Beauty is Imperfection

(Originally posted Friday, October 03, 2008 )

What were the highlights of the vice presidential debate between Sarah Palin and Joe Biden?

–*In the spirit of Alaska, Palin bit off her own hand to get out of a snare of microphone wires.

–*Joe Biden sat down on the stage and sang a song to Elmo about the troubled environment. Elmo shot back that Biden was patronizing him.

–*Palin said she wanted to expand the executive authority of the VP to be overlord of the fish and the beasts and heaven.

–*Palin said she was more supportive of the middle class than Joe Biden because she keeps making new middle class people in her belly.

–*Biden tried to be folksy like Palin by talking about some unemployed steel workers he met, but the story wasn’t really going anywhere until he got to the anecdote about the steel worker who was also an aspiring flash dancer.

–*Palin says she refuses to play “the blame game” about who failed to prosecute war in Iraq, who caused the Wall Street meltdown, who caused man-made global warming, who killed Nicole Brown Simpson, who broke into Watergate and who shot who in the face.

–*Palin asked Biden if she could call him “Joe.” After disarming him with this charm, she then blindsided him with the joke about why blondes wear panties.

–*When Biden cornered Palin on the issue of her lack of Wall Street knowledge, Palin answered: “So they can keep their ankles warm!”

–*Palin said she was confident that we could remove our dependence on foreign oil shortly after opening all the oil taps in Alaska and then discovering three more Alaskas somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.

–*Biden said he was for gay marriage if by “gay” you meant happy.

–*Palin said that she was against gay marriage and that her gay friend Elmo was in complete agreement with her.

–*”So you can take her home like a six pack.”

–*Biden said that he and running mate Barack Obama would support a bailout plan for Wall Street as long as it had clear oversight measures that didn’t reward financial firms for taking on more risk or overleveraging themselves. Palin responded by saying she would personally drive a wooden stake through the heart of anybody who was greedy.

–*Palin says she believes a woman should have an abortion only in cases where she is raped by the mother.

–*Biden believes that we should make incursions into Pakistan to fight Al Qaeda in cross-border raids, even though this is possibly an infringement on the sovereignty of an unstable nuclear power. Palin’s cue card says we should not snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq.

–*Palin’s cue cards mainly, though, say “hockey mom,” “As we like to say in Wasilla….” “Maverick,” “I know what you’re sayin’ there,” and “Doggone it, people like me.”

–*After the debates, the pundits say both candidates rose high above expectations. Biden showed his far-ranging knowledge of foreign, economic and social policy and thumped his 35 years of public service. Palin finished her sentences.