I'm watching the candidate Civil Forum at Saddleback Church. This is really interesting TV because we are actually getting to hear the candidates actually talk in actual full sentences and actual full thoughts, without any attempt on the part of Pastor Rick (the moderator) to get a "gotcha" out of them. Which is not to say that he's not asking uncomfortable questions about policy, such as abortion. But he's not doing Stephanopoulos and Russert-style gotcha interviewing. (Sorry to all the people who so loved Russert; I couldn't stand him).
It's a total condemnation of the mainstream media that a pastor at a megachurch can provide a better look at presidential candidates than can our national media. See this if you can; it's worth it.
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I watched it all. Now I'm a little scared that McCain will be seen as more likable and heroic and Obama will be seen as an egghead. Nuance is not an american trait--we like black and white. We hate complexity. It reminds us how stupid we are.
Tell me. The talking heads were all, "McCain came across better because he was so decisive and black-and-white." yeah. Except he was decisive on issues in a way that is at odds with my beliefs. So why is decisive good? We've already got a "decider" in the White House, don't we?
Here's how f'd up the TV coverage was: MSNBC actually counted each candidate's use of the words Jesus, Christian and God. Like, counted the words as if word count means anything.
And then they counted the amount of applause each candidate got, determining that McCain got more. Hellooooooo! He's in front of evangelicals! And he said, "I'm pro life and this administration will be prolife." Hello, morons of cable tv.
I liked Obama's answers a lot. The whole thing was a bit of a rohrschach test, wasn't it? We all saw what we wanted to see.
Anyone notice that little bit of eminence grise in Obama's hair post-vacation?! Nice!
I wrote a piece after seeing Obama early on called "The Most Elegant Man In America" in which i compared him to having that casual grace of Fred Astair. The man is smart as well as elegant. Too smart for us, I'm afraid, and too elegant, because we see how ugly and clumbsy we are, and it pisses us off.
And Please tell me when we will get off the idea the a man and a woman are the only one's deserving the special kind of living hell some marriages can be. Can't we all just be unhappy together?
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