Nash McCabe, the Latrobe, Pa., woman who’s so disturbed about Barack Obama’s decision not to make flag pins part of his everyday wardrobe, turns out to be a known Obama-hater whom ABC News tracked down with malice aforethought.
Josh Marshall: “[I]t does reinforce my sense that the disgraceful nature of the debate wasn’t just something that came together wrong, some iffy ideas taken to[o] far, but was basically engineered to be crap from the ground up.”
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Sean Roche
The McClatchy story you link to suggests another flaw of the debate format: the complete lack of give and take. One could imagine a very informative and interesting conversation between Obama and Ms. McCabe. She gets it off her chest that she’s insulted by his non-chalance towards the flag and his easy path to success. He asks about her history and does or doesn’t demonstrate empathy and does or doesn’t provide a convincing story about what his presidency would do for people like her.Heck, they could have done a two- or three-minute interview with her along the lines of the McClatchy story (including the anger at Obama) and let the two candidates respond.It’s terrible that ABC so badly misused Ms McCabe and her story. It’s what the election is all about.
Dan Kennedy
Sean: That’s an excellent point. I should have pointed out what a sympathetic figure McCabe is. ABC used her not because she’s sympathetic but because she detests Obama.
Sean Roche
Agreed, but there’s the rub. ABC could have had its cake and eaten it. Let her vent her bile at Obama and provide the catalyst for a discussion about some critical issues.
Anonymous
I’m just sitting back enjoying the hilarity of the liberals complaining about the debate questions. Now you know what it’s like to be a conservative. Did any of you people watch the CNN Republican YouTube debate? You want to talk about pointless gotcha questions – and questioners with an agenda. Here’s a little rundown of the pointless questions Republicans have been asked to try and make them seem like crazy fringe lunatics. It happened to them at every single debate.1. Do you believe every word of the bible?2. Raise your hand if you don’t believe in evolution.3. The retired gay military man from Clinton’s gay steering committee asking about “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”4. How many guns do you own and what kind are they?5. What would Jesus do about the death penalty?Every single Republican debate turned into an MSM caricature of what the Republican party believes in.I think Barack Obama’s close friendship with a domestic terrorist is far more important to the national dialogue than how many guns Duncan Hunter owns. The fact he could associate himself with such despicable people speaks to his character. Charles Manson killed people before I was born – but that doesn’t mean I’m going to have him over for dinner at my house. It’s nice to finally see the media give the Democrats the same treatment Republicans have been getting all along. And it’s downright hilarious to watch the liberals squirm.
Don, American
“Crap from the ground up.” I love it.
Anonymous
Do we really need interaction between ‘people who don’t like candidates’ as a category? I don’t think so. This was much too close to performance art. Seeking out ringers is not the way to go. The whole evening was one small step above a SNL skit. * I do feel sorry for “Pin Lady” who has serious illness in her family. Maybe George and Gibson can open their checkbooks.
Anonymous
Dan,To give this complete context, we would do well to remember the soldier who questioned John McCain during the CNN debate moderated by Anderson Cooper. By the time CNN went to the post debate panel, Bill Bennett was already receiving information that the soldier was a plant who was working on Hillary Clinton’s campaign.This information was nearly instantly confirmed. CNN claimed ignorance of the soldier’s campaign role.Glen BergendahlWeymouth
Dan Kennedy
Both parties’ candidates put themselves through YouTube debates. Both had to suffer through the ridiculous questions that CNN insisted on choosing rather than leaving it to the YouTube community to decide.What ABC did this week was special.
Peter Porcupine
DK – Anderson Cooper is the next likely anchor of CBS News – tha’s pretty special, too, after he used questions from campaign operatives in his debate – AND he had the man there live, in case he didn’t do a good enough job on McCain with the video – remember?There’s an old saw about a conservative being a liberal who was mugged – from the indignation I’ve read, it fits pretty well here. NOW you all care about the content of debates! There’s an excellent piece on Politico about this – [HERE – http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0408/9718.html%5D
Dan Kennedy
PP: You’re just wrong, at least about me. Here is what I wrote about the Republican YouTube debate.
Anonymous
Oh, That’s right. Ask tough questions of Hillary. Ask tough questions of McCain. But leave St. Obama alone. Hope for change. Change for hope. Together we can (Oh wait, that wasn’t Obama…but how did that turn out?) Liberal media bias at its best. Wonder how that will play in Peoria, not just Provincetown.
lou
anonymous 11:25you think asking about lapel pins is tough questioning. What, do you live National Enquirer land?For instance, if they had asked him about possibly waffling on his pro-choice stance, I’d have been for that. Or any number of serious issues.As Jon Stewart said,”I’m the silly man” about the silly questions asked.
Anonymous
“Wonder how that will play in Peoria, not just Provincetown.”FYI – Hillary won Provincetown, 867 to 488 for Obama