I just stood in line for nearly FOUR hours, here in Dekalb County, GA to vote for Barack Hussein Obama and Joe Biden.
I feel good.
October 4, 2008
Fact-Checking the VP Debate
Joe Biden and Sarah Palin Vice Presidential Debate
As with any presidential campaign, lies and half-truths flow freely. The following is from wire.factcheck.org. The guys over there have done a real job of “Keeping them Honest,” throughout the entire Election.
Some highlights:
Killing Afghan Civilians?
Palin said that Obama had accused American troops of doing nothing but killing civilians, a claim she called “reckless” and “untrue.”
Obama did say that troops in Afghanistan were killing civilians. Here’s the whole quote, from a campaign stop in New Hampshire:
The Associated Press fact-checked this one, and found that in fact U.S troops were killing more civilians at the time than insurgents: “As of Aug. 1, the AP count shows that while militants killed 231 civilians in attacks in 2007, Western forces killed 286. Another 20 were killed in crossfire that can’t be attributed to one party.” Afghan President Hamid Karzai had expressed concern about these civilian killings, a concern President Bush said he shared.
Whether Obama said that this was “all we’re doing” is debatable. He said that we need to have enough troops so that we’re “not just air-raiding villages and killing civilians,” but did not say that troops are doing nothing else.
McCain in the Vanguard of Mortgage Reform?
Palin said that McCain had sounded the alarm on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac two years ago.
Palin is referring to a bill that would have increased oversight on Fannie and Freddie. In our recent article about assigning blame for the crisis, we found that by the time McCain added his name to the bill as a cosponsor, the collapse was well underway. Home prices began falling only two months later. Our colleagues at PolitiFact also questioned this claim.
Palin’s Health Care Hooey
Palin claimed that McCain’s health care plan would be “budget-neutral,” costing the government nothing.
The McCain campaign hasn’t released an estimate of how much the plan would cost, but independent experts contradict Palin’s claim of a cost-free program.
The Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center estimates that McCain’s plan, which at its peak would cover 5 million of the uninsured, would increase the deficit by $1.3 trillion over 10 years. Obama’s plan, which would cover 34 million of the uninsured, would cost $1.6 trillion over that time period.
The nonpartisan U.S. Budget Watch’s fiscal voter guide estimates that McCain’s tax credit would increase the deficit by somewhere between $288 billion to $364 billion by the year 2013, and that making employer health benefits taxable would bring in between $201 billion to $274 billion in revenue. That nets out to a shortfall of somewhere between $14 billion to $163 billion – for that year alone.
Palin also said that Obama’s plan would be “universal government run” health care and that health care would be “taken over by the feds.” That’s not the case at all. As we’ve said before, Obama’s plan would not replace or remove private insurance, or require people to enroll in a public plan. It would increase the offerings of publicly funded health care.
Did McCain “vote the same way” as Obama on funding troops? This correction by Factcheck.org answers that question.
Correction Oct 3: This article originally faulted Biden for saying that McCain had voted “the exact same way” as Obama on a controversial troop funding bill. We said that McCain was absent for the vote and so didn’t vote at all. Biden was, however, correct.
McCain did vote against the troop-funding bill in question, H.R. 1591, on March 29, 2007, when it originally cleared the Senate. The vote to which we referred, and which McCain missed, was a later vote on the House-Senate compromise version of the same bill, on April 26, 2007. McCain opposed the bill, which Obama supported, because it contained language calling for withdrawal of troops from Iraq. Biden was responding to Palin’s accusation that “Obama voted against funding troops.” Obama voted for the bill March 29 and April 26, and then on May 24, 2007, following a veto by President Bush, Obama voted against a similar troop-funding bill, H.R. 2206, that lacked any withdrawal language.
To read more facts on the topics that the Vice Presidential candidates discussed Thursday night, check out wire.factcheck.org and PolitiFact.org.
A few other misleads of note:
Palin: We need to look back, even two years ago, and we need to be appreciative of John McCain’s call for reform with Fannie Mae, with Freddie Mac, with the mortgage-lenders, too, who were starting to really kind of rear that head of abuse.
October 4, 2008
Does Folksy REALLY work for you?
Sarah Palin
I was born, and spent most of my childhood, in a small town. When I was twelve years old, my family picked up and moved to the big city of Atlanta. From one southern state to another, that hospitality was something that was never lost. I still smile at strangers when I walk down the street. Wave at my neighbors as I drive through my subdivision. Guest are still offered something cold to drink, something to eat. While others from bigger cities may scoff at this, one thing we from the south will always be known for is a hospitality that is genuine and meaningful.
But here’s the thing… There is quite a fine line between that genuine graciousness and the quite disingenuous nature of what we saw displayed on stage, by Governor Palin, last night.
Leading up to last nights debate, I had the opportunity to see several clips from Palin’s previous debates; and for a moment I thought perhaps that that would be the Palin that would show up last night. Not that I heard anything riveting during any of those performances… but the “folksiness” was kept to an absolute minimum. Why the drastic change of persona over the last couple of years? Is it that she doesn’t think she can speak to Americans, as a whole, as if we have more than two braincells to rub together? The only time I speak in the manner that she spoke to us last night is when I am playing with my 9 month old nephew. Being talked to as if I am an infant, or at best, a toddler is not something that I would calling “endearing.”
Didn’t we, as Americans, learn our lesson last go around with Bush? That wanting to have a beer and pizza with the president (or in this case, vice president) isn’t a qualifying factor? That it simply cannot be the barometer by which we measure presidential competency? It’s as if many of us are allergic to those who are intelligent. How else can you justify smearing someone for being a Harvard Law grad, while praising someone who took years to find a major, after changing schools three or four times? Yes, that may make her “normal” and “just like many other Americans,” but is that what we really want in someone who has to deal with the complexities of being one of the leaders, if not the leader, of the “Free World?”
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
I know that the Obama/Biden ticket has been trying to draw comparison between the Bush/Cheney Administration, and what a McCain/Palin Administration would look like, but after last night, never before has the similarities been so glaringly obvious. A (potential) vice president that has their own interpretation of the constitution? Where have we seen that before?
Palin made an attempt to further explain her position on the constitution and the role of the vice president today on FoxNews:
Incoherent? Maybe. Unnerving? Definitely.
Just Another Point of View 