Dw. Dunphy

My initial idea for taking in tonight’s town hall debate was to do so with headphones and without visuals. I’ll admit, over the past month or so, the visual component has played a heavier role in how I perceived the outcomes as opposed to what was being said. Ultimately I simply watched the CBS coverage in the standard way. So let’s put aside the vision part of the television, moderator Tom Brokaw’s incessant needling over time constraints, and focus on what was said.

Unlike the dynamic found during the primaries, Barack Obama is attempting to tie what he will do with how he will do it. John McCain relies on a long strand of “just vote for me” and “I know what needs to be done”– which simply drives me insane. First, if he actually knew how to accomplish these things, as he keeps saying with such certitude, why did he wait until he was running for president? If you have a solution and you withhold it until it is politically beneficial to you, what does that say about your decision-making ability or, more precisely, your opportunistic character?

Don’t get me wrong – all politicians are opportunistic. It’s in the red blood cells of the profession. But when it comes to thinking through the haze of a crisis, or a potential crisis, (The hunt for al Qaeda for, example), and focusing everything on that specific mandate, a left turn is taken at Albuquerque to wage war on an unrelated country on the basis of past grudges, Oedipal comeuppance, unverified intelligence and basically shining that sloppy free throw into a “slam dunk.” I need someone to convince me more than just saying: “Vote for me ’cause I know what to do.” I need much, much more convincing. (more…)