Saturday, August 26th, 2006...9:16 am
Last Night’s KUAT Debate
Just a few little observations:
Did Bill Johnson really regret the fall of whites-only governments in South Africa and Rhodesia? Hmm…let me check the debate out again…
…yep, he did. Keep talking that way and you can stop wondering why some of us throw the word “racism” around. Oh yeah, and your call for deporting Muslims and sanctioned racial profiling doesn’t help matters either.
Jeff Latas remarked that we had reduced our dependence on foreign oil by 87% percent during the administration of Jimmy Carter. There was that matter of the Iranian revolution and the lingering effects of the Arab oil embargo that had something to do with this.
Ernesto Portillo Jr.…I love you, but man, what was with that Barbara Walters turn? “If you could meet Saddam Hussein, what would you say to him?” Nice calling Patty Weiss out when she tried to change the subject, though. What, no questions about what tree they would be?
Oh yeah, Alex Rodriguez served in Bosnia (but apparently not Herzegovina) and worked in the Pentagon. I wasn’t sure anyone caught that.
At the end, Portillo asked about what role religion plays in each candidate’s life and what role they believed religion should play in government. The answers, frankly, disapointed me. I don’t know why we Democrats are afraid to mention our religious views. I don’t need to hear details about whether you keep Kosher or you said the Rosary today, but I’d like something more than “I’m spiritual.” Latas said he would address the second part first and spoke about separation of church and state but never got around to the first part. Many of the other candidates did the same thing. Rodriguez was the only one to actually acknowledge a specific religious tradition (he’s Catholic…and served in Bosnia). Gabrielle Giffords acknowledged that she practices religion but never said which one, and Francine Shacter said her religion is “Justice, Justice, Justice!” Even Johnson, a member of a pioneer Mormon family that founded St. David and whose ancestors include at least one bishop, didn’t acknowledge any sort of faith background.
Why the reluctance? I doubt anyone would be angry at the answers. This sort of reluctance just feeds into the right-wing myth that we Democrats are anti-faith, and it doesn’t give faithful voters much reason to trust that we understand them.
Enough of my rants…what do the rest of you think?
NB – When downloading the debate, I had a much easier time with the Windows Media version than the Quick Time version. It also seems to run really fast, not quite to “chipmunk” level though.
24 Comments
August 26th, 2006 at 11:02 am
I like Francine’s answer that her religion is “justice, justice, justice.” In fact, I like a lot of what Francine has to say. It’s too bad that there is no way to attach her to the Tucson Weekly frontrunner Giffords as a sort of Siamese candidate.
August 26th, 2006 at 11:08 am
Why the reluctance? Because non-believers still have to be in the closet, unfortunately. I bet a lot of our House members are religious in name only, but damned if they’re going to admit it…
August 26th, 2006 at 1:43 pm
I think an individual’s personal religious belief is irrelevant. What is relevant however is the way someone acts as a person and that can be based upon their faith or whatever. Robert Blendu is a good example of this, his favorite book is the bible and yet, he has consistently failed to live by those standards, often promoting legislation that feather’s his nest and is patently unethical. Blendu merely wraps himself in his religion as a vehicle to pander to his base.
Sadly, wrapping oneself in their religion publicly with an intent to pick up votes is just sad to me. I actually appreciate the fact that many Democrats don’t do this and I don’t think they should start.
August 26th, 2006 at 3:09 pm
KUAT debate:
Disappointed with the questions since they did not focus on much except foreign policy. Domestic issues like health care, education, etc. largely ignored with only a couple of questions.
Latas won the debate because he seems to be the one who grasps the issues most in depth and can communicate his positions with more clarity. He knows how to easily mix a lot of facts and stats in a concise and logical manner to make his point. Definitely understands the Hezbollah situation in Lebanon better than any others and was the only one to mention the US involvement of planning in advance (supplying weapons too). He also won all the foreign policy questions. On Lebanon I thought Weiss and Giffords were too protective of Israel and not realistic. I know Giffords is Jewish and Weiss is married to a Jewish man. Not sure if that influences their perspective. Regardless this conflict isn’t about the Israeli or Lebanese people but about corruption in governments, just like we aren’t Bush’s actions.
Weiss probably did the second best overall. She presented well and communicated in a concise and forceful manner. On the Sadam question, Ernesto Portillo was especially rude interrupting her instead of letting her finish her point. I know he endorsed Giffords months ago so was probably trying to throw Weiss off her game, but she did not miss a beat of getting right back to what she was saying which was a slam dunk and made him look like a jerk for interrupting her.
My one complaint is not Weiss’ fault but that horrible lighting. I have not seen that lighting used on any other candidate interviews and wonder why this was used. Weiss has scars on her face, it appears from burns or something and the lighting really emphasized it. It was shocking to see initially. If any of Ms. Weiss campaign people read this, my girlfriend says you can get injections of filler substances that smooth out the skin. It is used for wrinkles and scaring and apparently a lot of Hollywood types use it to smooth out skin flaws and it works well on burned or acne scarred skin.
The lighting was harsh on Giffords too with her fair skin but not as bad as Weiss. Giffords did better than I expected. A close third to Weiss. She came across more adult, more serious, less prom queen and the hair style was a good decision. She finally looked and presented like an adult. She has definitely improved since I have seen her last. Giffords won the one immigration question when she said she did not believe in amnesty…the rest of what she said was similar to Weiss but her presentation was better and will attract more people
Johnson is a nut case with a few lucid moments of truth mixed in. Interesting to hear him and his fundamentalism viewpoints. Something in his speech makes me think he is a bit of a savant.
Shacter made some good points and can be concise and pointed at the same time. Although I don’t know the “I’m am older than God” closing gives anyone a reason to vote for her.
Alex and Gabrielle have a tendency to sound like they are reading a script. Gabby not as much, but Alex to the extreme.
Weiss started out good in her closing…”This race is about integrity…” Then she never followed up on that theme which she should have. She did talk of her challenges growing up (good to do) and a little about her journalistic background (everyone knows at this point and don’t care). It would have been more effective to skip the career stuff and focus on integrity and why voters should support her since she is now an underdog in the race.
August 26th, 2006 at 3:13 pm
Religion does not equate to spirituality or even faith. My upbringing in Christianity, for exampole, is historically rooted in political foundations and not spiritual ones, much like the vast majority of religions.
I thought all the candidates did fine on that question but I particularily enjoyed Francine’s answer.
August 26th, 2006 at 3:14 pm
Beware false prophets.
August 26th, 2006 at 4:04 pm
Woah,
I wasn’t there, but Latas actually tried to spin that the Carter administration planned and executed an “87% slash in foreign oil dependance” from the reality of the OPEC oil embargo?
This wasn’t some type of initiative, OPEC refused to sell oil to us! There were fuel lines, stagflation, the genesis of modern Islamic terrorism, and we are supposed to use this as what to shoot for?
Free advice for Democrats. Some people that are voting are actually older than 40. Be very careful when refering back to the “good old times” of Jimmy Carter.
August 26th, 2006 at 5:30 pm
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August 26th, 2006 at 6:09 pm
I believe that Jeff is not referring to the “good old times” of Carter, but rather praising Carter for all of the monumental energy and environmental legislation that was passed during the his Administration.
August 26th, 2006 at 6:39 pm
On a more important issue than personal religion–When asked whether they support a timeline for the U.S. getting out of Iraq, instead of being forthright by stating “I don’t think the U.S. should commit to a timeline” and explaining why, several of the candidates sidestepped the actual question.
I had previously heard from someone that Giffords supported a pullout by the end of 2007. But she didn’t mention any timeline or dates in her response.
So I went to her website to see what she say re this. On her website, she states,
“The increased sectarian strife in Iraq and growing instability in the Gulf region during the past six months have only intensified the need for a responsible and plausible exit strategy from Iraq by 2007. My priority is to bring our troops home safe and soon.”
This statement sounds like double-speak. A quick uncareful read of this could lead you think she wants the troops to start coming home by sometime in 2007. Yet if you re-read it carefully, what it actually says is that she wants an exit strategy–a PLAN–by 2007. Which is it?
August 26th, 2006 at 6:59 pm
“And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.”
Matthew 6:5
August 27th, 2006 at 7:22 am
Ease up on the criticisms of how people look folks. Geez…we are getting a little high school now aren’t we?
I watched the debates on the web and really didn’t learn anything new about the candidates. It was my first chance to see Schacter and Rodriguez. Both were impressive. I thought Giffords came across as an experienced legislator, Patty was elequent as always, and Latas came across as smart and impressive as he always does.
I thought the atmosphere was honestly rather stale and I am not sure that any candidate did much to move a voter one way or the other. Supporters still support who they support overall and I am betting that most of the people that watched were already decided.
August 27th, 2006 at 7:31 am
As to the religion question. Religion seems irrelevant as a campaign question. I mean, what do we learn about a candidate if they speak about their religious faith, honestly? Is it expected to be a voting cue if they have similar religion as you do? Would those of minority religious faith risk alienating voters who are of a majority faith? Frankly, I think it also cheapens a person’s religious faith to have to say on camera essentially that “I am (fill in the blank with the faith) and it drives the way I think and my ethics.” So what do we really learn about a person if they say, I am Buddist, Methodist, Catholic, or Mormon? Finally, the implication to some is that if you have no faith, that you are in some way unethical or don’t follow teachings that could make you a better decision maker.
I don’t know, I guess I think the faith thing really doesn’t tell us much when asked and, at worse, it is used to somehow either promote a candidacy or to detract from one.
I will end with a story. I once advised a young man who wanted to be Sheriff in a county surrounding Atlanta. As we talked he pulled a “Star of David” pendant from under his shirt and said openly that he worried what would happen to his candidacy if people found out he was Jewish. It was very sad that he felt like he had to hide. I can imagine his opponents proudly proclaiming how Christian they were while on stage with him.
August 27th, 2006 at 8:57 am
Framer,
The OPEC oil embargo was in 1973. I don’t think Carter was the Pres then.
August 27th, 2006 at 9:20 am
Just gotta love Francine up there, and compelled to say that although a little miffed at some Weiss campaign antics, I would be proud to vote for Giffords, Weiss, Latas, or Francine in November. I really believe all four have put a lot of heart and soul into the issues we face and would work hard for what needs to happen.
Candidates wisely avoid god-talk simply because odds of a negative consequence far outweigh those for a good result.
Have been rather baffled since age of six (true story) on how anyone can fail to see that human spirituality (whatever that is) got “interpreted” differently in the different cultures of the world. This is hard to grasp?
Even more baffling is that once folks choose what to believe, their choice is “right” and even more insane, anyone choosing differently is………
Michael published a fabulous post at Blog for AZ about religion. Leister went positively ballistic and trolled the daylights out of the thing.
I think politicians will continue to craft “sensitive” remarks so as to survive a childish conversation offending as few people as possible. Whether it takes ten years or 100, eventually education will raise the maturity of the conversation and what is legitimate about spirituality will remain and infantile religious nonsense will be discarded.
August 27th, 2006 at 10:36 am
kralmajales,
I deleted my comment that referred to one of the candidate’s “looks” even though I offered some good, solid advice. This is the way things are, like it or not, and there’s a lot more to it than you might want to admit. Giffords is cute and a little tweaking could have her looking like a movie star. Why not go for it? I’ll tell you one thing about the CD8 Republican candidates that you probably haven’t thought of. We’re lucky that none of them are good looking. If one of them looked like George Clooney, the Democrats could have a real problem on their hands. Bottom line here is that if you’re good looking, get all the mileage you can out of it.
boo hoo,
Nice catch on the oil embargo. I missed that but I should have remembered. Those were the Nixon years.
August 27th, 2006 at 5:46 pm
Liza,
I think that Gabby does not want to let her looks (pleasent as they may be) detract from her message. While many elections are decided on who looks better, physical attractiveness on the part of women tends to give the impression that they are distracting.
Is it fair? No, but we have to work with what we are handed.
August 27th, 2006 at 6:37 pm
Really folks, if you want to vote on looks, it’s Alex all the way.
August 27th, 2006 at 6:52 pm
Elizabeth,
You’re right, of course. I would just say, however, that if you want to neutralize your appearance for the sake of your message, your overall image needs to be age appropriate. Women candidates are srutinized unfairly by both men and women, but that’s how it is. Remember the Hillary Clinton makeover? Bill would have lost in 1992 if they hadn’t done it.
BTW, I like your name.
August 27th, 2006 at 6:58 pm
randall holdridge,
I think you might be right. I only saw him once, so I’ll have to take another look.
August 27th, 2006 at 9:11 pm
Thanks Liza.
August 27th, 2006 at 11:45 pm
It’s unfortunate, but there is prejudice against people who are atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Moslem, Jewish, Mormon, Catholic, fundamentalist Christian–depending on what part of the country you’re from. I’ll never forget during the 2004 election, the MSNBC was interviewing people on the streets of Boston, I think it was, and Steven Baldwin [actor] indicated that he had found Jesus and was therefore going to vote for George Bush [who pretends to be a reborn Christian]. Why research the candidates issue stances, experience and character when all you have to do is check what religion he/she is and vote accordingly. So much for an informed, discerning electorate.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:27 pm
Well said, cc.
Consider this.
By the way, met Stephen Baldwin once. The guy has the cerebral horsepower of a cinder block.
August 28th, 2006 at 11:06 pm
x4mf–Gak! A friend of mine showed me that today–another “fake” fundamentalist Christian. Ms. Harris. I knew some fundamentalist Christians when I was younger. They were decent, good people [notwithstanding their views being different than mine]. There are a ton of pretend ones in politics–family-values-spouting yet very slimy, very corrupt, and lying [and the main mark of Satan is being a liar...]. I wish Larry Flynt hadn’t stopped outing them.