretty low on the credibility scale, IMO.
On camera, when asked by Rick Warren, he said he was in the "cone of Silence" isolation room during the Obama interview.
15 - Dr Dreadful
I haven't had much time to peruse BC over the last few days, but I did want to chime in belatedly and complement you, B-Tone, on a very timely and pertinent article.
I'm particularly impressed by your very articulate resistance to the BC Politics meme. The way things normally go here is that the right-leaning writers and commenters kick things off by saying that A and B are so. (They are usually also unable to resist attributing A and B to C, the value of which usually = +/- liberals and/or Democrats.) The left-leaning writers and commenters then respond by agreeing that, yes, A and B are so, but dissenting from the view that this is because of C. This immediately puts them on the back foot, allowing the right-wingers to claim the high ground.
To your great credit, you have presented a very different approach here. You start by saying, "STOP! A and B are NOT so. This is why."
I concur with your argument. McCain and Obama are not idiots, nor are they of a particularly lower caliber than any other presidential candidate of the last 230-odd years.
I think that presidents like Jackson, Lincoln, the Roosevelts, Truman and Reagan now seem great to us simply because we have had more time to observe the effects of their policies. You will find no shortage of scathing and disparaging commentaries about any of them in the historical record.
16 - Lisa Solod Warren
Clavos, check out stories in the New York times, NBC and Time magazine, which, you may decide to call "the left wing" media, anyway, but I hope not. It's all over.
And, hey, you think McCain never lied to a preacher before????
17 - Pablo
Clavos, re post 4
Yeah i watched it for a bit, I couldn't help but be amused by Rick Warren, Saddleback preacher boy who just happens to be a lifetime member of the CFR. So on the stage you had 3 CFR members! hehehe
18 - Clavos
So on the stage you had 3 CFR members!
Good! Since they run everything anyway, they sure wouldn't want to let some ignoramus conspiracy nut slip in there.
19 - Dan Miller
As I understand the situation, Senators Obama and McCain had flipped a coin to determine who would go first. Senator Obama won the toss, and went first. Senator McCain was traveling in his motorcade from his hotel to the venue when the event began, and arrived about thirty minutes late. Apparently, The Reverend Mr. Warren was not aware of Senator McCain's tardy arrival until questioned about it later.
Although I am not particularly impressed with either candidate, it seems to me that the attention being paid to what Senator McCain may or may not have heard during the half hour when he was not in the official "cone silence" is a distraction from what he and Senator Obama said, and from what I understand to the the widespread perception that Senator McCain did a better job overall than did Senator Obama.Dan
20 - El Bicho
"That being said, on balance this was McCain's crowd."
It was Orange County after all. Would like to see this type of event in front of a pro-Obama crowd.
If you like the candidates, they both came off well. Obama appeared to think about his answers, while McCain seemed well prepped from his stump speeches. For example with abortion, Obama has his opinion but accepts people disagree and wants to work together on it. McCain has his opinion and there's no room for disagreement.
I am not sure how an undecided would form any better opinion as both men seemed capable of handling the job. Although, if voting for McCain means we have to hear "my friends" incessantly for four years, that would push me to Obama.
McCain's story about the Christian prison guard seemed very odd, though. If it was true, it sounded like some sort of psy ops the North Vietnamese were running on him.
Most of Warren's questions were good, although there were a few clunkers. "Who would you not nominate for SC?" Why answer a question like that? First, their answers were obvious based on party, and second, why antagonize people who be presiding over cases you will be submitting to the court? And "what would you tell Americans if there were no ramifications?" Right, I'll get back to you late November.
My favorite moment typifies the American voter. Warren, like most people, doesn't want to pay taxes, yet he wants a special project for orphans funded. An absolutely worthy cause but who is paying for that? Reminded me of a segment of "TV Nation" back in the '90s where Michael Moore went to Gingrich's district, which as Speaker naturally saw him bring home the most amount of tax money. When interviewed, the citizens all thought taxes should be cut.
21 - El Bicho
Appears I lost the last bit. Let me finish
...When interviewed, the citizens all thought taxes should be cut. When asked about the tax money they were receiving, none wanted the money for projects they were associated with cut, but they were all for the cutting of others' funding.
22 - Baronius
I didn't see the Saddleback event, but if Obama supporters are saying that McCain got the questions ahead of time, McCain must have trounced Obama.
Dread, are you sure that BC is dominated by right-wingers? From my biased perspective, we have a pretty good mix here, both in writers and commenters.
23 - Clavos
Clavos, check out stories in the New York times...
Since you didn't, as is customary, provide links to your sources, I only took the time to read the NYT piece. It notes, as you said, that MCCain was late in arriving at the church at the beginning. It also notes that the MCCain staff say that he was not listening to the broadcast, but I take your point, they are all lying Republicans (oh wait, that's a tautology, isn't it?).
Interestingly, the NYT also declared McCain the "winner" of the event...
24 - Baronius
Baritone, do you really equate answering in shades of gray with thinking more?
McCain answers in black and white, as you put it. That doesn't necessarily mean he's given the underlying issue less thought. A lot of it is personal style. For example, my personal style of writing is sissified, with a lot of equivocal words. I've found that if I don't do that, I end up putting words into other people's mouths.
I'd bet that people who never think answer strongly, people who think some answer weakly, and people who think a lot answer strongly. Upon first considering an issue, one is struck by the validity of different schools of thought. As you study more, though, you're going to reach a conclusion, and that's going to make you more decisive.
Answering in black and white helps secure the base. Answering in gray lets you appeal to everyone. I don't see how either is necessarily more political.
One last point: Obama talks like a lawyer, and McCain talks like a sailor.
25 - Baritone
Bar,
As I noted, I do believe that McCain came off better than Obama at Saddleback. The word "trounced" didn't come to mind, however. Obama gave good, well considered answers and, as I noted, seemed to be reasonably well accepted.
But, on balance, McCain had the ready answers that the majority of the audience both wanted and expected to hear. I understand that Warren's church is less "fundy" than many, but, when it comes down to it, overall the congregation leans more to the right than left which obviously worked in McCain's favor.
I've also noted with my own take on Obama's debating performance and to the Fallows' article in The Atlantic that Obama does have some problems regarding his debating skills which he should work on prior to the coming one-on-one debates after the conventions.
I agree with Clav that the Saddleback format worked quite well. Assuming that the above claims about McCain having perhaps heard Obama's session are untrue, the idea that the candidates are asked essentially the same questions with the other candidate out of ear shot works. It allows each candidate to state his position without attempting to "one up" the other.
As I noted, overall I think Warren did a decent job with perhaps a few exceptions. He did attempt to ask the questions and then step back allowing the candidate to answer without the often annoying intrusions ala Chris Matthews.
It would be nice to see the same format used in a more neutral setting.
B