Because you know, not showing up and giving the other guy hours of free uncontested airtime to get his message out will sure show him.....
Really why not just donate to the other guys campaign fund so he can run ads against you?
Yet for some odd reason, this is EXACTLY what some republican just did.
And not just any republican, it was an incumbent governor. Specifically Rick Scott, republican governor of Florida.
No really, for like 4 minutes Governor Rick Scott basically refused to debate his opponent, Former Republican Governor of Florida, turned Democratic Candidate for Governor Charlie Crist.
Why? well actually rather then tell you.....I really cant do it justice so I'll just show you.
The only thing missing from that clip is "LIVE FROM NEW YORK IT'S SATURDAY NIGHT!"
A couple of things stick out pretty fast
First: This clip exemplifies EXACTLY what is wrong with the media.
So consider the position of the "hosts" in this clip. As far as they know, 1 of their 2 candidates has declined to show up to what is a major hour long (at least) preemption of their usual primetime line up.
And their solution? basically ignore the candidate that did show up and stick their thumbs up their collective asses.
Lets assume for a moment you actually give a flying fuck about someones opinion of an electric fan, well you know when would be the perfect time to discuss that? how about the half hour or so of post debate analysis that follows these things?
But apparently to these jack off's their own opinions are of such interest, not only do they think thats what people want to hear, the actually go so far as to quite the candidate who DID show up from giving his positions.
And hell, sticking his thumb up his ass was the least of the moderators problems.
After all there is actually nothing remotely unusual about a political debate starting with no candidates on the stage. Thats actually how most of them start, then the candidates get introduced and come out.
Now it appears in that clip that Crist was waiting backstage for his introduction, and as soon as he realized he wasnt going to get one, and that the moderator was going to use this standard procedure to create the false equivalency that neither candidate was willing to debate, he hauled ass and got out there.
What the moderator SHOULD have done was introduce both candidates, then explained why one of them didnt come out.
But see that would violate rule 1 of political reporting: "unbaised" mean ALL THINGS must be EQUALLY the fault of both parties. Bringing Crist out, then explaining why Scott wasnt coming, would have made it seem like Scott was the ONLY unreasonable one, and therefore would not have "unbaised"
Same thing when the moderator tries to cover for Scott by ONLY mentioning the part of the contract that Scott wants him to mention, that being the ban on electric fans.
Which therefore makes Scott seem less unreasonable by giving him "justification" for his actions, and saying his actions were caused by crist's, thereby fulfilling rule one, its BOTH their faults Scott isnt there.
Which would be fine and good, except for one small problem, its NOT TRUE.
The Scott Campaign itself released the section of the contract they cited as "proof" the fan was banned. The problem is, it DOESNT ban fans. What it bans are "any electronics" used by the candidates. Presumably this is intended to mean cell phones, lap tops, ear pieces, anything the candidates could use to get information from.
But Scott Campaign is claiming that the fan falls under the definition of electronic, and therefore was banned, they are NOT actually claiming that the contract out right banned fans.
Which means their justification basically relies on word play, which makes it a very weak justification.
Especially considering that under the definition the scott campaign wants to use "any device used by the candidate that uses electricity" that would also ban the use of the Microphones on the desk the candidates would use to answer the question, not to mention the time clock in front of the moderator to show them how much time they have to finish answering the question.
But I dont see the Scott Campaign demanding the candidates scream their answers while counting to 60 seconds in their heads.....
Oh, except its worse. See not only did the moderator pass off the Scott Campaign interpretation of a rule as the wording of the rule itself, the contract actually DID deal directly with fans. It also contained a sentence explicitly allowing "electronic devices used to regulate temperature" or as they are known to the rest of us Fans.
So yea basically the moderator is outright LYING to people to make both candidates seem unreasonable. Like when he explains the situation he says "Gov crist asked for a small fan to be placed under the podium. The copy of the rules Gov Scotts campaign showed me said "no fans" yet the yet somehow their is a fan"
YES BECAUSE THE RULES SAY THATS OK. Which is probibly why Gov Crist asked for a fan in the first place.....because the rules said its ok, and he's wearing a suit in Florida and Florida is well known for being FUCKING HOT!
Same with the female moderator when she asks Crist a question about the rules. Shes acting like this is an open question.
But heres the thing, the moderators are actually supposed to read the debate rules BEFORE the debate.
So yea, all the moderators KNOW what they rules actually say. But in the interest of looking "unbiased" they pretend they dont and instead operation on the assumption the Scott Campaigns interpretation of the rules is THE rules, that way Crist looks unreasonable.
Second point. At one point one of the moderators claims you cant have a debate without both candidates......why the fuck not?
Unless its an episode of the West Wing, candidates dont actually talk to each other at all during debates.
Usually the moderator asks a general question about policy, both get an answer and retort, and then sometimes the moderator asks one of them a follow up question about a previous stand or point of clarification on the issue.
There is absolutely no reason you cant do the same thing with one candidate. You just double the amount of time he has to answer the question, meaning the process would still take exactly the same amount of time as scheduled.
I mean I suppose officially thats more an interview then a debate, but considering the other side basically forfeited, that actually seems fair to reward the candidate who showed up with basically and extended interview. An heres the thing, if the moderator has done their job, the interview should actually BE challenging because point of the debate questions is supposed to be to challenge the candidate your questioning, and those same questions would be the interview questions.
But then again, that assumes the moderators have done their jobs properly and these 3 ass clowns dont seem to have done so.
But heres the thing, after Scott actually showed up, things got even weirder
Here's Scott explaining why he didnt show up
A couple of things stick out pretty fast
First: This clip exemplifies EXACTLY what is wrong with the media.
So consider the position of the "hosts" in this clip. As far as they know, 1 of their 2 candidates has declined to show up to what is a major hour long (at least) preemption of their usual primetime line up.
And their solution? basically ignore the candidate that did show up and stick their thumbs up their collective asses.
Lets assume for a moment you actually give a flying fuck about someones opinion of an electric fan, well you know when would be the perfect time to discuss that? how about the half hour or so of post debate analysis that follows these things?
But apparently to these jack off's their own opinions are of such interest, not only do they think thats what people want to hear, the actually go so far as to quite the candidate who DID show up from giving his positions.
And hell, sticking his thumb up his ass was the least of the moderators problems.
After all there is actually nothing remotely unusual about a political debate starting with no candidates on the stage. Thats actually how most of them start, then the candidates get introduced and come out.
Now it appears in that clip that Crist was waiting backstage for his introduction, and as soon as he realized he wasnt going to get one, and that the moderator was going to use this standard procedure to create the false equivalency that neither candidate was willing to debate, he hauled ass and got out there.
What the moderator SHOULD have done was introduce both candidates, then explained why one of them didnt come out.
But see that would violate rule 1 of political reporting: "unbaised" mean ALL THINGS must be EQUALLY the fault of both parties. Bringing Crist out, then explaining why Scott wasnt coming, would have made it seem like Scott was the ONLY unreasonable one, and therefore would not have "unbaised"
Same thing when the moderator tries to cover for Scott by ONLY mentioning the part of the contract that Scott wants him to mention, that being the ban on electric fans.
Which therefore makes Scott seem less unreasonable by giving him "justification" for his actions, and saying his actions were caused by crist's, thereby fulfilling rule one, its BOTH their faults Scott isnt there.
Which would be fine and good, except for one small problem, its NOT TRUE.
The Scott Campaign itself released the section of the contract they cited as "proof" the fan was banned. The problem is, it DOESNT ban fans. What it bans are "any electronics" used by the candidates. Presumably this is intended to mean cell phones, lap tops, ear pieces, anything the candidates could use to get information from.
But Scott Campaign is claiming that the fan falls under the definition of electronic, and therefore was banned, they are NOT actually claiming that the contract out right banned fans.
Which means their justification basically relies on word play, which makes it a very weak justification.
Especially considering that under the definition the scott campaign wants to use "any device used by the candidate that uses electricity" that would also ban the use of the Microphones on the desk the candidates would use to answer the question, not to mention the time clock in front of the moderator to show them how much time they have to finish answering the question.
But I dont see the Scott Campaign demanding the candidates scream their answers while counting to 60 seconds in their heads.....
Oh, except its worse. See not only did the moderator pass off the Scott Campaign interpretation of a rule as the wording of the rule itself, the contract actually DID deal directly with fans. It also contained a sentence explicitly allowing "electronic devices used to regulate temperature" or as they are known to the rest of us Fans.
So yea basically the moderator is outright LYING to people to make both candidates seem unreasonable. Like when he explains the situation he says "Gov crist asked for a small fan to be placed under the podium. The copy of the rules Gov Scotts campaign showed me said "no fans" yet the yet somehow their is a fan"
YES BECAUSE THE RULES SAY THATS OK. Which is probibly why Gov Crist asked for a fan in the first place.....because the rules said its ok, and he's wearing a suit in Florida and Florida is well known for being FUCKING HOT!
Same with the female moderator when she asks Crist a question about the rules. Shes acting like this is an open question.
But heres the thing, the moderators are actually supposed to read the debate rules BEFORE the debate.
So yea, all the moderators KNOW what they rules actually say. But in the interest of looking "unbiased" they pretend they dont and instead operation on the assumption the Scott Campaigns interpretation of the rules is THE rules, that way Crist looks unreasonable.
Second point. At one point one of the moderators claims you cant have a debate without both candidates......why the fuck not?
Unless its an episode of the West Wing, candidates dont actually talk to each other at all during debates.
Usually the moderator asks a general question about policy, both get an answer and retort, and then sometimes the moderator asks one of them a follow up question about a previous stand or point of clarification on the issue.
There is absolutely no reason you cant do the same thing with one candidate. You just double the amount of time he has to answer the question, meaning the process would still take exactly the same amount of time as scheduled.
I mean I suppose officially thats more an interview then a debate, but considering the other side basically forfeited, that actually seems fair to reward the candidate who showed up with basically and extended interview. An heres the thing, if the moderator has done their job, the interview should actually BE challenging because point of the debate questions is supposed to be to challenge the candidate your questioning, and those same questions would be the interview questions.
But then again, that assumes the moderators have done their jobs properly and these 3 ass clowns dont seem to have done so.
But heres the thing, after Scott actually showed up, things got even weirder
Here's Scott explaining why he didnt show up
So you see Scott didnt show up, because he didnt know of the guy who was ALREADY on the stage was going to show up.......
Either Rick Scott is the worlds WORST X-Man, whose mutant power only allows him to in the past, or this is a horrible excuse.
Either Rick Scott is the worlds WORST X-Man, whose mutant power only allows him to in the past, or this is a horrible excuse.
Actually no matter HOW you look at it, its a horrible excuse.
How god damn long does it take to figure out the guy CURRENTLY ON THE STAGE, is actually showing up for the debate. Apparently it takes Rick Scott up to 3 minutes to process the location of a single person.
I'm pretty sure even my old AOL Dial Up connection was faster than that.
But for a second here, lets humor Scott and assume Crist wasnt actually going to show up.
Why would that matter AT ALL to Scott? Even with incompetent moderators, if you walk out, look like your the only one willing to debate the issues, the audience is going to love it and the other guys going to look bad.
Basically if Rick Scott actually thought Crist wasnt coming, he should have been at the curtain, ready to open it in a seconds notice and make Crist look like an elitist little shit who cant even speak without a precious fan.
But whats Scott's claiming here is basically "hey look, I thought my opponent was about to do something amazingly stupid (not show up).....so i decided to do the exact same stupid thing, its not my fault he didnt go through with it "
But even that falls all kinds of short. See the contract is worked out between the two campaigns. So if Crist wasnt going to show up because he couldnt get what he wanted in the contract, and Scott decided not to show up in a sign of solidarity for Crist, it would still raise the question of "what the fuck is wrong with the Scott Campaign that they wont put something into the contract even their own candidate is in favor of?
Also, I mean lets assume for a second that despite the fact its one of the stupidest things he could do, Scott really wasnt going to show up if Crist wasnt, it raises a couple of interesting questions.
1) how badly organized is the Scott Campaign that they apparently forget to station a staffer:
a) in the backstage near the curtain able to look out on the stage
b) near a television that they could actually SEE if crist showed up
c) that they forgot to station the Governor closes enough to the curtain to instantly appear if Crist showed up.
2) Ok so if your not showing up in a show of solidarity with Crist, why did you send a staffer out to the moderators claiming you were protesting Crist breaking the rules?
More to the point if you sent a staffer out to the moderator explaining Crist had "was breaking the rules" and had gotten his way WHY THE FUCK WOULD EXPECT HIM NOT TO SHOW UP FOR NOT GETTING HIS WAY?"
And all of this ignores the much larger and more important fact that fans were expressly permitted in the contract.....that Rick Scott signed.
Yet apparently he didnt actually know what it said.
Which raises the question, how many other things.....like say LAWS, has Rick Scott signed that he doesnt know the contents of.
Does he just make a habit of assuming things say what he thinks they say and signing them?
Does he have any idea of what his own record as governor actually is? Or is he just assuming the laws are what he thinks they are?
Oh and the final (at the moment) worst part of this.....apparently time hasnt really improved things for the Scott Campaign.
See the day after the campaign Scott's campaign released this statement to the media:
"So, let's get one thing clear: Rick Scott never refused to take the stage and debate. In fact, our campaign was not notified Charlie had even taken the stage because the last we heard, Crist was in an 'emergency meeting' with debate organizers pleading for his precious fan.
"But Charlie Crist can bring his fan, microwave, and toaster to debates -- none of that will cover up how sad his record as Governor was compared to the success of Governor Rick Scott."
Now not only does that "clarification" still contain all of the original problems (why do you care if Crist is showing up and the fan was expressly legal so why would crist be arguing over it/did you actually read the contract), it adds a new ones.
Mainly if Scott's campaign didnt give a shit about the fan, and intended to come out as scheduled, WHY DID YOU SENT A STAFFER UP TO THE MODERATORS WITH A COPY OF DEBATE RULES CLAIMING A FAN WASNT ALLOWED AND YOU WOULDNT PARTICIPATE?
Also, if Scott was going to come out as planned, what the fuck took so long? I mean your claiming Scott was standing at the curtain, waiting to debate, heard the debate start, heard the moderators say he wasnt coming, saw/heard Crist come out......and just stood there for a few minutes thinking absolutely nothing was wrong.
So yea, the question has to be asked....how little attention does this guy pay to the world?
I mean I suppose the staffer COULD have been a rogue operative, and Scott didnt know the staffer was going the media with that excuse. But then we have the added question of "how poorly is Rick Scotts campaign being run that he cant control his staff AND that his staff is too stupid to go get him when they realized the debate was startin? and why if hes THAT BAD at running his own campaign would you ever want him to run a state?"
So yea. By his own "admission" Rick Scott is:
1) not paying attention to things that are happening in front him him
2) a horrible manager
3) not reading things he signs
4) willing to do something stupid, solely to look as stupid as someone else
5) Incapable of adjusting to changing or uncertain circumstances (like say the location of a debate opponent) until it is too late.
How god damn long does it take to figure out the guy CURRENTLY ON THE STAGE, is actually showing up for the debate. Apparently it takes Rick Scott up to 3 minutes to process the location of a single person.
I'm pretty sure even my old AOL Dial Up connection was faster than that.
But for a second here, lets humor Scott and assume Crist wasnt actually going to show up.
Why would that matter AT ALL to Scott? Even with incompetent moderators, if you walk out, look like your the only one willing to debate the issues, the audience is going to love it and the other guys going to look bad.
Basically if Rick Scott actually thought Crist wasnt coming, he should have been at the curtain, ready to open it in a seconds notice and make Crist look like an elitist little shit who cant even speak without a precious fan.
But whats Scott's claiming here is basically "hey look, I thought my opponent was about to do something amazingly stupid (not show up).....so i decided to do the exact same stupid thing, its not my fault he didnt go through with it "
But even that falls all kinds of short. See the contract is worked out between the two campaigns. So if Crist wasnt going to show up because he couldnt get what he wanted in the contract, and Scott decided not to show up in a sign of solidarity for Crist, it would still raise the question of "what the fuck is wrong with the Scott Campaign that they wont put something into the contract even their own candidate is in favor of?
Also, I mean lets assume for a second that despite the fact its one of the stupidest things he could do, Scott really wasnt going to show up if Crist wasnt, it raises a couple of interesting questions.
1) how badly organized is the Scott Campaign that they apparently forget to station a staffer:
a) in the backstage near the curtain able to look out on the stage
b) near a television that they could actually SEE if crist showed up
c) that they forgot to station the Governor closes enough to the curtain to instantly appear if Crist showed up.
2) Ok so if your not showing up in a show of solidarity with Crist, why did you send a staffer out to the moderators claiming you were protesting Crist breaking the rules?
More to the point if you sent a staffer out to the moderator explaining Crist had "was breaking the rules" and had gotten his way WHY THE FUCK WOULD EXPECT HIM NOT TO SHOW UP FOR NOT GETTING HIS WAY?"
And all of this ignores the much larger and more important fact that fans were expressly permitted in the contract.....that Rick Scott signed.
Yet apparently he didnt actually know what it said.
Which raises the question, how many other things.....like say LAWS, has Rick Scott signed that he doesnt know the contents of.
Does he just make a habit of assuming things say what he thinks they say and signing them?
Does he have any idea of what his own record as governor actually is? Or is he just assuming the laws are what he thinks they are?
Oh and the final (at the moment) worst part of this.....apparently time hasnt really improved things for the Scott Campaign.
See the day after the campaign Scott's campaign released this statement to the media:
"So, let's get one thing clear: Rick Scott never refused to take the stage and debate. In fact, our campaign was not notified Charlie had even taken the stage because the last we heard, Crist was in an 'emergency meeting' with debate organizers pleading for his precious fan.
"But Charlie Crist can bring his fan, microwave, and toaster to debates -- none of that will cover up how sad his record as Governor was compared to the success of Governor Rick Scott."
Now not only does that "clarification" still contain all of the original problems (why do you care if Crist is showing up and the fan was expressly legal so why would crist be arguing over it/did you actually read the contract), it adds a new ones.
Mainly if Scott's campaign didnt give a shit about the fan, and intended to come out as scheduled, WHY DID YOU SENT A STAFFER UP TO THE MODERATORS WITH A COPY OF DEBATE RULES CLAIMING A FAN WASNT ALLOWED AND YOU WOULDNT PARTICIPATE?
Also, if Scott was going to come out as planned, what the fuck took so long? I mean your claiming Scott was standing at the curtain, waiting to debate, heard the debate start, heard the moderators say he wasnt coming, saw/heard Crist come out......and just stood there for a few minutes thinking absolutely nothing was wrong.
So yea, the question has to be asked....how little attention does this guy pay to the world?
I mean I suppose the staffer COULD have been a rogue operative, and Scott didnt know the staffer was going the media with that excuse. But then we have the added question of "how poorly is Rick Scotts campaign being run that he cant control his staff AND that his staff is too stupid to go get him when they realized the debate was startin? and why if hes THAT BAD at running his own campaign would you ever want him to run a state?"
So yea. By his own "admission" Rick Scott is:
1) not paying attention to things that are happening in front him him
2) a horrible manager
3) not reading things he signs
4) willing to do something stupid, solely to look as stupid as someone else
5) Incapable of adjusting to changing or uncertain circumstances (like say the location of a debate opponent) until it is too late.
6) not even sure why he does the things he does.
So yea, thats 6 great reasons why you should NEVER vote for Rick Scott for anything, and Charlie Crist didnt even need to say a word.
On the upside, maybe now that someone was actually stupid enough to do it, candidates will stop threatening to walk out of debates because they will realize how fucking stupid a threat that really is....
So yea, thats 6 great reasons why you should NEVER vote for Rick Scott for anything, and Charlie Crist didnt even need to say a word.
On the upside, maybe now that someone was actually stupid enough to do it, candidates will stop threatening to walk out of debates because they will realize how fucking stupid a threat that really is....
