Comments open for reaction. I’m watching the other one.
And based on his facial expressions… she’s killing him.
A better sign – traffic has taken The Corner down.
By the way… Bush comes up less frequently in the US debates than he does the Canadian ones. How ironic is that?
A good debate, Biden was competetent, but boring, too detail obsessed, and stumbled badly on the same sex “marriage” comment, among others. Palin in a walk, despite some stumbles and too many mentions of the word “maverick”.
And I don’t know if I’ll be the first to say it, but I will – Gwen Ifill performed admirably as moderator.
Oh… and the reason I skipped the Canadian debate? Simple. I watched, or tried to, the French language one. And my impression after that is that the broadcast consortium are rock hard stupid.
Layton suggests “take a deep breath and go for it”. In that context, I can’t help but visualize a gun to my head.
Layton is a d*ck. Here he is in a sweater.
http://media.canada.com/idl/edjn/20070120/153851-53380.jpg
So you tell her that we have a voluntary military for just those sort of things. If she’s too emotional to understand the role of the military, perhaps she should move on to something else.
IanV,while you are at it,can you give me saturday’s lotto numbers.
Ian…how true,seeing as it was a Liberal majority who sent our troops there in the first place, without a vote.
PMSH is the only one who had the guts to change his mind when he knew it was better for Canada, but risky in the ‘popularity’ scale.
“Stupid, knee jerk kool aid drinking blind partisans will throw out every principle and value if it serves there side.”
So says the the liberal plant, with an IQ to match.
Paikan – This debate was better than the American one
May – Its our democracy, it matter more here
=======================
Gee, really Liz?!
Duhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Seriously, do any Liberal voters bother to get out of their chair on election day?
You missed the point completely but thanks for trying.
Palin did a great job of talking to the people, great job tonight.
The Canadian four on one , was not a debate, it was a rehash of everything we’ve seen in Question Period for the life of the Harper government. It was sickening and real amateur hour.
Lizzy May will never get anywhere close to governing or even influencing government, she was a waste of airtime and damned obnoxious, that’s one shrew who can’t be tamed.
Can’t the moderator muzzle that looney bi tch. How about a great big cup of shut the fu ck up
On Newman now…. NDP strategist says that she thought Layton had given a lot of zingers. Hmmm. I thought the one hitting you with the missile deserves that credit… loved Harper’s comment about Layton’s stay at the Shouldice Clinic. Reminded me of the 2000 debate when it was pointed out that Joe Clark paid out of pocket healthcare.
His class act preformance will translate into a majority gov.. let the housecleaning bagin
I want to thank everyone for making me laugh. I’ve been chuckling aloud here reading these posts. I thought my head was going to explode watching that. I’m sure my blood pressure was at an all time high!
I find the entire thing ridiculous to say the least. First off because I believe Elizabeth and Giles should not have been included (I don’t think I have to state the reasons why) and secondly because hearing the same thing over and over again (ie Bush/Iraq/sweaters, etc.) is just so petty, so old, and certainly not something that should be brought up in what should be a “serious” debate. Is that what they truly believe the people of Canada find important?
For me Harper was the obvious winner. I thought that when allowed to squeeze in a few words, he did so calmly and without a lot of trash talk unlike the other so called leaders.
I’m sure the CBC won’t see it that way but I’ve lost all hope in ever seeing anything “fair” come from them.
You need to learn how to read and decifer and understand, Mississauga Matt, before you make idiotic mysogynists statements. Otherwise thanks for trying.
“the quintessential obnoxious fat boorish slovenly socialist Canadian broad”
I forgot to add completely lacking in class.
It is what it is…I say it because it happens to be true.
Loved the hypocrisy. While attacking Flaherty, through Harper, on saying that “Ontario is not a place to invest” and that saying such doesn’t inspire confidence in investors… then they turn around and attack him for not saying that the sky is falling in the nation as a whole.
I switched back and forth between the 2 debates but found myself watching the VP debate more because half the time there was a attractive face on the screen compared with the canadian debate which offered 0% attractiveness and 20% downright ugly…
and to any conservatives here? at 10:53- yeah I just called Liz May ugly, which is a fact but I also indicated the rest were unattractive too which is also a fact.therefore I consider myself fair and unsexist and I also say that the democraps ARE being unfair and sexist with Governor Palin.
I felt Steve Paikin did a reasonably good job tonight. He was often but not always effective at restraining the other 4. Those ineffective times were not for lack of trying.
Liz not so deftly sidesteps the question if she should have an ELECTED mp to be included in the debate.I think they will hold onto until their current elected base.
I’m a virtuoso with the remote. Watched both debates – more or less.
Canadian Debate: Harper in charge but slimeball Layton surprisingly strong. Duceppe was very good, as usual but, who cares. Dion and May split the absolute bozo award
American Debate: Biden kept his cool and sounded statesmanlike. His legislative experience showed. I breathed a sigh of relief that Palin didn’t duplicate her performance with Couric. On energy she was head and shoulders above Biden but, I can’t agree with Kate that she “killed” him. Hell, she survived with honour, and that was an accomplishment.
Globe&Mail poll on who won the debate! Go Harper!
Anon…I would have paid to see Layton’s face with that one,what a hypocrite.
The Mop & Pail is asking who won:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
And of course, Borat is in the lead…
Zog – I was speaking in the whole about the overall bearing and presentation. And Biden’s “facts” are already being challenged on the news networks.
It was the split screen that was killing him. Palin took notes when he scored points or made comments she wanted to respond to. He offered gratuitous grins at first, but that deteriorated to grimaces, and at one point, wiping his brow.
She was cool, composed, and having fun.
I thought the line of the night belonged to Dion, who said near the end that “a Liberal government would work with otters to get things done”.
Because if there is one species out there that gets things done, its otters (alright, maybe beavers too).
The moderator – at times just allowed the “babble from the background” while Harper had the floor. Far to many times in fact. Interesting that there was no babble while other leaders had the floor. Kudos to Harper in how he dealt with this. How can this be called a debate when it was more like a 4 on 1 pile up with very little chance of rebuttal by the l.
The element of Funding for the Arts trumped a discussion on the CHRC/T and this is very discouraging. To think that the arts issue was that highly rated that it deserved to be an element in this debate speaks volumes about who determined the elements to be aired and the why behind them.
Paiken referred to some 4500 questions being submitted yet the handful that were aired were pretty much softball intensity. A grade 5 student could have come up with better.
How nice not to have the distracting voices of translators (almost as difficult to understand as Dion) rumbling over the incessant background noises of candidates plus the sound system. (French Debate last night)
At times Dion might have actually benefited in having a translator tonight as well. The more intense Dion got – the less he was understood. When asked to talk about what he would first do if going back as prime minister, he totally fumbled the ball and had no idea where the ball went to try to recover it. Almost incomprehensible in answering the question and surely he must have lost a lot of supporters just on this point alone. He should have knocked it out of the park – but that never happens if their is no bat in the hand.
G.D. had the lighter moment when addressing the question of what will you do first if becoming prime minister. Response – well, you other three want to become PM. I don’t, but here is what I’m going to do – and he laid it out pretty well.
Time @@@@@@ spent.
Sorry, Kate, but I can’t agree with you on the Ifill compliment.
If you have the opportunity to watch the debate again, please note the number of times Biden is given the first response over Palin, then after Palin gets her chance she let him deliver a rebuttal. Ifill gave him the first word, multiple extra (fallacy-filled) rebuttals after which she closed off the subject and moved on. Even when Palin was given first response Biden was allowed a final (extra) rebuttal after Palin’s.
Then she gave Biden the last closing words in the debate.
It would be very interesting to compare the total speaking time Ifill gave to each of them. I would guess up to 70%-30% in favour of Biden.
One can argue that this is a subtle form of favouritism, but it’s favouritism nonetheless. And having the last word in a debate like this one always counts for something.
This was another 4 on 1 debate.It is ludricous to pick a winner from the pack of four. Harper did not win many points but to survive the gangbang with his hide intact puts him head and shoulders above the rest…To survive having to give Lizzie a peck on the cheek afterwards,well he is a better man than me.
Dion cried, people died.
I am amazed at the self control of the PM, I wanted to reach across the TV and strangle the smirking moustached weasel, I don’t know how he did it. As for Ms May, if I was beside her, she would now be partaking of our free health care and having an index finger re-attached after having it jabbed at me countless times.
So Harper believes the WMD threat as a reason to invade Iraq was bullshit.
Interesting.
You know what? I feel bad that Stephen Harper had to kiss Lizzie May on the cheeks. I would have much preferred him giving Governor Palin a couple of pecks. She certainly deserved them more than Ms. May.
I’ve already seen 1 poll. Global I think.
Harper won pretty large. Layton 2nd.
Layton is the big loser. It reminds me of the 2003 Ontario election where, for some odd reason, the NDP chose to attack the Tories all the time. Most analysts agreed that NDP leader Hampton ran the best campaign. He was glowing and predicted the NDP would do very well. They lost seats to the Liberals. Jack didn’t go after Dion enough. Again, I think he’s cooked a deal with the others. He didn’t change his mind as everyone thinks, he just went off script. Just think of all the pressure on Layton from the likes of Hargrove and friends in the labour movement who back strategic voting. May’s addition further adds voice on the left to the “coalition” argument, that parties are only a means to an end. The NDP, will at some point, fold into the Liberal Party.
JimmyF:
Very funny. Have you ever seen the sea otter clip from South Park?
http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=KKUJgkSOy8Y
Watched Palin/Biden instead, with quick channel changes to check out the Canadian debate.
Could not watch the Canadian debate for more than 30 seconds at a time. Elizabeth May had her big yap going every time (usually out of turn). Couldn’t stomach that. Back to Fox.
She even had to get the last word in after Paikin signed off. Shut the eff up, Lizzie. You are inconsequential and a waste of time/energy. You should not have been there.
I watched the debate at my local Conservative candidate’s HQ. Much snickering at the moonbat May, and Jack’s creative accounting and constant references to the evil “big oil”. However, the general consensus was that Dion did better than expected – he was intelligible and not falling all over his tongue, which is what we were expecting.
Harper was his usual calm, controlled self. I would have liked to see him land a few zingers, but of course, if he had tried that, he would have been characterized as “mean”, “angry”, and “snappish!”.
We actually thought Paikin did a much better job than the French moderator last night. He did keep trying to get people to stop interrupting and redirect the flow to whomever was supposed to be speaking. That the four spoiled brats didn’t listen doesn’t surprise me.
When Harper’s voice suddenly started echoing, we were instantly suspicious, as *EXACTLY* the same thing happened to our candidate in the local televised debate. He’s a transit expert and when asked what he would do for transit in the GTA, all of a sudden, his voice was echoing and nearly unintelligible.
And to the calculation errors:
May kept claiming Germany has a lower unemployment rate; wrong – Germany’s rate is 24% higher than Canada’s.
Dion kept claiming we had the “worst performance in the G8”; wrong – in the last quarter, while Canada’s 0.3% growth was nothing to crow about, it beat Japan’s -3%, Germany’s -2%, and Italy and France’s -1.1%. That’s half the G8 showing worse performance. Nice try, Steffi.
Layton made the most egregious blooper, though, when he said the average Canadian family is working 290 hours more per month. Can the man not do simple math? That’s more than 9 hours per day, every day, including Saturday and Sunday, 52 weeks a year. I’d love to see him produce figures to substantiate that!
Cbc,our unbiased canadian brawwwdcaster,has recieved hundreds of e-mails about the debate. So far they cannot find one that supports Harper.That is odd,hmmmmm.
Newman and Meharchand are sarcastically chuckling reading an e-mail that noted how many times Harper said “I want to be clear.” I wonder if it was even half as many times as Paul Martin.
Dion was awesome! I never saw his lips move once the whole time May was speaking!
Harper, hands-down winnner.
The couple of times I tuned in and Stephane was talking, he really sounded like he was going to cry. Wimp.
That was a horrible format. Next time, cut out the Bloc and the Greens and make the debate more manageable. Lizzie will have no reason to be there next time – she won’t have ANY MPs. And if one is talking, the rest KEEP THEIR BIG YAPS SHUT.
Harper was prime-ministerial. The rest ranged from whackjobs (Layton) to feeble (Dion).
Let’s convince Canadians of this.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com
Poll.
Vote.
Re the gangs with handguns bit, if you get rid of those and they start going at each other with explosives, long arms, longbows, swords, siege engines, and whatever else, will the left figure out that maybe taking the gangs off the streets might solve the problem?
And on the arts item, with the Conservatives pushing money toward arts credits for children, one might suggest that artists could make good coin passing their craft on to the younger generation.
Crazy Jack Layton made a remark to Harper about how he lets companies outside of Canada buy our lumber and why doesn’t he, Harper, create those same business interests in Canada to create jobs here at home??????
Is he mentally insane????? So selling Canadian lumber to American builders is “bad” for Canada because Canada should be building those American homes here in Canada – Is that what Taliban Jack, Mr. Economics Layton is trying to say???
It’s Harper against four insane communists.
Paikin did a VASTLY better job than any moderator I have seen before. Very evenhanded. So much better than the no-name who did the French debate
Paikin is emerging as the best journalist in Canada.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com
vote in the poll.
The big “kiss or peck on the cheek” is up front and center in living color – see TO Star. Probably up on u-tube by now and one can only imagine how far and wide this is bound to go. Like they say, pictures are worth ……..
Interesting that the Star and Globe both have Dion winning tonight’s debate. Do vote and check the results.
Bit OT from the debate itself, but anyone notice CBC’s pregame show and and how the leaders dress?
Of all the leaders and the photo’s they chose, the only one to have their party’s website advertised in the shot was the Liberals.
Any photo could’ve been selected, but the one they chose of Dion showed him coming off his plane, and painted in big bolf letters on the inside of the door (swung open as he’s coming out waving), is liberal.ca. It’s almost more prominet in the shot than Dion himself. Why that photo? He’s a politician. He wears suits in every photo.
Again, most average Canadians don’t tune into politcal program in general, especially the uninformed and undecided… but when they do, it’s on nights like tonight. Isn’t this just a “clever” way to send people to get the Liberal Party’s propoganda out?
Layton now suddenly makes huge leap from about 11% to 23% in “who won debate” poll. Obviously some NDP boys are pumping the PCs hard somewhere.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com
Vote.