« October 2004 »
S M T W T F S
1 2
3 4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 22 23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31
You are not logged in. Log in
Entries by Topic
All topics  «
Trailhobbit's Rambling Blog
Tuesday, October 5, 2004
The Empire Strikes Back


Last August, I heard someone say that the Vice Presidential debate would be like watching Luke Skywalker take on Darth Vader. Throughout the Cheney-Edwards duel tonight, those images kept running through my mind. The imagery is too perfect. What many people forget is that the first time Luke crossed lightsabers with the Dark Lord, he didn't exactly come away with a resounding victory. He got his hand lopped off, his psyche impaled, and his innocence shattered.

Granted, none of these things happened to John Edwards, at least, not on camera. But watching the grim VP and his wide-eyed challenger face off, you couldn't help but notice that Edwards was usually on the defensive. He did a good job -- he spoke pretty eloquently, knew his facts, and made (in my opinion, but I'm biased) better arguments than Cheney. Yet somehow Cheney gave the general impression of swatting Edwards' arguements off like flies. Dick Cheney is a smart, smart man. I'm not sure if, in his entire career as a lawyer, Edwards ever had to argue with a man like Cheney.

Edwards got some good jabs in. The debate came closest to paralleling Thursday's when Edwards astutely, directly (yet so obviously) told Cheney towards the end that we were not attacked by the same people we invaded. But Cheney was nasty with his cutting remarks about Edwards' frequent absence from Senate voting sessions.

Unlike Bush's stellar convention speech, Cheney did not for one minute even hint of winning me over. Edwards, who said "It's wrong" on at least two occasions, was clearly in the right and trying his best to advance that. No mistake about it, this was good versus evil. Unfortunately, it was also good getting its butt kicked by said evil.
So it goes.

Posted by Trailhobbit at 11:24 PM EDT

View Latest Entries