Organizing for America

BIDEN REVIEWS ARE IN ROUND 1

October 02, 2008

Washington Post, Chris Cillizza: “The Fix”: Biden is on point: In each of the first three questions he banged on McCain. Keep your eye on the fruit... LINK

First Read (Domenico Montanaro): Biden is hitting his stride on foreign policy. His nuance and directness on this subject is what made him so good in those Democratic primary debates. LINK

TIME: [Donna] Shalala on Biden’s health care answer: “Nailed it.” Women in this room erupted in cheers. Who knew there were so many Democratic CEOs? LINK

CNN (Candy Crowley): "How long have I been at this? Five Weeks?" I'm not sure that's the greatest line for Palin to be using. LINK

ABC News (Rick Klein): Palin is falling into meaningless platitudes: "Change is coming." "We're going to learn from the mistakes of this and other administrations." LINK

Washington Post (Chris Cillizza): It's a hard argument for Palin to make: we need change, we need new faces, we need John McCain? LINK

TIME: John McCain “knows how to win a war.” Has anyone told her he was in Vietnam? LINK

TIME: Sarah Palin boldly vows to not answer the moderator's questions. LINK

Politico (Jonathan Martin): The Palin response to Biden's Bush-bashing: Too much looking backwards. She acknowledges that there have been "huge blunders throughout this administration as there have in every administration." LINK

Politico (Jonathan Martin): Now we know why Palin is trying to stick to her message and avoid the questions and conversation at hand. That climate change answer was rushed and uncertain, more like the Palin we saw with Katie Couric than the Palin of the first 30 minutes tonight. LINK

TNR (Michael Crowley): A pre-emptive strike from someone who clearly plans to spend the night dodging: "I may not answer the questions the way that either you or the moderator want to hear..." LINK

Washington Post Fact Check: Palin “Flatly False” on Biden Attack. Sarah Palin just asserted that Sen. Joseph Biden backed John McCain's military policies until this presidential race. That is flatly false. Biden was an outspoken opponent of President Bush's troop increases in Iraq as soon as Bush announced them after the 2006 elections. As Foreign Relations Committee Chairman, he led the most heated hearings before the troops were actually deployed. LINK

New York Times: Gov. Sarah Palin boasted that Mr. McCain “sounded that warning bell” about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, echoing some of Mr. McCain’s recent comments in which he portrayed himself as being on the vanguard in warning about the impending financial crisis.

But the legislation was introduced more than 16 months earlier and the debate over the issue had been going on for some time. He also only added his name after an oversight agency issued a lengthy report condemning practices at Fannie Mae. LINK

Washington Post Fact Checker (Michael Dobbs): Sarah Palin repeated John McCain's claim that Barack Obama voted to increase taxes for every American earning more than $42,000 a year. This is a considerable stretch. LINK

USA Today Fact Check on Palin Claim that Obama Voted 94 Times to Increase Taxes: The facts: Non-partisan Factcheck.org called that count, which has been cited before by Republicans, "inflated and misleading." Examining the 94 votes at issue, Factcheck.org found that 23 were for measures that would have produced no tax increase at all; they were against proposed tax cuts. The 94 tally includes two, three and even four votes on the same measure. LINK

New York Times Fact Checker: Ms. Palin castigated Mr. Obama’s health care plan as one that would be mandate a “universal government-run” system in which health care is “taken over” by the federal government. This is inaccurate on several levels. LINK

USA Today Fact Check on Palin Health Care Attack: The claim: Palin said Barack Obama wants a "universal, government-run program" and "health care being taken over by the feds." The facts: Obama's health-care plan does not call for a government takeover. In fact, it isn't even universal. It would only cover all children. Obama's plan would give Americans the opportunity to have government health insurance, but they also could pick a private plan. LINK

Washington Post Fact Checker: Palin Attack on Obama Iraq Record. Sarah Palin oversimplified Obama's vote to stop funding U.S. troops in Iraq. Obama was one of 14 senators who voted against the bill on the grounds that it did not set a timeline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. Obama made clear that he was in favor of funding the troops, but could not agree to an indefinite extension of the war. The previous month, most Senate Republicans voted against a Democratic bill (supported by Obama) that linked funding of the troops to the establishment of a timeline for withdrawal. McCain missed that vote. LINK

Washington Post Fact Checker (Jonathan Weisman): Gov. Sarah Palin was erroneous when she claimed U.S. troop levels in Iraq are now at "pre-surge" levels. LINK

Washington Post Fact Checker (Jonathan Weisman): Palin repeated a standard line offered by the McCain campaign--that Obama has not admitted the "surge" of additional troops in Iraq worked. But in a September interview with Bill O'Reilly of Fox News, Obama said "the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated. . . I've already said it's succeeded beyond our wildest dreams." Obama has not, however, retracted his opposition to the surge, and he has said political reconciliation still needs to take place in Iraq. LINK