News About News

I was watching the Democratic Iowa "debate" Sunday on ABC-TV. I qualify the term because 1) the questions were designed intentionally to provoke - the "some say Obama's not ready to lead; what do YOU think, Hillary?" or "some say Clinton can't win the general election; what do YOU think, Barack?"; and 2) the so-called minor candidates were given short shrift. So I was surprised to see the results of an unscientific survey - I was stunned to see this as of 4 pm yesterday:

Who do you think won the Democratic debate?

Dennis Kucinich 11,821
Barack Obama 8,721
Hillary Clinton 5,546
Joe Biden 3,338
John Edwards 3,150
Nobody won. I'm voting Republican. 1,639
Nobody won. I'm waiting for Al Gore to get in the race. 1,145
Bill Richardson 1,109
Mike Gravel 1,044
Chris Dodd 201
Total Vote: 37,714

Dennis Kucinich, whose first chance to comment was about 30 minutes in. Kucinich, who had 2% of the vote in the polls in Iowa going in (Clinton, Edwards and Obama all have about 23% each). Kucinich, who provided my favorite moment in the event. When each candidate was asked about God and prayer. Dennis Kucinich said, "I've been praying to God for the last 45 minutes that you would call on me!" In spite of the flawed process, some things that the Ohio Congressman said hit a nerve. I'm not quite sure what, because my local ABC News affiliate cut off the 90-minute event after an hour in favor of its scheduled program, Teen News.
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I'm feeling sorry for poor Bill Plante, not about the row over the CBS News White House correspondent's remark at that Bush bye-bye for Karl Rove ("If you're so smart, why did you lose Congress?", he yelled), for which he's been labeled a rude liberal and adversarial, among the nicer terms - here are Plante's thoughts on that controversy. Rather, because he's ALSO been cast as another brainless MSM TOUTING Rove here. And what praise did Plante bestow on the outgoing official? "He’s not only the mastermind behind everything - he’s the president’s senior advisor..." But he WAS considered the mastermind, or as Bush put it in 2004, "the Architect". He HAS been a Bush advisor for decades. I think Plante was just stating fact, not fawning over power.

And speaking of Rove, I heard him on Meet the Press on Sunday. As Chris Matthews was recently criticized for saying, he DOES talk really fast. I think he's very good at manipulating information to his political advantage, but judge for yourself.

ROG