Biden interrupted Ryan 82 times:
Vice President Joe Biden interrupted Paul Ryan 82 times in a
90-minute debate with rival Paul Ryan. “Mr. Vice President, I know you’re under
a lot of duress to make up lost ground, but I think people will be better
served if we don’t keep interrupting each other,” Ryan said during the debate.
But Biden's performance here in Danville, Kentucky
was both comical and self-defeating. Just as Al Gore sighed and rolled his eyes
in 2000, so Biden smirked and guffawed. He gesticulated wildly and jabbed his
finger. He interrupted Ryan and the moderator Martha Raddatz. Many women and
swing voters will have hated it. And by engaging in off-putting histrionics and
displaying a cavalier attitude towards the truth, Biden was channelling Al Gore
- in the debates against George W. Bush that put paid to Gore's lifelong
ambition of winning the White House.
Raddatz (the moderator) -- 31 times...
Raddatz followed the Biden lead though – interrupting the
debaters 50 times. She leaned heavily on Ryan, interrupting him 31 times, 12
more than the 19 times she cut off Biden.
Ryan scored the biggest line of the night: “I think the
vice president very well knows that sometimes the words don't come out of your
mouth the right way,” Ryan said to audience laughter.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/10/12/liberal-media-split-over-how-to-spin-raddatz-and-biden-performance-at-debate/#ixzz296paRq71
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/10/12/liberal-media-split-over-how-to-spin-raddatz-and-biden-performance-at-debate/#ixzz296paRq71
Confusing Strength With Aggression by Peggy Noonan
So, to the debate:There were fireworks all the way, and plenty of drama. Each candidate could claim a win in one area or another, but by the end it looked to me like this: For the second time in two weeks, the Democrat came out and defeated himself. In both cases the Republican was strong and the Democrat somewhat disturbing.
Another way to say it is the old man tried to patronize the kid and the kid stood his ground. The old man pushed, and the kid pushed back.
Last week Mr. Obama was weirdly passive. Last night Mr. Biden was weirdly aggressive, if that is the right word for someone who grimaces, laughs derisively, interrupts, hectors, rolls his eyes, browbeats and attempts to bully. He meant to dominate, to seem strong and no-nonsense. Sometimes he did—he had his moments. But he was also disrespectful and full of bluster. "Oh, now you're Jack Kennedy!" he snapped at one point. It was an echo of Lloyd Bentsen to Dan Quayle, in 1988. But Mr. Quayle, who had compared himself to Kennedy, had invited the insult. Mr. Ryan had not. It came from nowhere. Did Mr. Biden look good? No, he looked mean and second-rate. He meant to undercut Mr. Ryan, but he undercut himself. His grimaces and laughter were reminiscent of Al Gore's sighs in 2000—theatrical, off-putting and in the end self-indicting.
Mr. Ryan was generally earnest, fluid, somewhat wonky, confident. He occasionally teetered on the edge of glibness and sometimes fell off. If I understood him correctly during the exchange on Iran, he seemed to suggest to moderator Martha Raddatz that a nuclear war in the Mideast would be preferable to a nuclearized Iran. Really? That easy, is it? Mr. Biden had one of his first good moments when he said, essentially, "Whoa." Actually he said war should always be a very last resort, which is always a good thing to say, and to mean.
Because the debate was so rich in charge and countercharge, and because it covered so much ground, both parties will be able to mine the videotape for their purposes. On the attack in Benghazi, the question that opened the debate, Mr. Biden was on the defensive and full of spin. He pivoted quickly to talking points, a move that was at once too smooth and too clumsy. He was weak on requests for added security before the consulate was overrun and the ambassador killed. "We will get to the bottom of this." Oh. Good.
Mr. Ryan was strong on spending and taxes. On foreign affairs and defense spending, he was on weaker ground. Medicare and Social Security were probably a draw. Mr. Ryan coolly laid out the numbers and the need for change, but Mr. Biden emoted in a way that seemed sincere and was perhaps compelling. He scored when he knocked Mr. Romney for his 47% remarks, saying those who pay only payroll taxes pay a higher rate than many of the rich, including Mr. Romney. Mr. Ryan in turn scored on the unemployment rate in Scranton, Pa., Mr. Biden's hometown. It is 10%. It was 8.5% when the recession began. "This is not what a real recovery looks like." Mr. Ryan on abortion was personal and believable. Mr. Biden seemed to be going through the pro-choice motions.
I have just realized the problem with the debate: it was the weird distance between style and content, and the degree to which Mr. Biden's style poisoned his content.
In terms of content—the seriousness and strength of one's positions and the ability to argue for them—the debate was probably a draw, with both candidates having strong moments. But in terms of style, Mr. Biden was so childishly manipulative that it will be surprising if independents and undecideds liked what they saw.
National Democrats keep confusing strength with aggression and command with sarcasm. Even the latter didn't work for Mr. Biden. The things he said had the rhythm and smirk of sarcasm without the cutting substance.
And so the Romney-Ryan ticket emerged ahead. Its momentum was neither stopped nor slowed and likely was pushed forward.
Meaning that things will continue to get hotter. The campaign trail, commercials, all sorts of mischief—everything will get jacked up, cranked up. Meaning the next debate is even more important. Which means, since the next debate is a town hall and won't be mano-a-mano at the podium, that the third debate, on foreign policy, will be the most important of all.
Ms. Raddatz acquitted herself admirably, keeping things moving, allowing the candidates to engage, probing. There was a real humanity to her presence. We just saw Jim Lehrer beat up for what was also good work. May her excellence go unpunished.
Biden: “We weren’t told they wanted more security. We did not know they wanted more security there.” Update: White House: No, really, we had no idea
Just taking Biden at his word, we’d have to believe that (a) the State Department had no special concern over personnel in eastern Libya, where the weak central government can’t even deploy a police force, (b) the White House was unaware that al-Qaeda had expanded its operations in the region, and (c) no one remembered that the anniversary of 9/11 was approaching. That’s a shocking level of incompetence to confess on national TV. Small wonder that CNN’s tracking group considered this Joe Biden’s lowest point of the debate.
Furthermore, one has to wonder how the intelligence community will react to Biden’s bus-tossing them during the debate, too
Update: Good Lord:
“Vice President Joseph Biden speaks only for himself and President Barack Obama, and neither man was aware that U.S. officials in Libya had asked the State Department for more security before the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, a top White House official told The Cable.
The Cable asked Deputy National Security Advisor for Communications Ben Rhodes whether Biden was speaking for the entire Obama administration, including the State Department, which acknowledged receiving multiple requests for more Libya security in the months before the attacks. Rhodes said that Biden speaks only for himself and the president and neither of them knew about the requests at the time.”
So … it’s official that no one at the White House had a clue what was happening in a mess Obama helped create in eastern Libya? Words fail me.
Hillary's sinking ship
Two and a half weeks ago I wrote a column for Fox News Opinion calling on Hillary Clinton to quit as Secretary of State. As more information comes out about what really led to ambassador Chris Stevens’s death on September 11, we’re hearing growing murmurs demanding the same thing. It’s not a full-throated chorus yet. But yesterday’s hearings in front of the House Government Oversight Committee are encouraging others to join in.
They certainly confirm three damning facts about our Secretary of State.
First, she and her Washington minions ignored repeated direct calls for help with security in Benghazi, including from the ambassador himself, and warnings about a possible attack on the anniversary of 9/11. According to the State Department’s security chief Andrew Wood, getting “security in Benghazi was a struggle” without end.
Twice the man in charge of security for our diplomats in Libya, Greg Nordstrom, begged the State Department for more security in Benghazi after no less than 48 security “incidents” there, including two bombings.
Washington, however, said no. Hillary Clinton wanted to preserve the illusion that all was fine in Libya, especially on the eve of the November election. She had her minion Charlene Lee, assistant head of international programs, tell Nordstrom that State wanted “to normalize operations” in Libya and to “reduce security resources.”
In the end Ambassador Stevens had to trust his life to hired local security–who, we now know, led the killers to Stevens’s hiding place where they could torture, and murder him.
Second, by blaming the Stevens murder on a video instead of Al Qaeda terrorists, she and the president deliberately deceived the American people and the world.
Hillary paraded this falsehood in two very public speeches on September 12th after the attack, and again on the 14th–even though the word was out within 24 hours that the killings in Libya were the result of a terrorist attack.
Her own State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research dubbed the murders acts of terror from the start, and never considered the online video a factor. “That was never our conclusion,” officials now say.
It was not until September 21st–more than a week after the truth was known–that Hillary abruptly changed her story to “what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack.” By then the video story was so transparently false that when she trotted it out one last time at a Congressional briefing on September 20, the reaction was one of disbelief and disgust. “They’re trying to cover their behinds,” Congressman Ted Flores of Texas seethed, and he was right.
Third and finally–and most tellingly--the professionals at State are starting to abandon the Hillary ship. Wood and Nordstrom have provided a version of events that explicitly contradicts the Hillary version of what happened. That wouldn’t happen unless they and others weren’t fed up with taking the fall for their boss, and being associated with a dangerous and epic lie.
So don’t expect the administration’s latest story that the video story was the result of an “intelligence failure,” to help save Hillary. That’ll only arouse more ire inside the CIA and other intelligence agencies, along with State.
The only possible conclusion is that, in order to preserve the fiction that the Obama policy in Libya was working, Hillary Clinton was willing to put the life of our ambassador at mortal risk, and afterwards deliberately misdirected our attention away from a genuine lethal threat to our security, Al Qaeda, toward a fake one, an online video.
After this sustained deception no other Secretary of State in our history could keep his or her job.
This one shouldn’t, either.
Preventable tragedy
Obama administration can’t spin its way out of blame for Benghazi
Testimony in a congressional hearing Wednesday on the Sept. 11 outrage against the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi fueled a growing suspicion: President Barack Obama’s administration was more concerned about projecting the image of improving stability in Libya, to bolster his re-election chances, than it was about ensuring the security of Americans on the ground there.
The fact of a successful terrorist attack against the U.S. on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks — a day, above all others, when security for American officials in volatile countries should be at its utmost — is demoralizing and infuriating.
After months of concern by diplomats in Libya about the country’s deteriorating security, Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three embassy employees were murdered by heavily armed and organized terrorists. The possibility the government could have prevented their deaths by responding to their pleas for greater security is devastating.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Charlene Lamb, who helps oversee diplomatic security, acknowledged in the hearing that she had told security officials at the U.S. Embassy in the capital city of Tripoli not to bother asking for more security help after the assignment of a supplemental security team ended in August.
Security officer Eric A. Nordstrom told Congress members he took Lamb’s refusal to mean “there was going to be too much political cost.”
In March and July, Nordstrom cabled his superiors in the State Department asking for more security at Benghazi, which had much less protection than the embassy in Tripoli. He got no reply.
His further comment at Wednesday’s hearing is damning: “The takeaway from that, for me and my staff: It was abundantly clear we were not going to get resources until the aftermath of an incident. And the question that we would ask is, again, ‘How thin does the ice have to get before someone falls through?’ ”
That ice broke at 9:40 p.m. on Sept. 11, when a cadre of men stormed the consulate compound. They fired guns, threw grenades and set buildings on fire.
What followed in the ensuing weeks is an astounding display either of incompetence or dishonesty, as Obama administration officials gave constantly shifting accounts of what happened.
For at least a week, State Department officials blamed the attack on a spontaneous demonstration against a rogue video, made in the U.S., that mocks Islam. U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice said on Meet the Press on Sept. 16, “What happened in Benghazi was in fact initially a spontaneous reaction to what had just transpired hours before in Cairo, almost a copycat of the demonstrations against our facility in Cairo, prompted by the video.”
That explanation came under withering scrutiny, with pundits mocking the notion of “spontaneous” demonstrators showing up armed with rocket-propelled grenades.
Even as military and intelligence officials flatly stated the obvious as early as Sept. 13 — that the attack was a planned terrorist operation — the statements of those closest to the president, including Press Secretary Jay Carney, vacillated. On Sept. 18, Carney said, “Our belief ... is it was the video that caused the unrest in Cairo... and that precipitated some of the unrest in Benghazi and elsewhere.”
By Sept. 20, finally, Carney was declaring, “It is, I think, self-evident that what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack.”
What is equally evident is that, despite repeated concerns by diplomats working in Libya, the administration shortchanged security. And when the worst happened, it wasn’t willing to tell the truth to the American people.
And as of Wednesday, administration officials continued to insist that the consulate had adequate security.
The tragedy is magnified by the fact that Stevens, by all accounts, was passionately devoted to restoring Libya as a U.S. ally. He wanted to help build a democratic nation. But he wasn’t blind to the danger still posed by militant Islamists and other anti-American groups.
The murder of Stevens and his colleagues raises serious questions about the administration’s priorities and competence.
Raddatz Visited Biden at His Residence in March
White House records reveal that the moderator of last night's vice
presidential debate, Martha Raddatz, visited Vice President Joe Biden at his
official residence on March 26, 2012. Raddatz is an employee of ABC News.
On at least one other occasion, Raddatz visited the
White House. According to records, that visit was on December 18, 2009. The
reason for that visit is not know, though her meeting appears to have taken
place in the Old Executive Office
Building, and not the
West Wing.
From The Heritage Center:
Don’t Blame Budget Cuts for Libya Embassy Attack
Biden claimed that Ryan’s budget is partly responsible for the failures of security that led to the death of Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, saying that “The Congressman here cut embassy security in his budget by $300 million below what we asked for.”
As Heritage expert Brett Schaefer pointed out on The Foundry: “Overall funding for those programs has increased sharply over the past decade. Indeed, Worldwide Security Protection is more than double what it was a decade ago. … Moreover, the State Department has considerable latitude in allocating security funds based on current events and intelligence on possible threats. Why that latitude was not applied in Libya deserves further scrutiny.”
It’s also worth noting that the U.S. Senate has not actually adopted a budget in more than three years. So it is hard to see how the appropriations process is the appropriate place to start looking for the failures that led to the death of Stevens and his colleagues. The problems run deeper than that.
–Ted Bromund, Senior Research Fellow in Anglo-American Relations, The Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom
A Not-So-Balanced Approach on Spending
Biden echoed the all-too-familiar mantra that a so-called “balanced approach” is necessary to fix our spending and debt issues. Sounds fair, right? Except that the policy prescription he and President Obama advocate consists of more stimulus spending – disguised as critical investments, of course — plus massive tax hikes on high-income earners and small businesses, for starters. That’s a double whammy guaranteed to harm the economy.
Ryan rightly points out the sluggish economic growth the United States has experienced recently. The unemployment rate is still outlandishly high, and GDP has grown at a crawling rate. It is hardly the recovery Americans were assured would result from federal stimulus spending. That’s all the more reason not to double down on tax hikes on Americans or propose even more government spending. The economy needs to be free from the threat of Taxmageddon and other tax hikes, and Washington needs to curb its spending problem.
–Emily Goff, Research Associate, Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies
The Transnational Terrorism Threat
The debate took a quick tour over the landscape of transnational terrorism from Libya to Iraq to Afghanistan to Iran. It was so quick that no one bothered to explain where the war against transnational terrorism stands today.
The case in Libya is tragically all too clear. Al-Qaeda affiliates have established a base in the country. In Iraq, the AP recently reported that since the United States “ended” the war, the number of al-Qaeda in the country has doubled. Iran remains one of the world’s most notorious state sponsors of terrorism. The Taliban and other affiliates are threatening the stability of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Whoever holds the Oval office in January is going to have to deal with a significant transnational terrorism threat. The current U.S. strategy is just not up to the task.
–James Jay Carafano, Deputy Director, The Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies, and Director, Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies
Obama Tax Hike Would Devastate Jobs
Biden discussed President Obama’s plan to raise the top two marginal tax rates. If that were to occur, the economy would create 710,000 fewer jobs, according the accounting firm Ernst & Young. Jobs would suffer badly because, even though the Vice President said only 3 percent would pay those higher rates, those 3 percent are the biggest, most successful small businesses that do all the hiring. The Ernst & Young study found the Obama tax hike would devastate jobs because those businesses that would pay the higher rates employ 54 percent of the private workforce.
On the other hand, tax reform like Governor Mitt Romney and Ryan propose would lower rates to encourage growth and do so without reducing revenue or shifting the tax burden from high income taxpayers to middle income families. Even the Tax Policy Center, which is the group Obama and Biden cite to criticize the Romney tax plan, does not claim the Romney plan would reduce revenue -- never mind by $5 trillion.
–Curtis Dubay, Senior Policy Analyst, Tax Policy, Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies
The $6,400 Question on Medicare
The allegation that premium support in Medicare would cost seniors more than $6,400 more is both wrong and misleading. Heritage expert Rea Hederman explains, “[T]his dollar amount is incorrect, and the charge is erroneous. Such false charges are based on an outdated Congressional Budget Office (CBO) model of House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan’s (R–WI) 2011 budget proposal.” In fact, under Ryan’s current proposal, a senior would be guaranteed at least two health plans whose premiums meet 100 percent of the contribution amount. Read the facts.
Heritage expert Bob Moffit explains, “There is no major Medicare reform proposal, including the Ryan proposal, that would issue future senior citizens a voucher (a certificate or coupon or a check for a fixed dollar amount).” Under premium support, the government provides a direct payment from a government account to a health plan of a person’s choice, including traditional Medicare. Under premium support, plans would all have to meet government standards and provide at least the benefits of traditional Medicare. See how Ryan’s plan compares to the Heritage’s premium support proposal.
Medicare’s trust fund is projected to be bankrupt by 2024 and over the long-term the program has made $37 trillion worth of benefit promises to seniors that aren’t funded. Despite these serious problems, Obamacare cuts Medicare by $716 billion over the next 10 years and uses the “savings” to fund new spending in Obamacare.
–Alyene Senger, Research Assistant, Center for Health Policy Studies
Saving the American Dream
After a discussion of Iran, debate moderator Raddatz moved the conversation to a “different kind of national security issue” — the economy. Raddatz was entirely right to put it that way. You can be a liberal or a conservative, but it is impossible to believe that the United States can continue, over the long run, to lead in the world, to meet its national security responsibilities, to protect its allies, its interests, and its ideals, if its economy continues to grow slowly and the budget is consumed by entitlement spending.
A strong economy is not just vital for our prosperity: it is vital for our security. Unfortunately, after Raddatz’s well-crafted introduction, neither candidate made the connection she seemed to be hoping for, with both of them presenting their respective views on tax and economic policy. But as Heritage’s Saving the American Dream plan points out, fiscal responsibility needs to go hand in hand with international responsibility.
–Ted Bromund, Senior Research Fellow in Anglo-American Relations, The Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom
Don’t Lose Gains in Afghanistan
Ryan was crystal clear that the United States should not lose the gains made in Afghanistan over the last decade and must ensure the Taliban cannot regain influence there. By contrast, Biden staunchly defended the administration’s commitment to withdraw all combat forces by the end of 2014, but failed to explain how the United States would ensure Afghanistan does not again become a safe haven for terrorists intent on attacking the United States.
It is misleading for Biden to maintain that the only U.S. interest in Afghanistan is the withdrawal of U.S. forces. In reality, U.S. national security is inextricably linked to the future of Afghanistan. If the United States turns its back on Afghanistan, as it did in 1989, the Taliban are likely to regain influence, providing a boost to Islamist extremists throughout the world and an opportunity for al-Qaeda to revive itself. The truth is the United States will have to remain engaged in Afghanistan diplomatically, economically, and militarily through counterterrorism missions and training long after 2014.
Not only did the Obama Administration err in announcing the beginning of U.S. troop withdrawals back in December 2009, before U.S. surge forces had even been deployed, it also has fumbled the handling of peace talks with the Taliban. The administration has been more intent on striking a deal with the Taliban in order to justify troop withdrawals, than on using the option of negotiations as a tool to moderate the Taliban’s behavior and bring them into a political process.
–Lisa Curtis, Senior Research Fellow, Asian Studies Center
Unprecedented and Unconstitutional HHS Mandate
The Obamacare Health and Human Services preventative services mandate requires nearly all employers to cover abortion drugs, contraception, and sterilization regardless of moral or religious objections, effectively exempting only formal houses of worship. More than 100 plaintiffs have already been forced to go to court in an attempt to escape the coercive rule and protect their religious freedom.
The anti-conscience mandate is unprecedented and unconstitutional, and it is only an early warning sign of how one-size-fits-all health care requirements will trample on religious liberty as well as individual liberty. It should be a warning sign to Americans that one of the first parts of Obamacare to be implemented will force employers with religious and moral convictions to violate their consciences.
–Sarah Torre, Research Assistant, DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society
The Importance of Judges
Ryan and Biden talked about the importance of judges in this election and the likelihood that the next president will appoint one or more Supreme Court justices. They are right. The future of the Supreme Court does hang in the balance.
One vote may well change the court’s constitutional rulings on a host of issues that are critical to Americans who value freedom, including gun rights, the death penalty, private property rights, free speech, the free exercise of religion, and health care. If one constitutionalist justice leaves the Supreme Court and is replaced by a liberal judicial activist, our lives will be very different.
–John Malcolm, Senior Legal Fellow, Center for Legal and Judicial Studies
Military Readiness Must Remain an Issue
Sequestration and other defense cuts cannot be ignored. It is imperative that our nation’s leaders never forget that they have a duty to provide for the Common Defense. Cavalierly allowing the already atrophied defense capabilities of America to whither further is completely unacceptable. It is not responsible to hold defense hostage to new tax hikes that do not have the votes in Congress to pass normally.
America’s readiness is at the edge: smallest Army since before the Second World War, smallest Navy since before the First World War, and the smallest Air Force ever. The leaders of the nation owe the American people better than this.
–Steven Bucci, Senior Research Fellow Defense & Homeland Security, Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies
“We Believe in Opportunity and Upward Mobility”
Ryan could not have summed up the argument for economic freedom and limited government more clearly and concisely than when he stated: “We believe in opportunity and upward mobility.” This belief, which is at the heart of the American Dream, grows out of our founding principles.
It’s perhaps no surprise then that Ryan was the only one to invoke these principles. “We will not replace our founding principles, we will re-apply our founding principles,” he explained, thereby countering the progressive trope that we somehow need to move beyond our principles.
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