The much awaited appearance of the two candidates for Vice President in the November 4th National Election has provided much room for comments. Here are mine.
The two aspirants as choices by the front runners were in place because the Constitution says there must be sharing in the Executive Branch of Government with designated duties of the two top leaders. No mention is made of Parties or of specific requirements of the candidates except that they must be American born and be above the age of 35. What we saw was grandfatherly Joe Biden with his thinning gray hair towering over the diminutive winking and wriggling Governor who could be his daughter.
There was a generational difference in the candidates and the positions they carved out for themselves. Of course they were surrogates for the heads of their parties and the candidates for the top job of President. So, as expected, they each told us what an America with either John or Barak would look like with each as its chief executive. Both did their jobs with equal enthusiasm but with Joe Biden expressing much more gravitas than his younger opponent.
The Fact Checkers were at work during the “Debate”. They found many misstatements or not quite right attributions of what was said either by the Vice-Presidential candidates or by John McCain and Barak Obama. No great damage was done by gaffes or by lack of information or skipping around a topic either was ill prepared for. Joe Biden had a lot of facts at his disposal because he was there in the Senate working with John Mc Cain and laid out for all to see the difference between a Conservative independent (Maverick) and “Washington” regulars of a Liberal bent. Ms Palin played the unique State of Alaska as a hole card in her depiction of how she ran the state and would run the U.S. That was not all that convincing or useful except to note that she could have been the Cheer Leader granddaughter of the older man who opposed her.
The most important image projected in this debate was the serious one that the moderator exuded in bringing the duo back on topic. Joe Biden was aware of the time for he had much experience in debates. Sarah Palin was aware that her greatest strength was to push John McCain’s reputation as a “Maverick” and claimed that she, too, was such a phenomenon.
I don’t think too many minds were changed in their choices by this debate.