Althouse: "I got dinged a little bit even by my wife for interrupting too much. Okay."

October 6, 2016

"I got dinged a little bit even by my wife for interrupting too much. Okay."

Said Tim Kaine. Video here.

30 comments:

Jaq said...: He did his job. He made sure that Pence couldn't put any uncomfortable facts out there about Hillary. They are feeling pretty good. Kaine was nothing more than a thread spammer, like our own Unknown.; 10/6/16, 8:35 AM
ndspinelli said...: This is a girly man bossed around by women. If his ticket wins, it will be 2 closeted gays.; 10/6/16, 8:41 AM
David Begley said...: A heartbeat away.

Kaine is this year's Palin.; 10/6/16, 8:41 AM
dreams said...: "This is a girly man bossed around by women. If his ticket wins, it will be 2 closeted gays."

Girly person, he wants to be Hillary's right hand person.; 10/6/16, 8:45 AM
Mike Sylwester said...: Kaine had impressed me as a decent person until I watched his obnoxious conduct in the debate. His interruptions were only part of the problem. His tendentious statements were likewise obnoxious.

It's quite likely that he eventually might become the US President. His current disgraceful conduct will not be forgotten if that happens.

By the way, have any "fact checkers" said anything about his his preposterous statement that the Virginia Tech massacre was enabled by gaps in our gun-purchase background checks?; 10/6/16, 8:45 AM
Matt Sablan said...: "By the way, have any "fact checkers" said anything about his his preposterous statement that the Virginia Tech massacre was enabled by gaps in our gun-purchase background checks?"

-- If by gaps we mean, the government did not properly add the guy who had threatened people and admitted to having mental problems onto the do not buy list, the statement is true.

This is like an "I'm sorry you're offended apology" from Kaine. But, whatever. The VPs are now back to not mattering.; 10/6/16, 8:51 AM
TobyTucker said...: For this 90 minute debate, Kaine had 2 hours worth of talking points and 'zingers' memorized and ready to go. He acted like he wasn't going to get paid if he didn't use each and every one of them.; 10/6/16, 8:52 AM
tcrosse said...: If Kaine were truly consistent, he/she would be dinged by his/her spouse, not by his/her 'wife'.; 10/6/16, 8:53 AM
Nonapod said...: Strictly speaking, in a live debate situation I'm not sure strategically what the best course of action is when you want to/have to challenge an opponent in the middle of their time. I mean, I know what I like personally, but I don't understand what other people like. I know I like it when people are allowed to complete their argument without interjections. I detest crosstalk and yelling. But I know that lots of people hate it when someone says something that they find outrageous and it's not immediately challenged. They seem to feel that it's like you're tacitly agreeing with a statement if you don't interrupt it immediately rather than wait your turn to respond.

As I said, personally I like it when people are allowed to complete their thoughts. It's one of the reasons why I prefer textual online comment sections and forums. In those situations you sort of get the best of both words, a person is allowed to complete their thought and another poster can challenge a specific point made by selecting it out and responding. It's more civil and more logical. It allows more time for readers to digest and reflect on what's been said.; 10/6/16, 9:08 AM
Wince said...: Aside from style, Kaine demonstrated what politicians do: use narrative in an attempt to shape reality.

To go back to Althouse's earlier comment:

What happens when you transfer that skill to government — suddenly and at the presidential level — and when you are bursting with exuberant confidence? It seems like an insane risk.

Trump happens.; 10/6/16, 9:11 AM
Big Mike said...: Still Kaine. Still smarmy. Soon to be one very, very ill woman's heartbeat from the presidency.; 10/6/16, 9:22 AM
Once written, twice... said...: Of course Ann did not go apoplectic over Trump interrupting Clinton constantly during their first debate. "Cruel neutrality"? Give me a break.; 10/6/16, 9:31 AM
tcrosse said...: 2016, the Year of Tu Quoque.; 10/6/16, 10:01 AM
Clayton Hennesey said...: Has anyone yet commented on the three way dynamic among Hillary, Kaine, and Bill Clinton should Hillary win?

Hillary as President, Kaine officially Vice-President, unofficially court eunuch, Bill officially both royal consort without vaginal portfolio and former President.

Kaine with pseudopower, Bill with neither official power nor Monica, nor Energizer bunny Julie Tauber McMahon but ever with high hopes.

They would have to write the scripts in Spanish as a telenovela. Mere English would never suffice.; 10/6/16, 10:26 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Here's what I said about interruptions in the Hillary/Trump debate:

"In a debate characterized by interruptions, it's worth that the first interruption was Trump's "That's called business, by the way." Trump interrupted Clinton again in that same turn (to deny that he said "climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese" (which he did once tweet, perhaps as a joke)). Clinton never complained about that interruption. In fact, she took it as freeing her to interrupt, which she did the next time Trump got a turn. And it was quite something, with Trump also not complaining about interruption but reveling in the liberation to go back and forth. [Quote from transcript which ends with the moderator trying to break in.]

"And they didn't cede the ground to Holt. Hillary kept talking, and then Trump talked again — each of them for a fairly long time. Holt finally broke through with: 'Let me get you to pause right there, because we’re going to move into — we’re going to move into the next segment. We’re going to talk taxes...'

"And Clinton interrupted with "That can’t — that can’t be left to stand." Holt ceded the floor to her, and she and Trump went back and forth again, with Holt periodically trying to jump in and getting ignored by both of the candidates. Holt adapted and let the candidates go wild."

That is, the presidential debate played out differently, with both candidates opting to be interrupters in a more or less balanced way and with the moderator observing and adapting.

In the VP debate, Kaine interrupted without provoking Pence to behave the same way, and it went on and on and was very irritating and made it difficult for the listener and gave the impression of unfairness to the one, Pence, who didn't opt to be an interrupter himself. The moderator seemed to have no skill at all in observing and moderating, and it was not a lively back-and-forth but an unwatchable clusterfuck.; 10/6/16, 10:43 AM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Ann Althouse said...The moderator seemed to have no skill at all in observing and moderating, and it was not a lively back-and-forth but an unwatchable clusterfuck.

I don't really fault the moderator for letting Kaine keep interrupting--as you point out Holt pretty much let both Trump & Clinton interrupt each other frequently and just keep going. The part that made the VP debate a clusterfuck was the moderator repeatedly jumping in to interrupt and cut off Pence, too! That was her real failing, and intentional or not it looked biased as hell and really made it difficult to watch.; 10/6/16, 11:12 AM
Barry Dauphin said...: Who knows whether Kaine listens to his wife, but he sure listens to the campaign's political consultants.; 10/6/16, 11:27 AM
TreeJoe said...: As my wife and I have learned in our marriage, there are VERY different types of interruptions. Trump often interrupted to say "not true" or plug a one-liner and then stop and continue listening to Hillary. It gave him a chance to challenge her in the moment while not actually stopping her.

Kaine's interruptions though were to actually stop the other person from talking. He didn't want to listen to Pence or let Pence finish, he wanted to stop people from hearing Pence's full statement and to often make one of his own.

One of the most interesting and effective tactics I saw Kaine employ was that he interrupted pence DURING THE "PUNCHLINE"....very frequently when Kaine was summarizing and hitting home a key point, that's when the interruption would occur - obfuscating his message and preventing anyone from hearing it.

I think Kaine's job was not to "beat" Pence, it was to mitigate him and attack Trump. Kaine lost the debate, but he prevented Pence from effectively getting across some really good key messages about the Republican ticket stance in this election.; 10/6/16, 11:33 AM
Darrell said...: Barry Kripke would say it was a "Kaine weck." Exactly what a Hillary win would be for the United States.; 10/6/16, 11:55 AM
cubanbob said...: Kaine came across as what he is, an arrogant, smarmy, moronic asshole. Another Joe Biden. I suppose Hillary came to the same conclusion Obama did; find someone so dumb and objectionable that no one would dare kill you and make him president.

Contrast and compare with Pence. For that alone Trump's choice for a replacement president simply demonstrates who is putting country over personal aggrandizement.; 10/6/16, 12:01 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Tim in Vermont pretty much nails it with the first comment: Kaine's entire approach was be a debate troll. This is identical to the approach Biden used in the debate with Ryan, the only real difference was that Ryan handled it poorly, and Ryan was probably totally befuddled by the truly unexpected behavior. After considering it awhile, I think this was entirely planned in both instances- it was all designed to keep the opponent from saying anything at all. I think this time, though, Pence was expecting it and adapted to it quite effectively by not getting himself into a defensive response mode.; 10/6/16, 12:35 PM
jg said...: Everything seems justified when you're attacking "evil". Disgraceful behavior from the left these days - understandable when Hillary's persuading naifs that violence against Trump's "deplorable" supporters is morally correct.; 10/6/16, 12:36 PM
Comanche Voter said...: Kaine's wife needs to work on that bad habit of his.; 10/6/16, 12:37 PM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Dang it, am I going to have to be the one to remind people of Dana Carvey's Ross Perot imitation? Remember? "Can I finish?"

SNL: Dana Carvey as Ross Perot; 10/6/16, 1:04 PM
Shawn Levasseur said...: I guess Kaine was channeling his inner Kanye.; 10/6/16, 1:31 PM
khesanh0802 said...: The job of the moderator is to make the "debaters" behave. If Kaine had gotten called out a couple of times and reprimanded for interrupting I'll bet he would have stopped. How many times did he want the audience told that he was misbehaving, or that he was being rude, or inconsiderate? No one seems to expect anyone to act like an adult these days.; 10/6/16, 2:12 PM
Theranter said...: Damn he's creepy.
Are his pants even fully zipped in that clip?

And they accuse Trump of using coke? That guy is more fidgety than my ADD son. The nose, the pocket, the ever changing smirks and grimaces, the mic,...; 10/6/16, 2:18 PM
Humperdink said...: A clear case of Debatus Interruptus. No known cure.; 10/6/16, 4:12 PM
richard mcenroe said...: Tim Kaine, one heartbeat away from the Oval Office...or maybe a bit closer, all things considered.

Yeah, I'm voting for that.; 10/6/16, 8:16 PM
Big Mike said...: No one seems to expect lefties to act like an adult these days.

@khesanh0802, FIFY

BTW, were you really there? I don't get the 0802 reference -- after all the misery and suffering didn't we abandon the base on the Fourth of July?; 10/7/16, 8:33 AM