Palin's great challenge

On Thursday Palin will face the biggest test of her vice-presidential candidacy with the vice-presidential debate, and I am scared. Through her interviews in the past weeks, it has become obvious that Palin does not do well under that type of pressure. She will absolutely have to perform well in this debate in order to still be considered a viable candidate.

This article does not forget to mention her helpless interview with Katie Couric and the Saturday Night Live parody that went along with it. Although I am terribly worried as a Republican, the New York Times could potentially be helping the Republican ticket, if not intentionally. Just as I stated before the first presidential debate, they were lowering expectations for Obama. Could it be that they are trying to criticize Palin, but at the same time unintentionally lowering her expectations? I think so, yes. At the same time, NY Times states that Palin has presented a "question mark" that she will have to entirely erase at the debate and that could prove a very lofty expectation. Not only that but she will have to present herself in a way that does not seem too over rehearsed or scripted.

This week's wrap-up

The news topics on the New York Times this week focused on this past Friday's debate. The Debate was at the University of Mississippi between McCain and Obama. The news revolved on everything surrounding the debate: who was or wasn't coming, what would be discussed (the designated foreign policy, or the economy), and who would win. Directly after the main debate, there was news titled "the debate" on who won the debate. I believe that the issue is going to shift in the next coming week to the next upcoming debate.

I haven't heard anyone talk about the debate, other than within my Election class. A few friends have mentioned it, but other than that, there was no discussion about it. This could reflect on the perception of importance of the debate. If people do not think that the debates are important, it could change the entire campaign strategies. However, I think that there will be more discussion on how well each candidate did rather than the anticipation of each debate. Overall the top issues being discussed by the NY Times this week were: 1)The Debate 2)McCain's presence at the debate 3)Economy 4)Bush's speech 5)Controversial Ads.

The Debate is on...

Debate or no debate? That was the question all week. The New York Times top story this morning was that Senator John McCain stated that he will participate in the first presidential debate tonight, instead of postponing it to participate in the negotiations of the $700 billion bailout plan. After a flurry of phone calls and rearranging schedules, both senators are expected to arrive at the University of Mississippi this afternoon. There is the continuation of constantly trying to lower viewer expectations. The reason for doing this is: when viewers watch, their satisfaction with that particular candidate can only raise, not disappoint.

The main coverage of the article , however, turned into Senator Obama's talk on how he is "optimistic" at the way the Congressional negotiations are going for the bailout of financial institutions. He stated that there has been a lot of real progress that has been made in the recent hours, and it is important to remain calm and just move forward. The McCain statement this morning also stated that he was "optimistic" and stated that there was "significant progress" being made.



However, the NYTimes was quick to point out that this statement was also critical of Obama, portraying him as partisan and not as concerned as McCain. The direct quote:
"The difference between Barack Obama and John McCain was apparent durinig the White House meeting yesterday where Barack Obama's priority was political posturing in his opening monologue defending the package as it stands...McCain listened to all sides so he could help focus the debate on finding a bipartisan resolution that is in the interest of taxpayers and homeowners."
The NY Times was spinning the issue to portray Senator John McCain as a player on the offense. Many times in politics, if a candidate is putting out ads and statements that are critical of his/her opponent it means that they are losing in the polls. The more that the NY Times portrays Obama as the victim in this case, the better chance he has at winning. However, the Obama campaign has to be very careful because if he doesn't do anything, it could look like he is a weak candidate or that he has something to hide.





*Picture was taken by Win McNamee/Getty Images and can be found at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/27/us/politics/27debatecnd.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Three Days Left

Accessed 9:15pm on September 23

There are three days left until the first debate between Senator Barack Obama and Senator John McCain and the battle is already heated. With the biggest economic crisis since the 1930s, economy is undoubtedly the top topic; however, this Friday's debate will talk about foreign policy, not the economy.

Not surprisingly, the topic being discussed was the upcoming debate. At first glance, the article was giving a lot of credit to McCain. The article noted him as very comfortable when talking about foreign policy. He is considered to be a great speaker and totally in his element when he speaks on this issue particularly. So this is good news for the conservatives, right? Wrong. This is a technique that is used during all presidential debate times. They are setting the expectations so high for McCain, that he can only fall below those expectations, causing his ratings to drop. All credit that was given to McCain is slyly being used against him. There is no doubt that there will be a similar article to this one somewhere in a conservative news source talking about Obama.

From the week of September 15

News topics on the New York Times this week has started to move away from Sarah Palin and towards the importance of the economy in this election. This is easy to understand after the major changes in the financial markets this week. I don't feel that I have read enough from the New York Times to make a decision as to whether I agree with their opinion of the economy and the election.

Teachers, parents, friends and grandparents are definitely talking about the main issues. In every single one of my classes last week, the professors brought up the economy and the effects on politics at least once. There have been a couple of my friends believe that the current economic crisis is the result of failed policies of the Bush Administration and that Barack Obama would be the best candidate if (and when) it comes to the economy. An explanation for the parallel between these friends and news sources is that they are probably getting their news from a source with a similiar agenda to the New York Times.

Overall the top five news issues for The New York Times during the week of September 15-20 were: 1) Economic failures (Merrill Lynch, AIG, etc.) 2) McCain's "fundamentals" 3)Upcoming debates 4)Palin (as always) and 5) Biden's Guns.

Obama: "confidence will rise"

Accessed September 19, 2008 at 8:20pm

No doubt that the biggest topic in the news is the economic crisis. So, it would make sense that the politicians are going to be making comments about it as well.

Senator Obama has been talking about the economy for quite some time now, but after talking to the Treasury Department and his financial advisors, he believes that the financial markets will stabilize soon. He is reportedly giving measured responses and no longer providing an economic plan. He suggested that although he and John McCain will argue for different economic plans, they should work together towards what the country needs. Although he avoided the partisan words during his address of the economy, he did not hestitate to attack McCain afterwards.

The brief article does not have a strong leaning one way or the other. However, the fact that they are reporting on Barack Obama's response to the economic crisis and government bailout suggests the liberal leaning.

What are the fundamentals?

Accessed at 11:30pm on Tuesday September 16

NY Times states that John McCain made a big mistake when he said that the fundamentals of the economy are very strong. At first glance, this statement is absolutely ridiculous, and the Democratic party ran with it. This comes only days (hours) after news about Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch. The campaign had three choices: do nothing, attack the other side, or fix it. Fix it they did when only hours later he backpedaled. What are the fundamentals of the economy? For McCain, he meant that the fundamentals are the workers themselves. On Tuesday morning he stated that workers are paying a heavy price while the CEOs of big businesses are left with 'golden parachute' packages of millions of dollars. He did state that the economy was in big problems, and that the Republican party and those in Washington were to blame.

I agree that McCain cannot afford to stumble on this topic, but he did. The campaign did a very good job at saving the potential problem. In class tonight (Election 2008 with Dr. Rupp), we discussed the differences between conservatives, liberals, libertarians, and populists, among many other things. The fact that McCain is sticking up for the workers of America and stating that the big business and big government is the problem with the economy strikes a populist tone. This is a very smart idea. McCain is going to have to reach towards the populists in order to win the election.