Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Why I'm Not in Post-Debate Focus Groups   [Rich Lowry]

A few debate observations: 

—I thought Hillary was excellent. She never makes a mistake. She seems ready for pretty much everything. And, while she has done her share of pandering to the Democratic base, she is the only candidate operating with an eye to the general election and to the very real possibility that she will be the next commander-in-chief (see, for instance, her answers on meeting with foreign leaders and the practicalities of a withdrawal from Iraq). 

—Obama was fine, and improved like everyone says, I suppose. But as a colleague pointed out, there was a moment when he was saying "when I'm president," and the camera came in for a close up and caught his youthfulness so vividly and you had to think, "No, you're not ready to be president." It's a mystery why he can't drastically minimize the verbalized pauses—the "um's" and "uh's"—in his speech. He'd be able to if he just worked on it for a while. But he's still better than the rest of the non-Hillary candidates on the stage, and looks like a Hillary running mate if he doesn't pull off an upset in the primaries. 

—Edwards is so light he could float away like a feather. He is having a semi-meltdown on gay marriage, as he attributes his opposition to it to an irrational leftover from his upbringing. Given that his answer now is that he's on a personal journey, I don't see how he can avoid eventually becoming the first major (or formerly major) presidential candidate to endorse gay marriage. At this rate, I'm beginning to wonder if Elizabeth Edwards wouldn't be the better candidate. 

—Mike Gravel and Dennis Kucinich should really be posting questions on YouTube rather than standing on the stage.

07/24 01:08 PMShare