On the Biden-Palin debate...
Once again, I appreciate the BBC analysis of the debate. I agree particularly with the last thought: "[Palin] was never going to win the election for them tonight, but she could have lost it and she didn't." Indeed, she did much better than I expected she'd do. Where I disagree with the BBC analysis, however, is anywhere it says the debate was a draw.
Often in debates where a candidate who was expected to do poorly actually does very well, the success of that candidate is oversold. Palin brought skill to the debate that many of us didn't expect, but all that earned her was the right to be taken seriously. It didn't score her extra points just because she wasn't a total wreck behind the podium. It merely allowed her to eliminate the point deficit she had coming into the debate. And if you start both candidates at zero before analyzing the debate, I think Biden was the clear winner.
Biden did a much better job of refuting Palin's falsehoods (check out the "Fact Checker" tab on the BBC article) without going on the defensive. Both candidates, actually, did a fine job of staying on the offensive, but Biden did so without ever appearing evasive or repetitive. He also provided very good details about where he and Obama stood on the issues and presented fair and accurate contrasts with McCain. Up against Binden's "straight talk" responses, Palin came off as an obfuscator very early on.
All of that said, for the first half-to-three-quarters of the debate it did look like Palin might hold her own for the duration. In spite of not appearing as genuine as Biden, she answered several questions very well and managed to exude an air of competence about a variety of issues. The moment her strategy collapsed, though, was right after Biden gave a very moving account of his own struggles as an American who grew up on "Main Street". The emotion and pain of that account was very real and utterly effective. Directly following, the moderator asked Palin a whole new question and Palin's cold, cardboard demeanor was such a stark contrast against Binden's thoughtful passion that one could almost hear Palin's appeal withering away. In my observation, she never recovered and Biden did win the day.
Of course, all any of this means is that the debate likely won't have any impact on the presidential race whatsoever. That isn't particularly surprising since the only impacts expected were negative ones if Biden showed up too grumpy or if Palin showed up... well, just showed up. Since both candidates did reasonably well, the debate isn't a game-changer. Still, folks do like to figure out "who won" these things. And in my observation, it was Biden's night.
delicious
diggHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Hey wait... you suppose that code is copyrighted? Am I gonna get sued now???
Reverse Engineering
I think...
... the amount of awesomeness on this forum is going to make it explode!
No game-changer
Yeah, that last thought in the article is probably the main point--The main thing I thought was going to change after this debate was that calls for Palin to step down would now end. She made an excellent recovery from the interviews of the past couple weeks. That won't change anything in this election, I don't think, but it could make her more of a viable candidate for national office in future elections.
I disagreed with the article's assessment though that she looked weak early on. I actually thought she was strong at the beginning and that it was Biden who appeared nervous, and overly tired (his eyes looked oddly squinty).
I thought the back and forth between the two of them was really good, especially in the more restricted format, and Ifill did a very good job moderating though I would have liked to see her ask Palin to actually answer the question a couple of times.
And I agree that Biden overall performed better--two times that he stood out to me were when he questioned the "Maverick" title ('cause I think people in general are reading that as a vacuous statement) and when he said he hadn't heard any details of any plans. I also thought that emotional moment was a turning point.
One thing she said that I thought might be picked up as a negative statement on her part was her support for Cheney's redefinition of the VP role--which also highlighted Biden's knowledge of and support for the constitution in his rebuttal. I can't think of anyone who's more generally loathed than Cheney.
And I found her closing remarks really odd in tone. There were no specifics, but she sounded apocalyptic about the future of the country (in a couple of generations we won't be a Democracy?). And it contrasted with her earlier tone of criticizing Biden for being a Mr. Gloomy-pants looking back at the Bush Administration and it problems instead of thinking about change and the future.
No game-changer
"She made an excellent recovery from the interviews of the past couple weeks. " - I disagree. I thought her performance was terrible. At its good points, it was nothing but recycled rhetoric tied together with a few emotional appeals here and there.
I thought she was weak throughout the entire debacle. The smile was noticeably forced, the tremor in her voice could have been measured on the Richter scale, she was completely unable to maintain any sort of pace to her speech pattern, she overused fillers, she relied on pre-built phrases from her time in the indoctrination camp, and overall sounded like a high school cheerleader trying to give a speech on advanced physics. I had to turn the volume WAY down every time she spoke. It was like listening to Fran Drescher with a cold after dropping acid. The outbursts of trailer-trash lingo provided the perfect contrast to help we the viewers separate her personal thoughts from those that were implanted by someone else.
LOL!
"Fran Drescher with a cold after dropping acid" 
OK, maybe I'm overcompensating on the positive side--I generally agree about the vacuousness, the forced smile, the "also's" were driving me up the wall.
But I was trying to address the way I thought she would come across to people generally and I thought the combination of how low the bar had been set for her, and the tendency of people to be distracted by glossy but meaningless marketing (as in why she was so immensely popular in the first place) would lead to the "excellent recovery." That is, she was doing what she seemed best at when people were all swoony over her right after she was picked. I don't think I picked up on the fear as much as you did.
Polls are indicating that Biden is seen as winning though, so maybe people are seeing through her more than I thought they would.
Mean Joe Biden
I don't really think that, but that is how he was portrayed preceding the debate. I think the only mean thing he said was about Cheney being the most dangerous VP ever. I am actually intrigued by his response. He was not saying it like it was a typical canned answer. I could tell that he meant that from the botttom of his heart. I want to know why he feels this way or was it only hyperbole.
Other than that, it was a wash to me. I think people say it's a draw when they don't want to concede that the other person actually won. Depending on what one was looking for in that debate would more dictate ones response as to who won. This wasn't the only debate that I have witnessed from SP, so my view might differ from someone elses as to how she did. I don't recall ever seeing JB debate while running for a public office, but I was more impressed with him than I thought I would be.
Perhaps since expectations were a little low for SP after Katie C and that SP didn't blow it completely makes it seem like a wash to some. Maybe since expectations for Biden were for him to come across as a grade 'A' keister orifice that it would seem his reserve gave him the edge...I would have to agree that Biden had the edge. It was a good debate none-the-less.
#3 Son
HAHAHAHAHAHA!
I checked and I think the jury IS still out as to whether or not Biden is a "keister orifice".
As for why he thinks Cheney is the most dangerous VP ever, I think it's because, as he explained it, no other VP before has ever done so much to over-extend the authority of the VP office. The tradition of seeing power-grabbers as "dangerous" goes back to our "Founding Fathers".
Now... perhaps some agree with Gov. Palin that Cheney hasn't over-reached. But I think one can understand why those who do think he has might also label him "dangerous".
VP
Very Funny
I like the analogy that you use with sewage. But, with our technology as it is, how can we not know of the existance of the VP. Even if Palin didn't agree with the role of VP that Cheney took on, she would be in the lime light should her ticket win the election.
I have read a lot of blogs that talk about Cheney being dangerous and they all say the same thing..."Yep, he's dangerous" or "Would you go hunting with him?". I also read a few magazine articles from Time and Newsweek. Really, the same kind of rhetoric with vague "facts".
I am not disputing the over-reaching the boundary issue. As a manager, I don't allow vague, blanket statements and I believe in finding the root cause. This means sifting through the personalities, which often settles disputes. This is why I wonder how much of this is hype and how much is factual. Is there an official document somewhere that explains all of this? Sorry for my complete ignorance with the subject matter, but I am not always willing to follow the crowd. Especially when all I have seen are parroted statements.
Looking at it now, I would consider it mostly hype. Biden did a good job in the debate equating McCain and Bush on certain issues. Since Palin is an unknown entity, there wasn't much bad to equate her with(besides the GOP)...until now. Since she accepts the Cheney VP role, she too can be viewed as a potential dangerous VP. That is kind of ludacris since SP doesn't have the same insider contacts and she doesn't know where the bodies are hidden like "dangerous" Dick Cheney does.
For the record...I would feel safe going hunting with Dick Cheney. It's no big deal. Who among us hasn't shot one of their friends accidentally?
#3 Son
re: Very Funny
I was primarily thinking of a sitting VP, not a candidate VP. They tend to sort of disappear after being elected.
I found the "dangerous" label to be more rhetorical than anything else, although I do accept it as valid under the broader scope of Cheney's ad hoc redefinition of the role. Within the scope of all VP's ever, I'd say that the dangerous label can easily be affixed here. One might still say that it's sort of like saying "the most dangerous Jack Russell terrier that ever lived" too.
Cheney will never ever ever ever ever live down that whole shooting incident. Even after he's been dead for twenty years, people will give him crap about it. I'm just doing my part. 
Cheney's redefinition of the VP
I think this is the main thing people are pointing to when they refer to Cheney as dangerous--the hunting accident is just an easy, ah, target.
Cheney redefined the role as a 4th branch of government--somewhere between the executive and legislative (because of the VP's role in the Senate) in order to justify not adhering to the checks and balances between the two, especially any oversight of the executive by the legislative. (I guess since the VP is both, the office is self-monitoring:-))
Here's on article that drew attention to the problem and to Cheney's attempt to escape from certain rules about turning over documents: The New Standard: "Cheney's Office Declares Exemption from Secrecy Oversight."
I Hacked the GOP
Let me just say up front that I didn't read the BBC analysis or any other. I watched the "debate" myself and these thoughts are my own. My DVR cut off somewhere in the middle of Palin's wrap-up so I didn't get to hear Biden's. Other than that I caught it all.
I've long suspected that there are a great many Republicans out there that aren't actually people, but robots.
While watching the "debate", I realized that Palin is one of these Republibots. It was pretty obvious since she didn't say a single thing that isn't already continually parroted on Internet forums and blogs. Watching her in action, it was child's play to reverse engineer the lax programming that went in to this particular model. The programmer used PHP, no doubt because it uses dollar signs to mark variables. The Palinbot source code is as follows, with syntax highlight goodness:
<?php
include 'republican_soundbites_08.php';
include 'republican_distortions_08.php';
$reuse_previously_debunked_distortions = true;
while(debate_active() == true)
{
vapid_glassy_stare();
fake_smile();
while(my_turn_to_speak() == true)
{
$soundbite = get_random_soundbite();
echo $soundbite;
echo " also ";
$soundbite = get_random_soundbite();
echo $soundbite;
echo " also ";
$distortion = get_random_distortion();
echo $distortion;
echo " maverick, also ";
$soundbite = get_random_soundbite();
echo $soundbite;
echo " ummm, maverick, also, maverick maverick, also maverick also ";
$random_number = get_randomnumber_between_1_and_100();
if($random_number < 20)
{
$gibberish = get_random_annoying_colloquialism;
echo $gibberish;
echo " also, maverick ";
}
$soundbite = get_random_soundbite();
$distortion = get_random_distortion();
echo $soundbite;
echo " also, maverick, also ummmm also ";
echo $distortion;
}
}
?>
All in all, kudos to Biden. Palin's performance rates EPIC FAIL. The Republican party continues to fail to put forth any detectable, much less coherent, plan to do anything. She repeated so many buzzwords and catchphrases and memorized rhetoric I'm still surprised she didn't try to say Obama is Muslim or remind all us good ol' boy 'mericans that Obama is "colored".