Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Tuck, Realityville, KS — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 14:35:06 GMT

Obama could be a good canidate in 8-16 years, but he's so inexperienced that he doesn't deserve to even be in the top 3

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Fred, Baltimore, MD — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 14:37:09 GMT

No matter what chance he has or even that I disagree with most of his views, Only Joe Biden knew what he was talking about last night. He answered questions, did not politic (that much) and knew his facts and material.

Why the rest of the candidates don't answer the questions is beyond my grasp. I want an honest candidate that will answer questions and not tap dance. We do not need a dancer in the White House but an individual that will act, no the material and surround him or herself with knowledgable hardworking staffers.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

RealPolitiK — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:04:53 GMT

The debates last night proved two things. Hillary Clinton was the anointed nominee eight years ago, and the primaries have become more a show. Second, a Republican will be sitting in the Oval Office.

One more thing...could CNN be any more blatantly biased in favor of Hillary?

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

jerry/corpus christi texas — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:08:43 GMT

Newsweek's Fineman: "Better rested and more relaxed, Clinton raced to the center of the ring throwing punches at Obama, claiming that his health plan would leave 15 million people uninsured, and that his Social Security plan would require a ‘trillion dollar tax increase.’ Obama counterpunched, but the point is that he was backpedaling for a change."

She pretty much gave the same answer on Social Security that she gave in Philadelphia...What is your plan for Social Security Senator Clinton?

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

bevfrancisxeniaohio — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:18:28 GMT

I think that Clinton was great last night!!!!!

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Nancy Roberts — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:19:25 GMT

What show was Doug Burns watching? He couldn't even answer the question about driver licenses. He was slow thinking, sluggish and didn't seem to be able to speak in full sentences. Edwards was completely thrown back on his heels by Hillary and the audience giving him a taste of his own medicine. Joe Biden & Kucinich had some good ideas.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Paul, OH — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:27:39 GMT

How come CLINTON cannot still answer a Social Security tax question clearly. I am surprised about her definition of "middle Class". Middle class does not earn 97,000. I know for her thats nothing.. but for most thats a huge amount. She is a liar and will do anything for power. What stuns me is to see how some democrats cannot see through this. They behave like Cronjies of clinton. I will never vote for her.. Republican rather than HRC, unless Barack/ Edwards wins the nominee.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

R.Rajasingham, Guildford, United Kingdom — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:32:29 GMT

Is the U.S. still unwilling to follow the examples of Sri Lanka, Israel,India Britain and Bangladesh and trust its women to do a good job as leader ?

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Laurie Crosse Dix Hills New York — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:44:17 GMT

Hillary did well sounded strong and so did Edwards. The night's loser was Obama, who seemed rattled by some of the interaction and also sounded a bit too cerebral at times, reminding me, unfortunately, of John Kerry.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

carla Keogh — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:55:13 GMT

I would rather have an "honest" somewhat inexperienced Mr. Obama as my President than a dishonest experienced Mrs. Clinton. He can learn the job, she can't change who she is.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Fort Madison, Iowa — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:59:05 GMT

CNN should be ashamed. What a joke to allow that debate to be sandbagged. How is it even possible that she was thrown so many softballs by Brown. Do these two have a past? This did nothing but again raise questions about staged material and discredit CNN. And what about that post-debate debacle. C'mon people.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Pete Caloger Bushkill, PA 18324 — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 16:38:31 GMT

What a disappointing night in Las Vegas. CNN's buildup to the debate, the "thrilla in Manila" hype, was an insult to the event. Blitzer's incessant interruptions and framing of questions to maximize potential for fireworks (and minimize potential for information we the voters could use) were a lowpoint. The crowd was a distraction and Malveaux' on the spot restatement of people's questions was uncalled for. I've never bought into the notion that CNN is the Clinton News Network, until now. I want information and answers in these debates, dammit, not entertainment. Awful.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Dixie Siegel Twin Falls, ID — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 17:35:12 GMT

People remember that NAFTA was Bill's baby...He campaigned against it to win the Union and worker's vote and then stabbed us all in the back.
and Hillary has the audacity to laugh at "charts"...she is Bush lite!

We need someone who can unite us. CNN and Wolf were
terrible. Remember who thought that 97,000 was poverty!!!

Obama made points with his answers to the audience. Wolf just gave "got you" questions. Look at the candidate's records and speeches and see who flip flops...it is not Obama. He said he missed the vote and that it was a mistake. He said he supported driver's licenses before and again, but Wolf wants sound bites, not thoughtful ideas.

Honestly I thought excluding the pandering to Hillary that Richardson did very well. Bidden was somewhere else. Dodd was good when they gave him a chance. This was the poorest debate forum yet. I am hoping that NPR bests them all.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Sam, St. Louis — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 18:02:56 GMT

Thank you CNN for a decent debate where the moderator did not get involved with the piling on like Timmie "Gotcha" Russert in the last embarrassing debate at MSNBC (which I have stopped watching). No one in news today is more biased that Timmie and his violent, vile, woman hating, pompous side kick Chris Crackpot Mathews. So hyprocrites get over it. When you get the closeted Rep, Matthews and Russert, help
with their wild attacks and anger at women or anyone who disagrees with them, we might consider watching MSNBC...with the only great journalist KEITH OBERMAN.
GO! HILLARY!

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Conrad Golbov, Indianapolis, IN — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 18:22:04 GMT

I'm seriously dissapointed with CNN in general. Wolf Blitzer may look distinguished with his white hair and his counterparts, but falls on his face as a moderator. I understand that these are presidential candidates, but seriously, where's the guy with the microphone volume knobs for when they start shouting over each other?

CNN did a terrible job controlling the audience, though the heckler's ability to distract and throw off Obama was, I think, quite telling. He's still new to the game.

In general, the three blind mice continued to lash out at each other and tap dance around questions, which I think the audience was pissed at. Only the four other candidates (Biden, Dodd, Richardson, Kucinich) actually answered the questions they were asked and knew what they believed.

For me, Biden was the only one that was acting Presidential. I felt like he knew it was beneath him and the US public to waste time in these schoolyard spitting contests.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Pierce, LA, CA — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 18:55:59 GMT

Obama was the clear winner. He was commanding, intelligent, clear and honest. Extremely Presidential! He is the only candidate who can effectively bring this country together and get things done. He is the Red and Blue Uniter.

Hillary has got way too much baggage with the Republicans which would result in Partisan Gridlock. Plus, she's taking money from Health Insurance Lobbyists in Washington, so do you really think that she is going to get anywhere with Health Care? Don't think so.

My vote goes to Obama!

OBAMA 2008!!!!

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Danielle Clarke — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 19:42:04 GMT

Hillary votes no to win votes but she won't speak the truth.

Barack has the courage to speak the truth. Citizens need everybody to have drivers liscense so they can be monitored for insurance and accidents and alcohol related deaths. He also pointed out the need to PASS an imigration bill to get those people on a path to citizenship. They will be needed to feel like americans so they can keep our social secuirty system fluid.

Hillary also got BUSTED on her statement about not RAISING THE CAP on social secuirty because she says the tax increase will hurt the middle class!

Barack stated that the 6% getting paid 97,000.00 a year is NOT THE MIDDLE CLASS !

Hillary also stated that she thought the american education system served us well ?? NOT ! !

Hillary also got BUSTED on her vote for the kyle Lieberman and the mother and the Iraq war veteran son who clapped when the rest of the candidates pointed out they were AGAINST the Kyle Lieberman bill to make the Iranian guard a terrorist organization and how the bill also allows for Bush to keep troops in iraq !!

Yes Hillary got busted BIG TIME the truth always comes out.

Thank God we have a candidate like Barack Obama who speaks the truth and doesn't shift back and forth trying to get votes.

Hillarys thinking people won't catch her shifting her point of view from one location (town) to another as she lies lies lies trying to sway the american voters !!

and on Pakistan

http://www.liberaloasis.com/2007/11/clinton_on_pakistan.php
Here's Sen. Hillary Clinton discussing Pakistan at Thursday night's debate:
... there's absolutely a connection between a democratic regime and heightened security for the United States. That's what's so tragic about this situation.
After 9/11, President Bush had a chance to chart a different course, both in Pakistan and in Afghanistan, and could have been very clear about what our expectations were. We are now in a bind, and it is partly -- not completely, but partly -- a result of the failed policies of the Bush administration.
So, where we are today means that we have to say to President Musharraf: Look, this is not in your interest either. This is not in the interest of the United States. It is not in your interest to either stay in power or stay alive.
Sure sounds like she wished Bush pushed for democratic reform in Pakistan, instead of propping up Musharraf's dictatorship.
But here's what she said in a debate from August, when criticizing Sen. Barack Obama's pledge to strike terrorists in Pakistan's border region if Musharraf would not act on actionable intelligence:
I think it is a very big mistake to telegraph that and to destabilize the Musharraf regime, which is fighting for its life against the Islamic extremists who are in bed with al Qaeda and Taliban.
Of course, as everyone now knows, Musharraf is primarily fighting for his life against lawyers and judges, not the tribal militants.
Sen. Clinton is not alone among Dem candidates in supporting Musharraf.
Both Sen. John Edwards and Sen. Chris Dodd have expressed support for Musharraf to maintain "stability."
Whereas Obama, Gov. Bill Richardson and Sen. Joe Biden have been more consistent in supporting democratic principles.--
........................................................................................................................................
also is she wants to count poll results see the immediate polling results below

So far, Barack is ahead in both:

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/debates/scorecard/

http://www.youpolls.com/details.asp?pid=996

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Ken Black — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 19:46:27 GMT

Reviews? The whole thing really, really sucked.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Stu, Saginaw, MI — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 19:50:41 GMT

I believe I'm both smart enough and realistic enough to appreciate the fact that my favored primary candidate simply is not going to win the primary. Thus, I'm going to have to look elsewhere for whom to support. It would be great if other commentators to this blog would do likewise.

After months of reviewing the commentaries, I used to think the most illogical commentators were the idiocies of both Jerry and Bee (both of whom are obvious Republicans); just why they butt in on Democratic politics is a mystery)--they are still asinine. Yet Sierra has come to outshine both of them in regard to non-objectivity. Sierra's favorite candidate has a snowball's chance in Hell of winning the primary battles, yet Sierra simply cannot accept that fact. Thus, we keep getting the shrill, stupid, and vitriolic gargage regarding opposition candidates.

Face it, Sierra, your favorite is going to lose!! Therefore, get on to deciding whether you're going to support the ultimate winner or continue whining!!

x

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

jim — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 20:15:00 GMT

those were the most stages audience questions i've ever seen in my life. cnn is pathetic.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Lee Holmes — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 20:35:23 GMT

From this perspective,CNN was the clear loser. It was one of the most idiotically moderated debates since Joe Walsh tried his hand at the presidency in 1980.[Rock presidential wannabes and pundits abounded then,with Zappa giving it some thought,and the band STYX pleading with Kennedy''Eddie'',Don't You Run[excpt.]:''you know you're a bootleggers son, and you saw just what they done to your brothers''[Cornerstone:A&M Records,1979].
Obama,in his flailing retreat on SS and immigration,was hit hard and will probably not recover. Neither will Edwards,who is moving towards the second tier with the other also-rans. Biden delivers his best performance,better than Clintons,while Hillary appears to have no problems with a nuclear armed Iran. Biden will move to supplant Edwards or Obama among the realists. Hillary will move forward into the unknown regions of an America that viruantly distrusts her making Paul the kingmaker between her and either Guiliani or Romney,who is running strong in New Hampshire,Iowa and Nevada,with Guiliani grabbing the lions share of electorals in Florida. We see a Hillary runaway which will bring the media guns to bear on her every move,while the GOP race tightens.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Lee Holmes — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 20:37:28 GMT

jim: One wit dubbed these ''questions from pear-shaped,middle aged women,like the one up on stage''.

Viva Las Vegas: The reviews

Sherry — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 00:34:20 GMT

1969 Student Commencement Speech
Hillary D. Rodham
May 31, 1969
Ruth M. Adams, ninth president of Wellesley College, introduced Hillary D. Rodham, ‘69, at the 91st commencement exercises, as follows:

In addition to inviting Senator Brooke to speak to them this morning, the Class of ‘69 has expressed a desire to speak to them and for them at this morning’s commencement. There was no debate so far as I could ascertain as to who their spokesman was to be — Miss Hillary Rodham. Member of this graduating class, she is a major in political science and a candidate for the degree with honors.

In four years she has combined academic ability with active service to the College, her junior year having served as a Vil Junior, and then as a member of Senate and during the past year as President of College Government and presiding officer of College Senate. She is also cheerful, good humored, good company, and a good friend to all of us and it is a great pleasure to present to this audience Miss Hillary Rodham.
Remarks of Hillary D. Rodham, President of the Wellesley College Government Association and member of the Class of 1969, on the occasion of Wellesley’s 91st Commencement, May 31, 1969:

I am very glad that Miss Adams made it clear that what I am speaking for today is all of us — the 400 of us — and I find myself in a familiar position, that of reacting, something that our generation has been doing for quite a while now. We’re not in the positions yet of leadership and power, but we do have that indispensable task of criticizing and constructive protest and I find myself reacting just briefly to some of the things that Senator Brooke said.

This has to be brief because I do have a little speech to give. Part of the problem with empathy with professed goals is that empathy doesn’t do us anything. We’ve had lots of empathy; we’ve had lots of sympathy, but we feel that for too long our leaders have used politics as the art of making what appears to be impossible, possible.
What does it mean to hear that 13.3% of the people in this country are below the poverty line? That’s a percentage. We’re not interested in social reconstruction; it’s human reconstruction. How can we talk about percentages and trends? The complexities are not lost in our analyses, but perhaps they’re just put into what we consider a more human and eventually a more progressive perspective. The question about possible and impossible was one that we brought with us to Wellesley four years ago. We arrived not yet knowing what was not possible. Consequently, we expected a lot.

Our attitudes are easily understood having grown up, having come to consciousness in the first five years of this decade — years dominated by men with dreams, men in the civil rights movement, the Peace Corps, the space program — so we arrived at Wellesley and we found, as all of us have found, that there was a gap between expectation and realities. But it wasn’t a discouraging gap and it didn’t turn us into cynical, bitter old women at the age of 18. It just inspired us to do something about that gap. What we did is often difficult for some people to understand.
They ask us quite often: “Why, if you’re dissatisfied, do you stay in a place?” Well, if you didn’t care a lot about it you wouldn’t stay. It’s almost as though my mother used to say, “I’ll always love you but there are times when I certainly won’t like you.” Our love for this place, this particular place, Wellesley College, coupled with our freedom from the burden of an inauthentic reality allowed us to question basic assumptions underlying our education.

Before the days of the media orchestrated demonstrations, we had our own gathering over in Founder’s parking lot. We protested against the rigid academic distribution requirement. We worked for a pass-fail system. We worked for a say in some of the process of academic decision making. And luckily we were in a place where, when we questioned the meaning of a liberal arts education there were people with enough imagination to respond to that questioning. So we have made progress.

We have achieved some of the things that initially saw as lacking in that gap between expectation and reality. Our concerns were not, of course, solely academic as all of us know. We worried about inside Wellesley questions of admissions, the kind of people that should be coming to Wellesley, the process for getting them here. We questioned about what responsibility we should have both for our lives as individuals and for our lives as members of a collective group.

Coupled with our concerns for the Wellesley inside here in the community were our concerns for what happened beyond Hathaway House. We wanted to know what relationship Wellesley was going to have to the outer world. We were lucky in that one of the first things Miss Adams did was to set up a cross-registration with MIT because everyone knows that education just can’t have any parochial bounds any more.
One of the other things that we did was the Upward Bound program. There are so many other things that we could talk about; so many attempts, at least the way we saw it, to pull ourselves into the world outside. And I think we’ve succeeded. There will be an Upward Bound program, just for one example, on the campus this summer.

Many of the issues that I’ve mentioned — those of sharing power and responsibility, those of assuming power and responsibility have been general concerns on campuses throughout the world. But underlying those concerns there is a theme, a theme which is so trite and so old because the words are so familiar. It talks about integrity and trust and respect.
Words have a funny way of trapping our minds on the way to our tongues but there are necessary means even in this multi-media age for attempting to come to grasps with some of the inarticulate maybe even inarticulable things that we’re feeling. We are, all of us, exploring a world that none of us even understands and attempting to create within that uncertainty. But there are some things we feel, feelings that our prevailing, acquisitive, and competitive corporate life, including tragically the universities, is not the way of life for us. We’re searching for more immediate, ecstatic and penetrating mode of living.

And so our questions, our questions about our institutions, about our colleges, about our churches, about our government continue. The questions about those institutions are familiar to all of us. We have seen heralded across the newspapers. Senator Brooke has suggested some of them this morning. But along with using these words — integrity, trust, and respect — in regard to institutions and leaders we’re perhaps harshest with them in regard to ourselves.
Every protest, every dissent, whether it’s an individual academic paper, Founder’s parking lot demonstration, is unabashedly an attempt to forge an identity in this particular age. That attempt at forging for many of us over the past four years has meant coming to terms with our humanness.

Within the context of a society that we perceive — now we can talk about reality, and I would like to talk about reality sometime, authentic reality, inauthentic reality, and what we have to accept of what we see — but our perception of it is that it hovers often between the possibility of disaster and the potentiality for imaginatively responding to men’s needs.
There’s a very strange conservative strain that goes through a lot of New Left, collegiate protests that I find very intriguing because it harkens back to a lot of the old virtues, to the fulfillment of original ideas. And it’s also a very unique American experience. It’s such a great adventure. If the experiment in human living doesn’t work in this country, in this age, it’s not going to work anywhere.
But we also know that to be educated, the goal of it must be human liberation. A liberation enabling each of us to fulfill our capacity so as to be free to create within and around ourselves. To be educated to freedom must be evidenced in action, and here again is where we ask ourselves, as we have asked our parents and our teachers, questions about integrity, trust, and respect. Those three words mean different things to all of us.
Some of the things they can mean, for instance: Integrity, the courage to be whole, to try to mold an entire person in this particular context, living in relation to one another in the full poetry of existence. If the only tool we have ultimately to use is our lives, so we use it in the way we can by choosing a way to live that will demonstrate the way we feel and the way we know. Integrity — a man like Paul Santmire.

Trust. This is one word that when I asked the class at our rehearsal what it was they wanted me to say for them, everyone came up to me and said “Talk about trust, talk about the lack of trust both for us and the way we feel about others. Talk about the trust bust.” What can you say about it? What can you say about a feeling that permeates a generation and that perhaps is not even understood by those who are distrusted? All they can do is keep trying again and again and again. There’s that wonderful line in East Coker by Eliot about there’s only the trying, again and again and again; to win again what we’ve lost before.
And then respect. There’s that mutuality of respect between people where you don’t see people as percentage points. Where you don’t manipulate people. Where you’re not interested in social engineering for people. The struggle for an integrated life existing in an atmosphere of communal trust and respect is one with desperately important political and social consequences.

And the word “consequences” of course catapults us into the future. One of the most tragic things that happened yesterday, a beautiful day, was that I was talking to woman who said that she wouldn’t want to be me for anything in the world. She wouldn’t want to live today and look ahead to what it is she sees because she’s afraid. Fear is always with us but we just don’t have time for it. Not now.