What I have learned from O'Donnell and Angle

Debates can be amazing for what they reveal about the cognitive machinations of political candidates.

I first watched the debate between Delaware senate candidates Chris Coons and Christine O'Donnell. I learned that when Coon's is offered the chance to take a swipe at his opponent he opted against it. Of course, O'Donnell was swinging for the fences as she took ill formed thoughts and tried to turn them into the "gotcha" moments her mentor Sarah Palin warned her about.

And Wolf Bliter hit her with that "gotcha" moment when she was asked whether she believed evolution is a myth.

"What I believe is irrelevant, because what I will support in Washington, D.C. is the ability for the local school system to decide what is taught in their classrooms."

Her beliefs are irrelevant? If her beliefs are irrelevant, why is she running for office?

But for me the quote that deserves a jaundice eye came as she tried to avoid being accountable for her beliefs about evolution.

"So when you look at his position on things like raising taxes, which is one of the tenets of Marxism, not supporting eliminating the death tax, which is a tenet of Marxism -- I would argue that there are more people who support my Catholic faith than his Marxist beliefs."

When she spoke about taxes being a tenet of Marxism, I had to laugh. Clearly O'Donnell isn't as familiar with Marx. If we follow O'Donnell's point to it's logical conclusion that raising taxes "is one of the tenets of Marxism" the United States of America was a "marxist" nation long before Marx was ever born, or had written the Communist Manifesto.

But perhaps the disturbing response of the night came when O'Donnell responded to a question about foreign policy and the war in Afghanistan.

When we were fighting the Soviets over there in Afghanistan in the 80s and 90s, we did not finish the job, so now we have a responsibility to finish the job and if you are gonna make these politically correct statements that it's costing us too much money, you are threatening the security of our homeland.

Oh no she didn't? The US was not fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan "in the 80's and 90's." The Soviet's left Afghanistan in 1989. And what job was she referring to that wasn't finished? It appears that O'Donnell doesn't know her Afghanistan from her Iraq.

Now there is Sharron Angle. Boy talk about a boring debate between her and Reid. After watching the debate it was clear that I am glad that I don't live in Nevada. As I watched the debate I kept wondering how in the hell did Reid become the Senate Majority Leader? His lack of preparedness was both alarming and disconcerting to watch.

But alas, what I learned from Angle supersedes that of the unprepared of Harry Reid. When asked about whether a senator creates jobs, the loss of jobs.

Once again, Harry Reid, it’s not your job to create jobs, it’s your job to create policies that create the confidence for the private sector to create those jobs. And they have lost confidence because of things like Obamacare. There’s a, a business in Reno, where he wanted to hire twenty-four – five – more employees but instead laid of five, just because of the provisions in Obamacare.

We’re seeing those kinds of policies actually crush our economy over the last 20 months.

Is Angle at all aware that what she is calling Obamacare was signed into law in March of this year, and that various provisions have only been in effect since September of this year. How is it that policies of Obamacare have been crushing our economy for 20 months?

Of course, her repeated denials of verbatim quotes by the moderator were expected. Angle refused to acknowledge her prior previous statements about phasing out Social Security, eliminating the Dept of Education, and her motivation for telling Tea Party candidate Scott Ashjian she "got juice" in Washington DC. (Geeze, I thought that Harry Reid was the only career politician in the race.)

The most telling moment of the evening came when Angle tried to attack Reid on immigration. Angle's false allegation about Reid voting for Social Security benefits for "illegal immigrants" was the opportune moment to point out the absurdity of Angle's point, such that it was. She said;

Harry Reid has voted to give Social Security to illegal aliens, not only before they were citizens but after they were citizens.

So, Reid voted to give Social Security benefits to "illegal aliens," not only "before they were citizens but after they were citizens" too? Reid missed a golden opportunity to ask Angle why is she be opposed to giving Social Security benefits to immigrants who became citizens.

Ah, the joy of debates. If Reid loses to Angle it will be of his own doing. Should he retain his seat, I hope to hell that the Senate Democrats are smart enough to remove Reid from any majority or minority leadership roles.