Christie calls CNBC moderator rude

I guess I must be in an anti-media mood, but the way this debate started, I think a lot of people (viewers and candidates) feel that way right now.

Chris Christie, rightly, calls the moderator rude.

Damage Done - Candy Crowley Redux

This may sound like a told-you-so post, but that is not it's intent.  The intent of this post is to point out the Benghazi scandal that is bubbling up now was deliberately tamped down long enough for Obama to get through the election and to question whether the press, now suspicious of the president's narrative, was deliberately complicit at the time of the election. 

Remember this?  Candy Crowley, worst moderator ever, is seen below giving president Obama a free pass on his interpretation of how events unfolded post-Benghazi.  In fact a free pass is too small a description of what she did.  She enabled a cover-up and helped mislead the American public on what now is turning into a scandal of possibly mammoth proportions.

She'll never moderate again.  Forget presidential debates, she's not fit to moderate a PTA meeting.  But the real problem is the damage she caused to the country by allowing and enabling this facade.  Innocent dupe misled by the Obama administration's talking points, or partisan hack trying to get Obama re-elected? The motive doesn't matter the results would have been the same regardless of why the debate moderator Crowley sided with the president, impartially in the CNN presidential debate.

Should Benghazi turn into another Watergate-scale scandal, Crowley would rightly be regarded as a hack journalist with purely partisan intent.  What will likely happen is that she will continue to be employed by CNN with nary a whisper of ineptitude on her part.  That's because the problem she exhibited in the debate is endemic to CNN.  It's core to their thinking.

Debate #2 - Moderator takes center stage

Last night's second presidential debate probably helped Obama a little bit.  Was it enough to change the Mitt Romney momentum?  Not likely enough to reverse it, but maybe enough to slow or halt Romney's ascent.  But Romney did well as well.  He didn't put the election away, but he didn't hurt himself.  It was about as close to a draw as a debate could be, especially since both participants were pretty lively.

Wait, did I say both participants?  I forgot about the Candy Crowley favoritism.  She was lively too.  Obama got far fewer interruptions than Romney and 3 more minutes of talk time.   And then there was this:

Is that what passes for a moderator?  She hopped in and offered observations on behalf of the president and then had to backtrack by mentioning Romney was fundamentally right, but chose the wrong word.

Here's the list of issues with that:

(1) Defending what Obama said is Obama's job, NOT hers.  If Obama wasn't going to do it, she should have let it stand.

(2) Her self-correction that Romney was fundamentally right was far less audible, and she did not balance it out properly.  Since she interjected herself, she should have had a proper exit strategy that included some level of clearing up the issue cleanly and clearly.

(3) She say Romney chose the wrong word.  Is this a Grade 6 grammar class? Is it her responsibility to superimpose her opinion on that point?  No.  That's not a moderator, that's a pundit.

The biggest issue in that debate was Crowley.  Obama and Romney both did passable jobs from a debate and influencing perspective.  I don't think this changes much of anything, other than hopefully some people's perception of the media's vested interests and inability in the main to be impartial and serve as moderators.

Biden: arrogant, smug, bit of a jerk

There are going to be many takes on the VP debate tonight.  Conservatives will agree Ryan won by remaining calm in the face of Biden's interruptions and those of the moderator as well (anyone have a count on moderator interruptions of Ryan vs. interruptions of Biden?).  Ryan stuck to his points and didn't blow it.  He came across well.  Liberals on the other hand will be excited by Biden's assertiveness.

But there's assertiveness and there's arrogant, smug jerky behavior:

Or this version if you prefer.  Biden at his smug, jerkiest: