Lincoln-Douglas It Ain't
October 7, 2004
I hope those of you wise enough to grab last Thursday's Sauce hot off the presses (looking for your weekly Filler fix, no doubt) were also wise enough to watch the debates. For those of you who missed them, I can't say enough good things about C-span.org's unflagging coverage of the critical election issues.
The debate was predictable, more photo-op and media frenzy than discussion. I can tell Kerry won, and I've only read the transcripts (my poor computer can't handle C-Span's streaming content). I'm sorry I missed all the nuances of Bush's stupidity, though; can someone tell me if he did that thing where he wiggles his ears when he's confused? Neither candidate supposedly knew the questions in advance, so I know Bush had to be a lot more off-balance than comes across in writing.
The thrust-and-parry was practiced, Kerry using the word "better" more times than I had the patience to count and Bush riding his terrorism hobbyhorse for all it's worth. What I want to talk about this week are the people who threw the party.
The event was put together by the Commission on Presidential Debates, which was established in 1987. It's run by former chairmen of the Republican and Democratic parties and has been responsible for every presidential and vice-presidential debate our generation has been old enough to understand. In fact, the Federal Elections Commission dismissed a complaint, filed by third-party candidates including Ralph Nader and Pat Buchanan, that the CPD was a partisan organization.
The candidates cited their exclusion from the 2000 debates, which they were not even allowed to attend as audience members, as evidence that the CPD supports the Democrat-Republican agenda and is therefore violating campaign rules by taking the large sums of corporate money that fund its activities. The more attention I pay to this election and the more I information I dig up, the more I begin to understand how we as a nation get collectively suckered.
Something random: I've taken up is listening to snippets of Rush Limbaugh on my way to and from class recently (1450 AM, Christian music by night and conservative propaganda by day as far as I can tell), and I heard him attacking Kerry because he got a haircut and a manicure before the debate. What? Rush actually used the words "primp" and "coiffure." I was flabbergasted, though I suppose I shouldn't have been. As though Bush wasn't rubbed down like a thoroughbred racehorse before the debate! Rush, please, for the good of all America, die soon. Take Michael Moore out in the middle of the ocean in a rowboat, sink it and get eaten by a giant squid. Please. Think of the children.
No e-mail last week! Do I have to tell you that it's okay to use pieces of dead babies to cure Alzheimer's to get some feedback here? Oh, that reminds me! To Beau Boudreaux and other bigots on the subject of gay marriage, I quote again from Brown v. Board of Education: "Separate is inherently unequal." Allowing same-sex couples to marry doesn't hurt anyone, so either make "gay" a psychological disorder again or move on. Write saucefiller@hotmail.com with whatever you have to say.
I hope those of you wise enough to grab last Thursday's Sauce hot off the presses (looking for your weekly Filler fix, no doubt) were also wise enough to watch the debates. For those of you who missed them, I can't say enough good things about C-span.org's unflagging coverage of the critical election issues.
The debate was predictable, more photo-op and media frenzy than discussion. I can tell Kerry won, and I've only read the transcripts (my poor computer can't handle C-Span's streaming content). I'm sorry I missed all the nuances of Bush's stupidity, though; can someone tell me if he did that thing where he wiggles his ears when he's confused? Neither candidate supposedly knew the questions in advance, so I know Bush had to be a lot more off-balance than comes across in writing.
The thrust-and-parry was practiced, Kerry using the word "better" more times than I had the patience to count and Bush riding his terrorism hobbyhorse for all it's worth. What I want to talk about this week are the people who threw the party.
The event was put together by the Commission on Presidential Debates, which was established in 1987. It's run by former chairmen of the Republican and Democratic parties and has been responsible for every presidential and vice-presidential debate our generation has been old enough to understand. In fact, the Federal Elections Commission dismissed a complaint, filed by third-party candidates including Ralph Nader and Pat Buchanan, that the CPD was a partisan organization.
The candidates cited their exclusion from the 2000 debates, which they were not even allowed to attend as audience members, as evidence that the CPD supports the Democrat-Republican agenda and is therefore violating campaign rules by taking the large sums of corporate money that fund its activities. The more attention I pay to this election and the more I information I dig up, the more I begin to understand how we as a nation get collectively suckered.
Something random: I've taken up is listening to snippets of Rush Limbaugh on my way to and from class recently (1450 AM, Christian music by night and conservative propaganda by day as far as I can tell), and I heard him attacking Kerry because he got a haircut and a manicure before the debate. What? Rush actually used the words "primp" and "coiffure." I was flabbergasted, though I suppose I shouldn't have been. As though Bush wasn't rubbed down like a thoroughbred racehorse before the debate! Rush, please, for the good of all America, die soon. Take Michael Moore out in the middle of the ocean in a rowboat, sink it and get eaten by a giant squid. Please. Think of the children.
No e-mail last week! Do I have to tell you that it's okay to use pieces of dead babies to cure Alzheimer's to get some feedback here? Oh, that reminds me! To Beau Boudreaux and other bigots on the subject of gay marriage, I quote again from Brown v. Board of Education: "Separate is inherently unequal." Allowing same-sex couples to marry doesn't hurt anyone, so either make "gay" a psychological disorder again or move on. Write saucefiller@hotmail.com with whatever you have to say.
posted by J. Aaron Brown at 10/07/2004 11:45:00 AM
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