Dark Bilious Vapors

I'm an utter and complete failure. Three debates, and I wanted to make this blog a "debate-free" zone for just one debate, but my daily reads kept coming up with quotables that I'm just compelled to take notice of.

Melanie at Just a Bump on the Beltway takes the honors for the third debate for this gem:

What I noticed last night was W's mirage, that ghost of himself that he thinks is always just over the horizon. He makes assertions about who he is and what he does, rather than come up with facts. He has an allergy to facts that is unlike any other president I've seen since Nixon. This is the least self-aware man I have ever seen in public life: he is simply immature. What did in his dad in '92 was the grocery store scanner incident. The son is even further removed from the reality of life of the vast majority of us who aren't making six digit incomes. That ignorance was on full display last night.

This interchange was the most telling:

Mr. President, what do you say to someone in this country who has lost his job to someone overseas who's being paid a fraction of what that job paid here in the United States?

BUSH: I'd say, Bob, I've got policies to continue to grow our economy and create the jobs of the 21st century. And here's some help for you to go get an education. Here's some help for you to go to a community college.

If you lose your job, it's because you are uneducated? We are in the middle of a structural change in employment which Chimpy cannot understand since he's never had to hold down a job. We are rapidly becoming a country without middle class jobs. Neither candidate addressed that, but W is so far removed from the world of work that I don't hold out much hope that he'd ever "get it." He certainly doesn't care about it. The jobs of the 21st Century appear to be low-wage, service sector jobs. Good on you, W. You don't need a community college education for one of those.

Len on 10.14.04 @ 12:02 PM CST