Comments on: My friends, here's to HOPE!

My friends, here's to HOPE!

blue_beetle — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 20:44:32 -0800

Synchronized Presidential Debating

By: a robot made out of meat

a robot made out of meat — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 20:50:46 -0800

It's... amazing. Thanks for this. Don't all major politicians go out and recite stump over and over?

By: Solon and Thanks

Solon and Thanks — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 20:50:49 -0800

A classic Daily Show technique, I'm glad other people are picking it up. I loved the sneak "my friends" at the end.

By: adgnyc

adgnyc — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 20:52:10 -0800

This was already on Anderson Cooper 360, which, at least in my opinion, disqualifies it as being a cool, interesting, provocative web find.

By: jeffamaphone

jeffamaphone — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 20:55:43 -0800

Brilliant.

By: griphus

griphus — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:01:57 -0800

This reminds me of something. During both the Couric interview and the VP debate, Palin stated this twice, verbatim: I'm not going to solely blame all of man's activities on changes in climate. Am I wrong in thinking that her talking points didn't get proofread?

By: shakespeherian

shakespeherian — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:10:55 -0800

Holy shit, a politics!

By: CitizenD

CitizenD — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:17:31 -0800

That was brilliant!

By: sir_rubixalot

sir_rubixalot — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:28:14 -0800

Awesome.

By: klarck

klarck — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:29:30 -0800

I have a feeling all hope for American political reform lies with these short, smart, funny pastiches. (Pastiche is probably the wrong word, but I couldn't bring myself to type M_shUp.)

By: Blazecock Pileon

Blazecock Pileon — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:48:08 -0800

My ears are ringing. Brilliant stuff.

By: drezdn

drezdn — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 22:01:24 -0800

Too much splash, so I give it a 5.6. Fortunately, it's enough to beat the Chinese for the gold.

By: WCityMike

WCityMike — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 22:15:42 -0800

Wonderful.

By: bettafish

bettafish — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 22:16:42 -0800

I don't think I'm so bothered by the candidates' repetitiveness as that we the American people apparently needed them to repeat the debates THREE TIMES to feel properly informed on their positions. Or maybe it's that the PTB in the media think that we needed the three debates; I'm not certain.

By: Jilder

Jilder — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 22:49:46 -0800

Six days to go, thank Christ. Then it'll be back to the sneezing kittens.

By: mullingitover

mullingitover — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 22:57:09 -0800

Don't start celebrating early.

By: mandal

mandal — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 23:15:18 -0800

Get into the groove Boy you've got to prove Your love to me... oh, wrong thread

By: Phire

Phire — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 23:34:26 -0800

That was a lot more amusing than expected. Kind of like that Bush "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" vid. Unexpectedly awesome.

By: fcummins

fcummins — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 00:39:04 -0800

Crashes my Safari:(

By: P.o.B.

P.o.B. — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 01:39:28 -0800

(Pastiche is probably the wrong word, but I couldn't bring myself to type M_shUp.) Thank you, since it isn't a mashup. Oh, and if anybody is using the word mashup in place of remix, then your just helping to obfuscate the original meaning of the word even more.

By: rokusan

rokusan — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 02:15:31 -0800

I've ranted about it before here: the debates are seriously broken, and have been since each team's lawyers started "negotiating" the terms. They're blanded down to nothing but spin-counterspin wanking. There are many, many different possible formats.The networks (even Fox) could make up their own debates and formats, shaming the candidates into attending if necessary, and then you'd at least get some attempts to differentiate. Use the market, in other words, so that they're actually trying to win a ratings prize. If the media wants us to both learn about and judge these candidates, the debates should probably be framed as a series of job interviews. One can be full of "Tell me about your worst decision." fluff that may reveal accidental information. One can be "Explain in simple terms your own (x) policy without mentioning your opponent or his plan in any way." all night. But most of all, one should be a bloody quiz on foreign affairs, preferably moderated by Trebek. And if they insist on walking around on stages, then I want them asked "Please point to Uzbekistan on this map." I know that sounds jokey, but I would love that very, very much and I do think that would be a fine "litmus test" for the Presidency. I want the guy who knows stuff, and most of all I don't want the parties running people who can not do that. So even though they keep telling me that these are baaaad things, I'm a big fan of litmus tests and gotcha questions. You betcha.

By: rokusan

rokusan — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 02:31:09 -0800

Or maybe it's that the PTB in the media think that we needed the three debates; I'm not certain. Three only seems like too many because they've been blanded down to nothing. I'd like ten debates. Thirty. Every goddamn day until the election, if necessary. This "drive to another small town on Tuesday" style of campaigning is silly in our electronic age. A TV ad swings more votes than ten stump speeches, but Presidential candidates go through the motions of tooling around to gymnasiums in small town America anyway because they're expected to grind out the grueling campaign as part of the narrative. Day to day, they all campaign as if running for President in 1892. I find it bizarre. Think about how Congress grills appointees. Can we have a little of that on each candidate? Heck, get the damn Senate involved, too. Let them lob softballs at their guys and hard questions at the opponent. Senate hearings still seem to work sometimes. Can we use them, or at least their approach, here? If you look back, I think one-on-one interviews were the most useful part of this campaign in terms of poking at weaknesses and revealing strengths in the candidates. So instead of some hokey bus tour for months, after which the candidate has to show up only three times (or just ONCE) and answer scripted questions for 90 simple minutes... well, let's see them grind out answering questions for six months instead. That's a lot closer to the kind of stress a President should master. Think about how McCain, Obama, Biden, Palin would have handled daily "question periods" from the media on Monday, the House on Tuesday, Fox on Wednesday, the Senate on Thursday, and the NRA or NOW or NAMBLA (any public group) on Friday? Do all the "town hall" debates you want, John. Every day. For months. I want candidates who can handle that, and most of all who are screened to handle that, complete with recovering from their own blunders instead of being afraid of making one. The way they show up now as touring rock stars for "press events" (or in Palin's case, "photo only events") is wrong, wrong, wrong. Grill them, dammit.

By: rokusan

rokusan — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 02:32:34 -0800

Am I wrong in thinking that her talking points didn't get proofread? She seems to transpose phrases often. I don't know if that's a kind of dyslexia or something else, but there seems to be a spark jumping the wrong synapses in there somewhere.

By: DU

DU — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 03:06:29 -0800

She seems to transpose phrases often. I don't know if that's a kind of dyslexia or something else I've noticed that this kind of transpose is pretty common from idiots who are trying to sound professional. I'm just saying.

By: From Bklyn

From Bklyn — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 03:29:58 -0800

The sound of it is pretty terrific - how close they hew to the same rhythm every single time. Granted they say them over and over again but there's something bloodless about it. It makes for a nice extension of "The Daily Show"'s oft-used video compilations of politicians contradicting themselves. Outside of the aesthetics of it though, I'm with rokusan: what has always been lacking has been an un-mediated source of information about the candidates. Of course, the campaign's whole purpose is to project the candidate as one specific kind of person/politician but there is still good information to be had from the unmediated access. I suspect Bush Jr. would never have survived the process if he had not been so heavily protected. Clinton and Obama and (perhaps) Dole and McCain (of 2000) would have, I suspect, benefitted. A while ago I looked for 'off-air' clips from network broadcasts, without success, thinking about how interesting the opening segment of "Farenheit 911" had been but without success. It has really been the one thing I have been most consistently disappointed in the internet by: I had a thought sometime back in the early 90's that maybe now, finally, we would see 'behind the curtain' and could read and watch news that was not so heavily processed. Well, we all have our little dreams.

By: cjorgensen

cjorgensen — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 06:19:47 -0800

I thought this was pretty cool. I think it's a fair criticism, and was kind of surprised they both were so "on point."

By: Mister_A

Mister_A — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 06:40:13 -0800

The reason that this mindless repetition of talking points has taken the place of actual political discourse is simple: If you, as a candidate, say anything that can ever be pulled out of context and used to undermine your position, it will be pulled out of context and used to misrepresent you. Witness the "Joe the Plumber" flap. I really think we need a national fact-checking board to vet all political ads to ensure that they are legitimate criticisms of policies and not just sound-bite distortions. My sense is that the American electorate has become somewhat desensitized to these tactics, which are also easier to refute thanks to the internet (thanks internet!), but I do believe that the electoral process is fundamentally broken because of the huge budgets and the rise of the "soft money" contributions.

By: cavalier

cavalier — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 06:46:00 -0800

Ah yes... fact checking... Dukakis.... rubbing alcohol.. freeing rapists... [still weeps for the '88 election]

By: ericbop

ericbop — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 08:17:55 -0800

Needs more Keifer Sutherland.

By: lazaruslong

lazaruslong — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 14:28:27 -0800

Well executed.

By: theora55

theora55 — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 15:01:54 -0800

I enjoyed that thoroughly; thanks for posting.

By: wei

wei — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 02:39:27 -0800

Ahh the echos! Boy, did that give me a headache!