NBC is showing 37% for Romney over 31% for McCain and 16% for Huckabee. And now for the debate... the Democrats. I guess Dennis lost his case.
9:06 (times are Eastern): Kucinich lost. Good lord, Hillary is grim and droning as she talks about her truce with Obama over the MLK controversy. Obama sounds normal. (Amazing accomplishment!) And Edwards seems to have a little speech memorized. He lived with the civil rights movement, blah, blah.
9:22: Someone in the audience is saying: "These are race-based questions." Tim Russert pauses, and the man shuts up. The debate goes on. But it's leaden. All three of the candidates look terribly weary.
9:43: Sorry for "underblogging" the debate. I'm trying to watch "American Idol" simultaneously. And I'm rather tired of both shows.
10:01: The pandering on economic issues is a huge turn-off for me. A 5-year freeze on interest rates? I'm not an economist, but that sounds terribly wrong. Yet there's not a word of explanation of why that might be a good idea (from Hillary Clinton).
10:17: I'm surprised that Tim Russert pronounces ROTC "Rot C," which I once said on a news show and felt very embarrassed about. I thought that was an old 1960s pejorative pronunciation. But Russert says it and then all the candidates say it. They're answering a question about requiring universities to give the military access to campuses, and the candidate all support it — and I don't hear one word about gay rights.
January 15, 2008
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59 comments:
Why the Michael Jackson tag?
LOL!
I was trying to do a Michigan tag, and that was the auto-complete.
Seems racial... but I was just trying to write Michigan....
I thought maybe you knew something about the debate half-time show that the rest of us didn't! ;)
I watched TV for an hour tonight.
Old men like Bill Bennett, Pat Buchanan, and Morton Kondracke yammering...women with long blonde hair and fluorescent lips...Mick Jagger in football knickers...Lou Dobbs....an ad that said "The 1960s were about change. A time of revolution. Today you can eat Total Cereal, and....."
It was awful...
Hillary is grim and droning as she talks about her truce with Obama over the MLK controversy.
This whole racial subtext of the debate is just awful and I think it has cast a very dark cloud over the entire campaign. Her answer about taking BET's Bob Johnson at his word is, quite simply, not credible, and I say that as a Democrat and one who has defended Hillary. It is clear what that pig Johnson was trying to suggest, and Hillary should have walked on stage and ripped the mic out of his hand the moment he said it. If she showed that kind of courage, she'd probably have gotten a 15 point jump instantly.
Did anybody get voted off the peninsula tonight?
Was that Al Sharpton that started screaming?
Peter: Heh. Heh. You said 'peninsula.' Heh. hee.
Brian Williams missed his calling. Last Comic Standing.
The Democrats are abysmal on the economy. The just want wealth transfers from the rich to the middle class. That gets us no where.
I couldn't take it. I stuck with Idol in Philly. It looks like a good decision.
JOM was live blogging it and it sounded as dreadful there as it sounds here.
Obama makes me a little horny-I would definitely do him.
The democrat candidates are better looking than the republican candidates.
The just want wealth transfers from the rich to the middle class. That gets us no where.
It gets them into office. :)
OK fellow republicans I am voting for Obama...because he is hot and I want to do him and want to see his hog really bad.
If I was a dyke I would probably bump beavers with Hilary.
OK, Titus. Whatever.
Since I can imagine where this is going, I will opt out of this thread, meaning I will comment no further, and will immediately delete the two comments left just a bit earlier. If I comment, I tend to want to follow. I know for sure that I don't care about commenting on this thread anywhere NEAR the amount that I want to take care NOT to repeat the experience of a couple of days ago.
Consider this a tribute to your superior skills of evocation.
Titus, if that's your predicate for voting, shouldn't you vote against him?
I haven't paid all that close attention to the forms of address used by the candidates during the debates, but is Hillary Clinton being called "Hillary" a lot while the others are addressing each other as "Senator"?
I know I could look up the transcripts, but I'm being lazy. It caught my eye because for the second time in as many debates, a one liner by Obama is getting feature coverage:
Later, Clinton asked Obama to back her legislation to prevent President Bush from unilaterally extending the United States' presence in Iraq beyond the end of his term next January.
"I think we can work on this, Hillary," he replied
Are the GOP candidates all calling each other all the time as John, Mitt, Rudy, Paul, Duncan, whatever? I'm just wondering because, over the years, I have heard about/known many women who have encountered similar circumstances in the course of their careers: referred to by first name while all the men are referred to as "Mr." or by title. Most of the ones I know believe it to be an unconscious indication that they are not the equal of whoever is addressing them, but a subordinate.
Unless everyone is doing it all the time, including Hillary, this does not sound like a good idea. (BWDIK?)
Althouse:
You are right about the pronounciation of ROTC. Rot-C was a perjorative. Unfortunately it has become common parlance. Don't say it around a member of the ROTC, or especially their training cadre however.......
OK, I just finished watching it and was completely bored.
reader i am, come back, it's ok, you can take it. Just ignore my comments if they make you uncomfortable.
I bet Obama has a nice hog.
Jesus, I can't believe how fast Google updates. Note the first result.
Althouse, I want to thank you for inviting me to co-blog with you tonight. It has been a honor and pleasure.
Althouse and I look forward to future blogging ventures.
We both hope you enjoyed faithful readers to our site.
Althouse, see you at dindin tomorrow night-hugs.
I was in ROTC in both high school and college in the 70s. This is the first time I have ever heard ROT-C called a pejorative. Air Force were zoomies or wing nuts, Army were bullet stoppers, Marines were jarheads, Navy were squids. Lots of stuff like that but ROT-C as a pejorative? Give me a break.
Prof A
Long ago "Rotsie" was the general oral pronunciation of the letters "ROTC" without, so far as I can remember, malice aforethought. Maybe during the Viet Nam era some wag started chanting "Rot-sie" as in something rotten, but I missed that & my friends & I still pronounce it that way w/o malice intended.
That's hardly a definitive answer to your point & you may dismiss it & me as well as my friends as out of it.
Hey, as I go to post this, I see that Google (H/T verso) & lawgiver agree with me.
A 5-year freeze on interest rates? I'm not an economist, but that sounds terribly wrong.
It goes beyond "wrong" and into the realm of "mind-scramblingly idiotic". I'm honestly surprised that Hillary would suggest something that dangerously stupid.
Was Hillary just talking about freezing rates on existing adjustable-rate loans? Because that would be dumb, but it is well within the range of normal government stupidity.
Don't say it around a member of the ROTC
I was in ROTC for four years in high school, and we used 'rot-C' ourselves. That didn't bother anyone, except for when we were out marching and wearing our uniforms and some of the other kids referred to us as 'Nazi rot-c's'
But it's a tempest in a teapot. Sort of like watching the debates and waiting for a question about nuclear weapons or nuclear power so you can see which of the candidates says, 'nu-cu-lar.'
It goes beyond "wrong" and into the realm of "mind-scramblingly idiotic". I'm honestly surprised that Hillary would suggest something that dangerously stupid.
I agree. Wonder if she was thinking of Schwarzenegger's bally-hooed plan which does not seem to have gone very far, except with a number of banks who would prefer to pretend that all those bad loans are secured by property worth the stated value rather than foreclose and take massive, perhaps unsustainable, hits to their balance sheets. With that alternative, a tiny limited income stream starts to look awfully appealing.
Of course, if anyone wants to see where that leads, all they have to do is look at the Japanese banking sector and its contortions and consolidations over the past 18 years. Interests rates fell to zero, but almost no one was borrowing because almost none of the banks had any money to lend anyway. But they sure had some beautiful properties propping up their balance sheets (as long as no one looked too close).
Wall Street Journal had a front-page story on vacancy rates today. California's major areas were holding pretty steady @ a decent 4% but there were plenty of metro areas elsewhere with rates almost twice that, similar to when the real estate investment property tax shelter boom collapsed after the changes in tax code during the Reagan Administration (TEFRA '86 IIRC). Not a good sign at all.
BTW, that was a good, solid win by Romney. Unimpressive turnout, though.
Lawgiver has it right. When it comes to pejorative insults, service members themselves long ago pre-empted that field, both inter-service and intra-service. Anything any civilian could ever come up with is paltry in comparison.
Lawgiver & tightspotkilo
Hey, remember what the even the rest of the ROTC called the Pershing Rifles?
Now I have two good friends who were in the PRs, in fact both commandants, & at various alumni reunions the PR alum seem more real than most. I now realize that it was not a bad group at all. In fact, looking back, I wish I'd joined it.
Any comments or feedback any of you have, to help us with our future co-blogging events, would be greatly appreciated.
Gahrie said...
Althouse:
You are right about the pronounciation of ROTC. Rot-C was a perjorative. Unfortunately it has become common parlance. Don't say it around a member of the ROTC, or especially their training cadre however.......
Incorrect, Gahrie. I was ROTC and we all said it "Rot-see". In the regular military, we have "ring-knocker" (Academy) officers, "Rot-see", and "rear-esh" specialty officers not in line command that get scholarships and very limited ROTC and OCS training as they become doctors, nurses, lawyers, logistics geniuses, and fish out of water cyber cryptologist masters degree dudes that still talk about "thingees" on their uniforms.
***********
Eli - "Sort of like watching the debates and waiting for a question about nuclear weapons or nuclear power so you can see which of the candidates says, 'nu-cu-lar.'"
Its a southern thing. If you go to nuke plants in Texas, Dothan Alabama, Turkey Point in Florida it is "nucular". Even up north because so many nuclear operators come from the Navy Nuclear Power Program which is dominated by Southerners and mostly stationed down South except for New London.
It gets worse: Heat from fishin' inside the Racktor is transferred in racktor kullint into stahm which then fahrs up the Tur-byn which runs the gen-rator to make the 'lektric-ty.
Same neutrons, different world where the grammar is "raht" no matter what some fool Yankee says.
***************
Michigan race - Romney is appearing to be finding his stride and getting comfortable. Almost as big a deal is Rudy getting 3% of the vote in a major industrial Northern state and bringing up the rear of the pack.
****************
Debate: Real trouble for Hillary if she is anti-nuke, anti-coal power plant construction, against any realistic energy source, is committed to amnesty for 12 million illegals and up to 40 million family members to be brought in for social services and additional energy use.
Edwards was as bad. Kudos for Obama saying nukes must be part of the solution.
All against any new oil exploration off our coasts or in Alaska.
Hillary! for regulating and then outlawing lightbulbs so "saner" flourescent fixtures can save the day.
All 3 candidates somehow are convinced "Global Warming" is a greater crisis than our present oil &energy crisis and America's priority focus must be on "Wind, Solar, Geothermal, and Ethanol from cellulose.
Quite different than what American idustry, the AAA, economists, and scientists say we must do..which is closer to the Republican side of Romney and Thompson.
(More nukes, more coal for synthetic oil, ending restrictions on oil exploration domestically, more conservation, more R&D, no more illegal immigrants adding tens of millions of new energy users to present consumption base.)
I had an NROTC scholarship to Notre Dame a long time ago. I've never in my life heard anyone say that pronunciation of ROTC was pejorative. I think only in Madison would it be considered pejorative, but then just mentioning ROTC or the military would be considered a perjorative in that town regardless of context.
I never thought or heard that ROT-C was a slam...and my brother was in it both in the HS version and in college.
Hillary was after an interest rate freeze on home loans not generally.
It will actually save the taxpayer money rather than giving out bailouts and free money to banks which solves nothing. don't replace debt with other debt, stop the bleeding and fix it.
If your intellectual choice is between a debate and american idol, then you need a life.
revenant said: "I'm honestly surprised that Hillary would suggest something that dangerously stupid."
I'm not. SHE is dangerously stupid, but her supporters keep denying it, and denying it, and denying it... If some idiotic remark doesn't fly, she'll just disavow it - or go silent on the topic - and in a few days it will disappear from the Dem Collective memory. The only subject Mrs. Clinton has studied over the past 35 years is how to acquire and abuse power.
Prich said:
If some idiotic remark doesn't fly, she'll just disavow it -
Accoding to the Clinton doctrine, we are supposed to read what they say versus listen to what they say.
If you ahd read what she said, you would have heard correctly.
hdlous
The government has no responsibility or obligation in re the mortgage situation. There is no need for a bailout or any type of interest freeze. What will be advocated next? If people cannot pay of their five to mid five figure credit card debt, is the government going to take the credit card industry to task? At what point do people take responsibility for their choices and actions? It is time to stop the whole world is a victim nonsense. People signed contracts. They are responsible for what they signed. They abide by the contract or suffer the consequences of their actions.
revenant (and Professor Althouse): The 5-year freeze is on those adjustable mortgages that are causing problems because people are walking away from them. In general I'm against bailing people and lenders out of situations that arose because of their own stupidity, but the fallout is dragging down the economy. It's not like there's a right or wrong choice in this case.
I suppose if the government can bail out the President's brother in a S&L debacle, it can bail out people who may have voted for him (the President, not his brother).
"It's not like there's a right or wrong choice in this case.
I suppose if the government can bail out the President's brother in a S&L debacle, it can bail out people who may have voted for him (the President, not his brother)."
So, since it's not like there's a right or wrong choice in this case, you'd support applying a voting test, per your last comment, to bail out people who voted for Bush?
Works for me. Excellent.
How do you know who voted for Bush? If you're giving away money based on that aspect, suddenly he'll have won in a landslide and will have had lots of political capital to spend.
To clarify, I should have added poor in front of people who may have voted for him.
…but the fallout is dragging down the economy. It's not like there's a right or wrong choice in this case.
The drag on the economy and the whole housing mess was the fault of those to kept the housing market artificially inflated. The market should have corrected itself almost two years ago.
The reason for the slackening of credit was to keep the market up at any cost. It had to eventually crash. This is what happens to markets when they are kept up through artificial means; whether by the private sector or the government.
No bail outs. No tax money to irresponsible people who should have known better. What next, bail out people who cannot afford to pay their credit card debt? Bail out the credit card companies?
As to Hillary being stupid and/or dangerous, she is not only both, but she lacks common sense- horse sense. The sense that horses have that keep them from betting on humans.
Hillary keeps proving over and over again that she has no concept of governance. She has no concept of what it takes to lead. She only knows talking points, and she is probably given those by others. She is no better than a news reader.
I am stocking up on incandescent bulbs, as those fluorescents are lousy. I want light that actually lights, just like I want toilets that actually flush.
hdlouse said:
"If your intellectual choice is between a debate and american idol, then you need a life."
The key word is choice. Something that would be outlawed under the progressive regime. There would be no choice.
You vil vatch vat ve tell you to vatch. You vil think vat ve tell you to think.
If my "intellectual" choice were between the debate and American Idol- no difference between the two- I would choose to turn the idiot box off.
"To clarify, I should have added poor in front of people who may have voted for him."
MM, Sure - I understood what you meant - I was gigging you on the notion that "(i)t's not like there's a right or wrong choice in this case" and using your following statement against that.
There are right and wrong choices in this case, and drawing an analogy to the S & L bailouts doesn't clarify that there are not, unless, of course, one favors bailouts, regardless of the demerits or consequences.
If the government can bail out the rich, why not have it bail out the poor too?
Ann Althouse said...
LOL! I was trying to do a Michigan tag, and that was the auto-complete."
was that an inadvertent pun or were you referring to Ford and GM?
Middle Class Guy belched:
"What next, bail out people who cannot afford to pay their credit card debt? Bail out the credit card companies?"
We did bail out credit card companies when the bankruptcy rules were re-written.
As to credit card debit and unaware consumers, Providian Bank in California was in all kinds of hot water a few years ago because of their practices.
What they would do, and it isn't uncommon, was to lower the credit limit to below the amount owed, whether in good standing or not. then they would charge an "over crdit limit" fee and when the consumer fought it, they would charge a late fee. The over limit fee was routinely the amount of the minimum monthly payment or $35 or the higher of the two. With the "over limit" the credit card interest would go from whatever it was to 28 or 32% depending on where the cardholder lived. 32% annual interest means the debt doubles in about 2 1/2 years.
That is preditory and almost 1 million people were affected by it so in cases like that, the government needs to step in because that is simply unfair by any standard. Even yours.
hdhouse:
There is a difference though between fraud ("That was not in my agreement") and trying to avoid the consequences of a bad decision ("I can't believe my property value went down at the same time the rate on my ARM / interest-only loan went up. Help me government!") As some one who is almost done paying off a pretty hefty five figure cc debt, I really do not have a whole lot of sympathy for the ARM people. We were offered an ARM 5 years ago and my wife and I looked at each other and said "5.8 for a 30 years is better than 3.5 for 2 years, 5.5 for 2 more, and 9 percent thereafter." Having eyes bigger than your stomach is part of being a human -- should we bail out being not financially prudent?
Hdlouse said:
We did bail out credit card companies when the bankruptcy rules were re-written.
You really do believe the conspiracy theories put out by people don’t you.
Please be specific? How did the new law bail out anyone? Protection is not a bail out. The bankruptcy laws were reformed due to the irresponsible use of credit by people and the high rates of bankruptcy; it was way too easy for people to literally walk away from their debts. The new laws leveled the playing field and allowed the credit card companies and their banks to keep easy credit available.
There has been no deleterious effect on debtors who for one legitimate reason or another cannot meet their obligations. Do you honestly believe, except in rare cases, people should be able to just walk away from the debt they incurred? Also, if the new law was so onerous, how come the number of bankruptcy lawyers and ads for bankruptcy have not diminished?
As to companies changing the rules midstream, like Providian; if they violate a contract or the law, they should be punished. My standards are very high. Thank you for the unexpected compliment.
Middle Class Guy said...
"My standards are very high."
fooled me completely
I remember a leftwing chant back in the 70s and 80s 'ROT-C, ROT-C. Reagan is a Nazi."
Don't worry, Ann. We call it ROT-Cee in the Army too.
Blue Moon
You ask
should we bail out being not financially prudent?
Sorry, the "not financially prudent" have the votes.
I deplore that, but recognize it as a fact.
They also get first dibs on the victim card. So, I also resent them taking the moral high ground. Lot of good it does me.
Few understand the moral of the Three Pigs, alas.
If the government can bail out the rich, why not have it bail out the poor too?
How is bailing out a savings and loan "bailing out the rich"? Sure, the people *running* the S&L might be rich, but the investors generally aren't.
As someone who was in college back in the 1950's, Rot-C was exactly what it was called with no pejorative slant at all. I guess it must have been a Boomer thing to trash something that helped a lot of young people get an education and a career. When will we ever be rid of these Boomers!!
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