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Originally Posted by Solace
Sorry but I have to disagree. I found myself laughing right along with Biden at the ridiculousness of the whole thing. Ryan has always been put up as the "brainy" Republican, and while he can certainly rattle off numbers his responses often bordered on naive if not stupidly reckless. I'm not trying to sell the guy too short, but it was painfully clear that he is nowhere near ready to have the responsibility he is running for.
Biden did exactly what Obama needed to do (and should have been doing for the last four years), which was to say strongly, "THIS STUFF IS BULLS***". Or malarkey, since Biden's Irish was showing quite a bit.  Sorry but I don't find the things he did dismissive at all. He played equal parts debater and the voter watching at home perfectly. Frankly I'm amazed he wasn't more animated, especially when Ryan completely dodged questions, refused to offer any specifics, and repeated lines over and over again even when they have been proven time and again to be lies.
I'm sure Biden could have contained himself better, but I'm baffled at the criticism. Debates are like this. Romney dominated time, interrupted and spoke out of turn, essentially told the moderator he'd fire him if he was elected, flipped on multiple issues and lied his ass off to the American people, and yet he "won" the debate because by golly, he looked so statesman. I saw people defending Obama's performance as "Presidential", which is a joke as well. I won't deny that body language matters, but people need to not be so hung up on the superficial and listen to what these people say.
A lot of these commentaries I've been reading about last night focus far too little on the substance of the discussion and far more on the presentation. Huffington has an article about how much water Ryan drank. Really, water?! Who the heck cares? |
Biden did a great job for Obama, no question. The problem is his attitude will be pushed through the sound/hyperbolic chamber that is the Fox/Conservative noise machine and the end result will be Biden/Obama = Old Codgy Bullies that hate new ideas. (Romney was pushed through a similar noise machine last week, but the key difference was how bad Obama did, not how disgusting Romney was.)
Substance is amazing and important, but it is easy for substance to get lost in America's over-mediated hyperbolic environment. Consequently, every step must be planned carefully, and presentation becomes of equal importance, if not sometimes greater, than substance. It sucks, but that is the way the current media works.