All About McCain

[Alex]

You posted that while I was fixing it (and noting it).

[BarTopDancer]

Originally Posted by Alex

Of course, my answer is that I don't consider "experience" to be that significant a factor in choosing a president and it certainly hasn't be a great indicator of presidential success in the past.

[Motorboat Cruiser]

Sorry, it was somewhat irresistible.

[Chernabog]

Originally Posted by BarTopDancer

Um ew. But whatever floats your boat dude...

I said "fun" not "sexually exciting". Um ew.

[innerSpaceman]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

Yeah, I think the experience thing is still a losing proposition for Obama. Unless he wants to talk about death or assassination, which would be really kind of creepy.

Yeah, except that I've never before found the VP choice to be so important, precisely because both candidates have a very increased chance of dying in office, imo.

[Gemini Cricket]

Originally Posted by Alex

Between the two, who do you want to be president if nothing happens? The one with the experience or the one without?

While I think this blunts McCain's ability to criticize Obama's relative lack of experience since it would now rebound on McCain, I think Obama and supporters have to be very careful to not criticize Palin for lacking experience since that rebounds on them as well.

No, I see what you're saying.

Palin: 4 years in the City Council. Then she was Ethics Commissioner of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission for 1 year. And then Governor of Alaska for 2 years.

Obama: Was in the Illinois Senate from 1997-2004. And was a Senator for 3 years.

[Ghoulish Delight]

I have never really understood the focus on the VP. They have no official authority over anything. As mentioned already, anything they have involvement in is only because the President has decided to put them in that role. Which the President could do for anyone, VP or not. The VP is just another glorified adviser at best, the President's got tons of those no matter what. I'm not swayed by the "heartbeat from the Oval Office" angle. Over 58 Presidential terms, only 8 have not been completed by the person elected. No matter who MIGHT, in the rare, ~15%, instance of the elected President not finishing the term, take over, it's not going to make me want to vote for or against someone who would definitely be in the office if I wasn't going to vote for or against them before.

[Chernabog]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

I have never really understood the focus on the VP. They have no official authority over anything.

Well except as President of the Senate under the US Constitution.

But besides that, they're basically a Presidential lackey

[Bornieo: Fully Loaded]

I don't like her. She reminds me of an old Boss of mine and she was a bitch...

[Tenigma]

Alaska's Palin misrepresented state's polar bear findings

A newly released e-mail from last fall shows that Alaska's own biologists were at odds with the administration of Gov. Sarah Palin, which has consistently opposed any new federal protections for polar bears under the Endangered Species Act.

The state's in-house dispute seems to refute later statements by Gov. Sarah Palin that a "comprehensive review" of the federal science by state wildlife officials found no reason to support an endangered-species listing for the northern bears. The governor invoked the state's own scientific work both in a cover letter to the state's official polar bear comments, and in an opinion piece published in the New York Times.

But the Oct. 9 e-mail, which was released this month to a University of Alaska scientist who had filed a public records request seeking information on the state's polar bear decision-making, shows that the head of the marine mammals program for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game and two other staff biologists agreed with the conclusions of nine polar bear studies that the federal government was citing to justify a threatened-species listing for the bears.

"Overall, we believe that the methods and analytical approaches used to examine the currently available information supports the primary conclusions and inferences stated in these 9 reports," Robert Small wrote.

Alaska officials have expressed concern that a threatened-species listing gives environmentalists more leverage to oppose oil and gas development in Arctic Alaska and poses risks to Native subsistence. The state's efforts to raise contrary scientific arguments have been met with derision by some environmentalists, who liken it to efforts from the tobacco industry to raise questions about the dangers of smoking and delay regulatory action.