Ifill: Palin "Blew Me Off"

On "Meet the Press" Sunday morning, vice presidential debate moderator Gwen Ifill said Palin "more than ignored" some of her questions -- she "blew me off." She added that Palin decided to "give a stump speech" instead of a debate, and that there's "little a moderator can do" to stop that. Watch:

Comments

[Bilboo]

She could have interrupted and told Palin to answer the question as posed. That's the moderator's job, and she shirked it.

She didn't have to sit there and take it. She chose to sit there and take it.

[BassMonk]

That would only allow Palin to waste more time making irrelevent points. Keep pushing or move on, it's not such an easy choice. I don't blame Gwen.

[grf67]

Palin is just another republican racist so you should not expect better.

[arvay]

Palin's tactic is scarcely new.

As a corporate PR guy, I was trained to answer the question the company wants to answer rather than the question asked, no matter how obvious the disconnect. We trained executives to do this. It presumes that the questioner is either stupid or passive, and over the years I was amazed at how often this worked with the press.

Ifill had a choice: insist on a genuine answer and risk being charged with favoritism, or trust the audience it figure it out. She chose the latter, and I won't try to second-guess her.

[ChaosTChoir]

Winky did a great job avoiding all the questions and sort-of answered..­.most of what she said made no sense but half the audience thought she won the debate.

One hopes the audience can figure it out ;at least half can I don't expect much from the other half.

SNL's Ifill did a wonderful impression which probably will last longer than the debate impression.

[fdavidm]

I respect Gwen Ifill and thought her questions at the debate were extremely thoughtful. I don;t understand however why she let Palin just run lose and not answer the questions that were proposed, especially since she announced upfront that she was going to ignore the requests of the moderator. It seems to me that that was a challenge being put forth that Ifill should have responded to.

[Ginger5]

The debate rules were engraved in stone in advance by the Obama and McCain. It was structured in a way to decrease friction between Biden and Palin to avoid gaffes and insults. The moderator was neutered by the rules

[pjburns11]

"The heels are on, but the gloves are off!" nyuk nyuk.

Cheap. Pathetic.

What's worse, is how many Americans think that is hilarious. We the Sheeple...

http://thetruthburns.wordpress.com/2008/09/11/you-can-put-eyeglasses-on-a-flock-of-sheep-they-are-still-a-flock-of-sheep/

[brabra]

This comment is pending approval and won't be displayed until it is approved.

Can anyone explain to me what the above sentence means when we try to post? When does it eventually show up if your comment is approved. I like to read what I post.

[brabra]

I wish Ifil had removed herself as moderator. Palin should have been called on for some of the things she got away with. I can understand Ifil's position, but we were cheated. The real Palin was not seen. What we saw was a "Miss America" wanna be and a McCain robot. Now we will never know if she has the knowledge necessary to be a heart beat away from the preseidency. This scares the hell out of me.

[eastutican]

Gwen Ifill should be finished as a moderator of anything. She looked like a whipped dog, having allowed herself to be worked over about the book. If candidates are going to be able to just freely associate, dont you think the audience listening should be told that ?? Ifill's performance could have been handled by a voiced computer.

[justoverit333]

I agree. It was a total stump speech.

[Cakey4814]

Oh yeah..that­'s what she should have done; caved in to the rightwing smear machine and cowered to the white power structure; wonder if that same pressure will be on Brokaw who supports McCain and not ashamed to say so!!

[ObamAtomic]

Gwen Ifil's did the right thing,let Palin imploded hersefl,Gwen Ifil's still own a career .
Palin is a facade of politician,beyond that all is the same.

[OB-GYN]

I appealed to Gwen Ifill and NPR to recluse themselves from the VP debate.

It would have put the ball back in McPalin's camp, which is where it needed to be.

[Cakey4814]

I see the McPalin plan worked by the bloggers on this site. You are blaming Gwen Ifill when it's obvious that her hands were tied. McPalin set the stage before the debate with "she's okay' she's not okay" which was to confuse the public with their tepid support for Gwen with that big "IF" hanging out there. The McPalin plan was to either portray Gwen as an angry Black woman if she pushed Palin to follow the rules which they would have then proceeded to link Gwen with Michelle (they've been trying to portray Michelle as the angry Black woman since this campaign began) or to have Palin run the show therefore showing Ifill and other Black people that no Black woman was going to tell Palin what to do. It's obvious by the MSM that the latter worked and people are blaming Ifill for McPalin pushing that old agenda of White Power being in control. While Ifill is being mocked by bloggers and the MSM Brokaw gets a free pass although his preference has been obvious. Where are the feminist that took up for Hillary speaking out in favor of Ifill or is that only reserved for a certain race?

[eastutican]

By your logic, we just cant have a black moderator when there is a Republican candidate. Ifill had plenty of choices, none of which she took except sit on her hands and ask scripted questions. Once a candidate goes off to freely associate, at least the moderator could, politely and articulately, point that out for the viewing audience. As it was, Biden followed the rules and Palin ran free doing exactly what she said she would within the first few minutes of this "debate". At the least, Ifill should have offered each side the opportunity to cancel if either thought, REALLY, that she was biased. Palin would have folded like the cheap lawn chair she is. The Republicans have gotten away with making up the rules as they go along for the last seven years, so the box they put Ifill in should have been no surprise. She at least could have tried to climb out. No need to be "angry". Just as clever and intelligent as she usually is. She was cowed by a bunch of school yard bullies and that is not their fault.

[Cakey4814]

You are obviously not a minority..­we have to play by different rules and you just don't get it. Gwen was boxed into a corner and did the best she could with what she had. Palin played that white woman entitlement to the hilt and let Gwen and Biden know right from the start that she was playing by her rules "wink wink"; that's the way people like her operate and Gwen knew it and like she said.."Pal­in blew her off". I'm behind you Gwen and so are alot of other people..we understand exactly what you were up against..

[FightMcCain]

The debate monitors should have a mic off button, and set it to off any time a candidate goes off topic. Afterall, they are there to debate, not read out their propaganda speeches.

Help us fight evil. Spread the word.
http://www.fightmccain.com/
Save the world.

[amities]

I'm surprised people are surprised that Palin didn't answer the questions. She's someone that doesn't read so she probably didn't even understand the questions!

[Apphouse50]

Paul Duke is rolling over in his grave.