The executive director of the College Republicans picked up her first paper when she was 12 years old! How cute! How early for the politically-inclined to start reading printed press! I marvel! This is the same girl I saw at the first presidential debate who was nodding her head at McCain’s every word (even if it wasn’t something to nod at) and shook her head and put her hands up in the air in frustration whenever Obama had something to say. Sometimes, the rest of the room found her erratic head movements more entertaining than the debate itself (although she somehow didn’t notice it… bit like McCain, right?).

The guest policies between the different undergraduate colleges is a public diary of who’s slept with who. For the sake of anonymity let’s have swipe-access between all four colleges.

Now this one’s a bit of tear-jerker–if you’re into the age-old story about the Dad who was never there. At least by the end of it, she recognizes that he’s not the stereotypical Dad-who-was-never-there. It is often the case that Daddy is working his ass off to get you through college.

Hope you’re as excited for tonight’s debate as I am. To add a little spice to the debate, follow the rules below, compiled with a little help from MIT’s The Tech. Please comment below if you have further suggestions!

Drink When Palin:
Says “Thanks but no thanks.”
Says “it’s my understanding”
Refers to the proximity between Russia and Alaska
Says the word “maverick”
Blinks! (drink 3 times)
Says “small town”
Calls herself a hockey mom
Implies that being the mayor of a small town better qualifies her for vice-president than community organizing
Says “crisis mode”
Says “second-guess” (two drinks if it is in reference to a pre-existing foreign policy, three drinks if it’s Israel)
Says “ya” instead of “you”
Is able to name a Supreme Court case that isn’t Rove v. Wade—2 drinks
Refers to choosing life, or making a decision to keep a child
Compares herself to Geraldine Ferraro (2 drinks)
Compares herself to Hillary Clinton (3 drinks)

If Joe Biden says, “Hillary Clinton is a friend of mine. Governor, you’re no Hillary Clinton,” take five drinks.
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That’s how John Nance Garner once described the Vice Presidency. Yet, somehow one of the most beloved games the media plays every four years is a mixture between 1) guess the nominees’ respective choices for VP and 2) think up pie-in-the-sky dream teams that are “unbeatable.” And to be honest, I don’t blame them: this is their version of the NCAA Tournament bracket. That being said, I’ll throw in my two cents anyway.

The truly amazing part of this whole process is that despite election after election to the contrary, people continue to believe that the magic to winning is in finding the perfect running mate. Ginia posted an interesting pro/con look at four pols being mentioned as potential running mates. I’d like to take a slightly different look at the same issue. Specifically, the ways in which a VP can and cannot boost the ticket.

Myth: A strategically chosen veep can deliver a home state or a region of the country.

People love to cite the 1960 election in which LBJ allegedly “delivered Texas.” Even if we grant this example—and it certainly is a disputed claim—it’s just about the only example. First, the only close elections have been in 1960, 1976, 2000, and 2004. Mondale in ’76 may have swung Minnesota, but Carter’s victory was decisive there. Gore may have helped in Tennessee in 1992, but Clinton beat Bush comfortably. Did Cabot Lodge help Nixon in ‘60? What about Bentsen’s boost to Dukakis in Texas in ’88? How did Edwards do in NC in 2004? A veep will very rarely swing an election by helping in a home state, let alone in an entire region.

Fact: A vice presidential candidate’s policy agenda is virtually unknown to the country and thus inconsequential in the election.

Quick, name a policy proposal advocated by Spiro Agnew? Edmund Muskie? Lloyd Bentsen? Dan Quayle? Exactly. People want to know what the President will do if elected, and they want to be confident that in the case of tragedy, the veep won’t screw it up.

A running mate CAN help compensate for perceived weaknesses in the Presidential candidate. Most people focus on the top of the ticket and the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate. A well known veep candidate with some generally acknowledged strengths can compensate well for a candidate’s weaknesses.

So what are Obama’s weaknesses? Well he’s the first candidate since 1960 to be unseasoned both in governmental management (i.e. no gubernatorial experience) AND in foreign policy chops (i.e. first term senator). But Obama’s main strength is that people perceive him as less partisan than most politicians and also as a uniter. With that in mind, here are a few names Ginia did not mention who should be considered:

Mark Warner – Sure, he’s running for (and likely to win) a Virginia Senate seat currently held by retiring Republican John Warner (no relation). But he also was an exceptionally popular governor who passed a necessary tax increase through a heavily Republican state legislature. Warner reasoned and compromised with lawmakers to create a bipartisan bill. If that doesn’t fit Obama’s alleged message of “change” than I don’t know what does. Problems: aforementioned Senate seat; a wife who hates the limelight.

Ted Strickland – Extremely popular Governor of Ohio. From Appalachia, and very comfortable talking about, and backing up talk of, family values and religion. A progressive who appeals to heartland moderates and liberal Republicans. Problems: Short on experience, and only two years into the governorship. Would it be prudent to jump to the national stage so soon especially with another green candidate?

Kathleen Sebelius – Popular Governor of Kansas, in the middle of her second term, and long on managerial experience; she appeals to constituents despite being decidedly and openly pro-choice. She must be doing something right. Problems: I hate identity politics, BUT, a black man running with a woman might just be too much for some Americans to handle at this point.

Hello all!

I think I am officially safe to comment on my experiences volunteering for the Obama campaign yesterday, since I am no longer in a campaign office.

My day was spent mostly in the great state of Pennsylvania, whose citizens finally had their chance to rock the vote. The day got off to a slow start, as I got a little lost trying to navigate the Philadelphia SEPTA rails. The ‘burbs were full of vibrant volunteers, but my laptop was not working…. so I wasn’t able to canvas too effectively. Many apologies to the kind women who had to drive me back to a campaign office so I could use a computer. Nevertheless, phone-banking was a lot of fun! I wasn’t able to reach too many people at home, but I hope they were still able to check their answering machines before the polls closed.

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I felt compelled to note an amusing line in this staff editorial:

“Further, whether or not Experience’s presidential candidate George Krebs took more credit than he should have for the completion of the off-campus Flex project, he has not adequately rebutted the suggestion that he did.”

If I understand this statement correctly, Krebs may or may not have made an unsubstantiated claim, but he has failed to properly address the claim that his claim was unsubstantiated. So, the editorial took a little joyride into the world of spin. It’s trivial silliness, but it reminded me of the not-so-trivial silliness inflicted on the national consciousness over another dubious (or not-so-dubious) political claim—that Al Gore took credit for inventing the Internet. I took the liberty of replacing a few nouns, and came up with this:

“Further, whether or not Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore took more credit than he should have for the creation of the internet , he has not adequately rebutted the suggestion that he did.”

Focus on the facts. If a candidate lacks integrity, criticize him for lacking integrity. Don’t criticize him for his failure to defend his integrity against attacks. That serves no purpose.

Thankfully, CCSC elections do not have the potential to plunge us into an endless quagmire of partisan hackery, corruption, and criminal incompetence. But still, let’s leave the spin to politicians, not journalists.

Through no fault of the candidates themselves, this year’s CCSC presidential campaign just screams Bush-Kerry. While there are plenty of Columbia students who probably remember that election as a near-metaphysical clash of good and evil, I remember it most for the candidates’ delightfully mismatched accents: Kerry’s aristocratic Massachusetts drawl versus Bush’s skeet-shooting, pickup-driving Texas twang (of course Bush was born in Connecticut, and came from every bit as populist a background as his Francophiliac opponent. But I digress). Inevitably it’s the shallowest and most superficial of differences that endure, and the one that stuck with me after a day of interviewing the CCSC candidates had to do with the circumstances under which we spoke.

We (myself and Commentariat staffer Meghan Mannion) talked to Connect Columbia presidential candidate Alidad Damooei in the second floor lounge of Beta’s palatial 114th St. brownstone. The candidate was nonplussed about the crucial three days ahead of him, and he spent a generous hour and a half with us, much of it dedicated to explaining the intricacies of Columbian student government.

When we met Krebs at around six that evening, he was celebrating the CQA’s endorsement of him for president, and could talk for an energetic twenty minutes before leaving for a mid-afternoon dormstorm. We pushed the rest of the interview back until Krebs was finished with a late-night campaign run and strategy session. We met with a still-wired Krebs at around two in the morning.

But the CCSC contest is more than a battle of personality types, and the student body’s choice will have as much to do with the candidates’ divergent philosohphies on student government as it will with their radically different leadership styles.

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