STRATEGY IS DEAD

There's a lot of talk today about this whole debate debacle, as Governor Sarah Palin faces the world in a test of preparedness against Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware.

No one expects Biden to "lose" this debate, which is highly dangerous for him and why you might have noticed both political parties playing down expectations. The wisdom is that if you handicap your player and publicly predict a low performance, even alluding to the possibility of a loss, you will easily come out on top without having to exert very much energy or intellect.

Everyone—even Palin—knows that Biden is the better, smarter and more qualified candidate. But no one knows how bad Palin will be against him. There are many risks, which include a PR nightmare scenario for Biden: he could forcefully prove that he is better, smarter and more qualified, thus causing a sense of resentment. Nobody likes a know-it-all, and everybody loves the underdog. America is huge on victims and charity.

So if Biden engages Palin, he runs the risk of looking like a father, which would also immediately transform him into an old, chauvinist misogynist by default. "Who does Joe Biden think he is, dismissing a woman so fervently?" I can already see Elizabeth's lips flapping tomorrow morning on The View, and it's not at all as if I plan on watching The View.



You can see what type of dilemma that Biden is in, and how millions of Republikkkan lackeys, flunkies and surrogates are prepared to spin this into a victory for Palin no matter how badly she fails tonight. So there's only one way that Biden can soundly rout Palin in their one and only VEEP debate:

He's got to surrender.

Yes; the senator must hold back his mental arsenal of foreign policy, economics, law, social issues, education, energy and anything else he knows that would warrant an answer to any of Gwen Ifill's questions longer than two sentences. We already know that the campaign of Senator John McCain is trying to DISCREDIT Ifill because she has written a book called Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama. If it is perceived that she is tossing journalistic "softballs" at Biden, it will appear as if GOP commentators were correct in assuming that she was already in pocket as an Obama loyalist and supporter. If he answers a question exceptionally well, Republikkkans will yell that the fix is in. Sheesh… at least McCain finally came out and admitted that Ifill, highly respected as an objective political journalist, will probably do a great job, as always.



On the other hand, if he decides to limit his answers, it will put pressure on Palin to best him. If she rambles, she will slip. If she keeps her answers similarly short, she will look like she's following Biden's lead because she is incompetent and has no answers. If she answers them correctly and blows everyone away with her understanding of the issues, she will still be less qualified as Biden, because no one with an I.Q. over 60 could possibly believe that he is not ready to step in at a moment's notice.

Biden will win regardless, but public relations can be a bitch to control, and you'd better believe that those wacky, Kool-Aid drinking Republikkkans are already preparing their victory statements for the morning news shows. Palin is a nincompoop, and it doesn't take an intellectual bombardment from Biden to expose this. Allow her to be the cause of her own political death, and she will most certainly euthanize herself on the public stage, proving to everyone that she never belonged behind that podium in the first place.

The best strategy is a non-strategy. If Biden follows my advice, I guarantee that he will have slayed the "LEVIATHAN OF FORENSICS" without having to raise his voice. And you can bet that if Biden walks away clean, the conservatives who were once all too giddy with the pretty lady from Alaska will attack her themselves, or simply decide as early as tomorrow that they cannot support the GOP ticket in November.