Vice presidential candidates battle
The vice presidential candidates kept it civil in the much-anticipated debate Thursday night. After recent slip-ups by both candidates (Palin’s infamous interview with Katie Couric on Sept. 17 and Biden comparing the current economic slump with the Great Depression during which he said President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave an address to the nation on television), this vice presidential debate was more pressured than usual.
Sen. Joe Biden said the election was not between Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain but between Obama and George Bush, Jr. He compared McCain’s policies on tax management, foreign policy and the economy to those of Bush, saying they were very similar.
“[McCain’s policy] is the same as George Bush’s. And you know where that policy has taken us,” Biden said.
Gov. Sarah Palin focused her debate on energy policy, her experience and qualifications for being vice president and endorsed McCain as the leader with the experience and voting record necessary to carry the country during the next four years.
“John McCain will put the government back on the side of the people,” she said.
The vice presidential candidates attacked each other very little, being critical of the other’s running mate instead. Biden used specifics and statistics in his argument, trying to appeal to intellectual voters, and criticized McCain as a warmonger short on diplomatic skills and out of touch with the American people. Palin, however, described herself as a “hockey mom” and said Obama lacked the experience necessary to lead a nation with impractical plans for the economy and said he buckles under political pressure.
–ben.abbott.@aggiemail.usu.edu