To Arms!

Posted on 10/01/2008 at 12:24 pm by Bob Cesca

Malkin and the far-right are crapping their cages over Gwen Ifill’s new book which — shock-horror! — has the name “Obama” in the title, even though it’s about the advancement of all black politicians.

BooMan snark:

I think it is an outrage that they are going to let Gwen Ifill, a woman, moderate a debate between a man and a woman. It’s as plain as day that Ifill is completely in the tank for Sarah Palin.

And Brokaw is good friends with McCain and he’s moderating the debate next week.

If there’s any excuse for Palin to withdraw from the debate, Ifill’s book is the one they’ll use.

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  • J M Ashby

    I dont understand. Its not ok for a woman to moderate a debate with a woman in it but it would be ok for a man to moderate a debate with a woman in it.Or neither? What do we need here a transexual moderator?

  • cminri

    “What do we need here a transexual moderator?” – Where is RuPaul when you need him?!?!

  • NotAPollStat

    Scarborough made sure he brought this out this morning, and of course, he was outraged!!! To repeat my comment made to the “Media Matters” article on this same subject …. to follow the McCain camp/Repub reasoning behind this … (as to their criticism of Couric’s interviews of Palin as “gotcha journalism”) — Couric was biased because Couric is REALLY a black man.

  • jbrons

    I will assume Ifill’s book was public knowledge well before the McCain campaign agreed to have her moderate the debate. I will also assume that they claim they didn’t know this, despite their reassurances that the McCain Campaign is aware of “doing research.”

  • JG

    I am concerned about this debate–it is clear Palin does not grasp the issues, but she is not going to talk about the issues. As one of her opponents in Alaska has said, she is great at hitting on “glittering generalities” and I also see a lot of nastiness in her debating style. My feeling is the sooner we can get this over, the better.Our media has become all about “the surprise” as if it’s the twist they’re are looking for over the substance. They have completely rigged the setup of this debate to declare her the winner–I hope I am wrong about this–and now they are working Gwen Ifill over–which may very well work b/c IMO, Ifill has always seemed very BBQy to me.

  • recruitgal

    Let me see if I have this right…If Sarah wins and/or makes it through the debate without falling down… She’s an all-round ass-kicking Hockey Mom who speaks directly to the people. They love her because she is one of them, despite the evil bias of the liberal media and their so-called ‘questions’.If Sarah loses and/or makes a complete fool of herself… Sarah doesn’t have a PhD from Harvard, she’s a “Joe Six Pack” ordinary American citizen. Besides Joe Biden was mean, sexist and condescending, and Gwen Ifill is openly supporting Obama – so the whole thing was rigged.Is that about the size of it?

  • http://obamaproject.windonwater.net QueenTiye

    ^^Yep. That’s the size of it.And I hadn’t even thought of the withdraw from the debate option. Dang.QT

  • cminri

    Btw – do we want her to withdraw from the ticket or not? I’m of 2 minds – on the one hand I want her to stay on the ticket because she drags it down with her ineptitude – but on the other hand…what if they win?? Quite a cunnundrum.

  • KatinWilm

    Seriously? These people whine more than my 3rd grader doing his spelling homework. Of course, my 3rd grader can show you where both Iraq and Afghanistan are on a globe and knows they don’t share a border.I think Paris Hilton should be moderator. “See you at the debate, bitches!”

  • http://www.broadwaycarl.blogspot.com Broadway Carl

    Yeah, I heard about the Ifill thing this morning. But it wouldn’t have mattered who the moderator was – if it weren’t Ifill and the book thing, they would paint any moderator as in the tank for Obama once Palin couldn’t answer the very challenging questions such as naming a newspaper or magazine she reads or naming a Supreme Court decision other than Roe v. Wade.

    The fact that they’re freaking out one day before the debate in hopes of causing such a ruckus that it’ll be cancelled is proof positive that they are scared shitless of what’s going to transpire tomorrow evening.

  • http://www.broadwaycarl.blogspot.com Broadway Carl

    …do we want her to withdraw from the ticket or not?

    Either way, it would be disaster for their campaign. Either A – she looks like an idiot at the debate and the numbers plummet or B -she withdraws, it’ll show what a stupid decision McCain made, the party goes into a tailspin and the numbers plummet.

    Win/win anyone?

  • dontpanic23

    Much as it scares me that she could end up you-know-where, I say leaving her on is better. As this has dragged on, more pundits (including now conservative ones) started scratching their heads loudly. The more she says to Couric and others, the more her stupidity resembles–even to some of those six-pack loving people she describes herself as–a big stinking box of dung covered rocks.And the same for Michelle Malkin. And the horse she rode in on. Idiot.

  • camel54

    I don’t understand what difference it makes anyway. It’s not as though the moderator awards points or declares a winner. I know, I know, the questions will be skewed because Ifill is known to be such a partisan. I hate to say it, but Ifill should back out now and have Lehrer take over. Jesus, let Elizabeth Hasselback do it for all the good that’ll come of any of this. They’re just looking for a good foundation for spin so I say give them what they want and then some. Watch Palin fail miserably and then ask them what exactly it was about the setup that was so stacked against their candidate. They’ll surely have something.

  • bearswife

    Oh dear the visual of Hasselback being the moderator is too much for me! (Why wasn’t she picked first?)She and Sarah could run off on hair and makeup tangents all night long…What will the McCain camp think of next?

  • cminri

    @Carl – do WE want her to stay on the ticket or not?

  • Pecos Bill

    @recruitgal-Yep, that’s about right.Just like a painting, it’s only as good as you ‘frame’ it…

  • Pecos Bill

    Oh yeah,To those of you that are ‘scared’or apprehensive when it comes to Palin.She is EXACTLY what you hear and see from her. Yes, she is as SIMPLE-minded as you think!Please, don’t exhibit ‘shell shock’ because of the last two elections!It WILL be OKAY!!! I PROMISE!!8^D

  • ConstanceRifle

    Or neither? What do we need here a transexual moderator?

    then the question becomes: pre-op or post-op? And should we consider the bias of a man who wants to be a woman vs. a woman who wants to be a man? And oh dear, that just adds many more complications that I don’t really want to think about.

  • cminri

    So everybody, what are your predictions for how well SP will do in the debate tomorrow night? Scale of 1 to 10? One being that she screws up so badly that we all do a happy dance and start celebrating and 10 being that we suddenly realize we have been duped and get really scared and start making plans to update our passports so we can leave the country if needed on Nov 5th?

  • http://obamaproject.windonwater.net QueenTiye

    crminri: actually about a 7.but for some levity (Bob – you’ve GOT to front page this): http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/10/obama-gets-mean.htmlQT

  • ConstanceRifle

    I swear I saw this in the comments over at MM:

    your lack of ligic is a symptom of your liberal bias.

    typo aside, do you see what they’re doing? It’s no longer “your liberal bias is a symptom of your lack of logic” as it should be to those people. It’s now, your liberal bias is your fundamental frame of reference, and logic only becomes skewed in the face of said bias. This is what passes for “thought” with these people.I mean heh, indeed, indeed!

  • jbrons

    Hey look, just like I thought. The book was reported by the AP two full weeks before the moderators were agreed upon.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/judd-legum/ifill-book-public-weeks-b_b_130834.html

  • http://www.broadwaycarl.blogspot.com Broadway Carl

    @ Caroline – I think we do want her to stay on the ticket. But my point was that either way, it wouldn’t matter. Look at the turnaround in the poll numbers after the Obama/McCain debate. That had nothing to do with Palin. She’s just a distraction in my view and it’s wearing off at this point anyway.

  • http://www.broadwaycarl.blogspot.com Broadway Carl

    Well of course they knew, jbrons. A book doesn’t magically appear out of thin air, Ifill didn’t write it in a month. This is all part of the plan to feign outrage just a day or two before the debate and make it seem unfair the same way they’re trying to lower the bar on expectations.

    Ifill just recently had an accident and broke her ankle in a spill down stairs. I’m thinking she was shoved by a right wing operative. “Oh, Gwen’s hurt, well okay – guess we’ll have to cancel the debate seeing as there’s no one else that could replace her.”

  • ceu

    Oh shit, Carl. I thought the same thing…and then felt horribly guilty for thinking it – right up ’til one of my kids said it aloud. BushCo has really done a number on our trust, eh?

  • camel54

    Well, when you define being asked questions, any questions, as “gotcha journalism” it shows how far you’re willing to go to twist reality in your favor. It doesn’t matter who moderates, they will have a complaint of some kind or another. When you look at how these people have castrated the fourth estate so that if you ask them a follow-up question to something they don’t answer or lie about, they attack you as an advocate and people believe THEM instead of their own ears and minds. When the most educated people in the country are progressives they say that’s an agenda using unfair hiring practices instead of the obvious fact that smart people tend to be progressive.

  • J M Ashby

    I honestly do not believe the McCain campaign is smart enough to do all of this elaborate planning for lowering the bar. I believe Palin is just as dumb as she looks and all of her answers during the debate will be canned. I also believe she will find ways to mess up her canned responses.

  • NotAPollStat

    The bottom line here is that it doesn’t really matter HOW Palin does. The bottom line for those that still say Palin IS qualified, is that the message they’re sending is they’d rather vote for a white, female, inexperienced candidate ANY DAY over an experienced BLACK candidate. Sure, WE all want our country to unify, but the sad reality is that the TRUE RACISTS are showing themselves in this manic support of Palin. It makes me sick, but it’s the truth.

  • NotAPollStat

    I’m sure Palin’s going to attack Biden via his son and the MBNA thing, and even though it’s a false attack (WE know,) the attack will be out there. Palin will also continuously attack Biden in other ways, and will slam Obama big time. The rednecks will LOVE it, cuz the little lady is giving it to the uppity “N word.” The BBQ media is totally in on this, why else are they CONSTANTLY showing the “white voters” poll numbers, and more importantly the “white women” poll numbers. (Although, they pull these numbers out of their ass poll…)

  • Leeman67

    I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I actually agree with Andrew Sullivan (!) that Obama/Biden should play along with this and allow them to remove her at the moderator. This way, they have NO excuse and I trust Biden’s ability to adjust on the fly to a new moderator vs. Palin’s, believe you me. I also think this ploy will get Ifill to overcompensate so as to try not to appear to favor Biden. So, in other words, she’ll favor Palin. So go ahead, remove her.

  • Leeman67

    Also, I wish the Dems would learn how to work the refs the way the GOP does. Why isn’t Obama making a big deal out of Brokaw and Scheiffer moderating the final two debates when both have proven to be in the tank for McCain? Oh yeah, that’s right: because Obama isn’t a big fucking baby like McCain is.