Biden vs. Palin: What Joe Needs To Do

Dear Joe,

Exposing Palin's disqualifications will be difficult. For she will deliver from memory non-toxic, formulaic "answers" crafted by her handlers, deliver them along with an occasional stiletto wrapped in carefully rehearsed Reaganesque good humor. And the PBS moderator, frantic to demonstrate her impartiality, won't press Palin when her practiced response evades the question. Your test is to pry her loose from her lines and then underscore the emptiness or sinister implications of her stated views without appearing condescending or a lout.

Here is how to do it.

First, as soon as possible, take on the perfectly stupid "experience" issue as it has been framed to date by noting that Presidents don't administer anything; they make basic policy choices from the buffet that their inevitably squabbling advisors spread before them and they appoint the people who execute their policies. That is why Palin's claim that she has actually "run" something while you and Obama have just made speeches is irrelevant. The relevant question is whether she has the judgment and understanding to make wise policy decisions and the character not to appoint cronies and sycophants.

Second, say without rancor that you have studied the few things that Palin has said about foreign policy in particular and they have given you the impression that she has not thought deeply about the issues or even been interested in them until now, but that her instinct seems much like that of McCain's, namely to rely on armed force as a principal means of getting what the country wants in the world. But you would be happy to be proven wrong.

Your next move flows directly from the first two: You need to state a number of questions you would like to see Governor Palin address, since [you will say] they will help you and the American people get some general sense of whether she has the knowledge, understanding and maturity essential for making policy for the nation. You will have to slip them in, one at a time, when you have the mic. Here are a few questions that could bring Palin out of her porcupine's croutch:

1. "If you had been President instead of Jack Kennedy at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, would you have resisted the majority of your advisors when they called for bombing or invading Cuba?
2. Should we threaten to attack Russia if it again invades Georgia's territory or if it fails to withdraw immediately the troops that are there now?
3. How many wars should we be prepared to fight simultaneously?
4, If North Korea goes ahead with its threat to re-start its nuclear program, should we attack North Korea? Suppose our South Korean allies are opposed to such an attack?
5. Suppose North Korea agrees to verifiably dismantle its nuclear installations in return for normalization of economic relations, an invitation to its supreme leader to visit the White House and Hollywood, and a Presidential declaration that North Korea is no longer part of the Axis of Evil. Would you support that deal? Suppose Iran did the same?
6. Do you think it was a mistake for us to arrange the overthrow, back in 1953, of Iran's only elected government? Do you think we would have the same problems with Iran if we had not done that?
7. Do you think we can address effectively problems like epidemic diseases, energy shortages, global warming and terrorism without having close cooperative relations with Russia and China, even though they are not Democracies?

You will probably manage to slip in only a few of them, Joe, but even a few should do the trick. Ask the moderator to press for an answer. If she doesn't, then the next time you get the microphone, ask Palin directly to answer and offer to waive a bit of your time so she can. If she ducks the questions, that's fine. If she attempts to answer, an army of post-debate spinners will not be able to obscure the fact that when Senator McCain placed Governor Palin a possible heartbeat away from the Oval Office, he revealed that for him, at this stage of his life, imagined political self-interest trumps the national one.

Comments

[Edmonsky]

Tom Farer:
Your ideas are very good but may not be as effective as you would like in this context and here is why. When you present Gov. Palin with any scenario that submits to “yes” or “no” answer, she is going to choose one and most especially she would like to err on the side of caution. But her problem is how to articulate her answers outside hitherto prepared talking-points because of lack of substantive knowledge base to draw from. That is the weakness Biden has to exploit. We know most of what she is going to say from her public statements. For instance, she is going to say that “surge” has worked but Obama did not support it nor acknowledge its success and we are winning.

Biden has to come in and say something like; Governor, l do not understand what you meant by winning in Iraq and what such win would look like by citing an example from past historical experiences; and while at it, what is Ambar awakening and how did it come about. Here she is going to ramble to filibuster and fill up the gaps; Biden has to say, Governor, you have not answered my question and l yield my time to you to help you explain what you know.

[elderly]

Ask her to tell you what Roosevelt did with respect to mortgages at the beginning of his term and why we don;t do the same now.

This will test whether she has any knowledge, the absence of which should disqualify her and ask her to conceptualize to the situation now.

[DXM]

"6. Do you think it was a mistake for us to arrange the overthrow, back in 1953, of Iran's only elected government? Do you think we would have the same problems with Iran if we had not done that?"

I have been absolutely appalled over the past 30 years how terribly few Americans are even aware of this fact, how it led to the overthrow of the Shah's repressive dictatorship, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism and, years later, lead to where we are today. Iran doesn't hate us because of our freedom, as dim-witted neocons constantly claim, they hate us for what we did to their democratically elected government 55 years ago, our policies that favored our selfish national interests over the interests of their country and their neighbors as well as the overt threats we have made specifically to them (i.e. the Axis of Evil tripe). I would love to see Sarah wrap her tiny little beauty-con­test-runne­r-up mind around this question and its implications (but then again, few Americans would not appreciate the question either... very sad!)

[IndependentforObama]

Well, your approach seems a little intense.

I am enraged that the McCain camp think it is okay to hide Palin's near total ignorance on EVERYTHING by conducting the most sexist campaign in history.
Premise: choose a female candidate for the aesthetic qualities but keep her quiet!

Women fought to be heard...this is why the Hillary's of the world did us proud and I am no Hillary fan but I know she is a GREAT, INTELLIGENT AND ACCOMPLISHED WOMAN.

The choice of Palin as Veep is a blow to FEMINISM the world over. I am delighted that intelligen­t/educated women have responded to Palin accordingly..by turning AWAY FROM MCCAIN!!!!

The way she has been handled and the way she has handled herself are an index of the
entire focus of John McCain on his single minded ambition to become President of our great country.

Will she do well in this debate? I have no doubt that she will. She is a good debater. And short answer form debates work well for the unlearned or ill prepared who have a basic knowledge of certain issues.

As for Ifill... I think you have seriously underrated her ability to take Palin to task. A female minority like Gwen does not climb up the corporate ladder by being frightened of her own shadow or distressed because someone is screaming wolf for no apparent reason. I KNOW she will not be giving Palin the "Easy" card.

[timm0]

Please also ask Joe to take exception to one of her highly likely verbal barbs by saying something like, "I truly respect the gift of delivering clever one-liner zingers as Mrs. Palin is clearly qualified to deliver. But I think that given the gravity of our many economic and international troubles, we might want to take a break from the superficial elements of typical debate rhetoric and focus on demonstrating our grasp of the issues and impacts of our solutions."

May be a little condescending as I've written it, but something that belittles the republican debate scoring system. May get the moderator off the snide if she indeed tries to be overly nice to palin.

[PaulL2]

Yes, this would be excellent. When I was a high school senior, I tried out a clever one-liner during class on a teacher who was probably approaching Biden's age. He cut me down so low with a comment similar to what you are recommending for Biden that I never crossed him again the entire year. I will never forget the incident. She simply could not recover from a comeback like that. She'd start blabbering like she did with Katie Couric, and it would be over.

[MPeter]

Good advice. I hope Senator Biden's handlers are browsing this website. I believe Joe will do fine. Still, such advice is quite helpful.

[LizM]

I have to chuckle at the spectacle of the media and blogosphere now, after having ignored and dismissed Senator Biden throughout this entire presidential primary and election campaign (when, that is, they aren't misrepresenting his polices and world view) seemingly having a bottomless pit of advice for him.

Why should we find any of this sage advice credible?

[IndependentforObama]

I have not seen any words of advice from you for as long as you have been posting so do you think you have the locus to question the writer of this piece?

Some of the advise is intense but a lot of it can be tweaked and used!!!! Emm....this is high stakes politics... everything is useful up until that very last minute and the fat lady screamssssss!

[LizM]

You're kidding, right?! I've been spouting advice for Obama for months and months...and he took it! Well, of course, he didn't listen to moi but he did pick Biden and demonstrated, to me, that he really does have sound and superior judgement.