Dear Lord, please provide me enough liquor to watch this debate

Here’s Katie Couric with both VP candidates about their thoughts on the Supreme Court:  This is a hell of a choice.  On the one hand there’s an unstoppable gasbag who makes every question all about him.  And on the other hand there’s an idiot with no understanding of constitutional law beyond the 3X5 index card ...

By , a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast.

Here's Katie Couric with both VP candidates about their thoughts on the Supreme Court:  This is a hell of a choice.  On the one hand there's an unstoppable gasbag who makes every question all about him.  And on the other hand there's an idiot with no understanding of constitutional law beyond the 3X5 index card placed in front of her.  Neither of them have met a sentence that they can't extend for another two minutes with their run-on syntax.  The debate tomorrow night might be the most painful two hours of television I have watched since  Temptation Island.  UPDATE:  Ross Douthat makes an excellent point:  there's a sense in which the apologists for her performance are getting something right: In the process of performing very, very badly on national television, Palin is holding up a mirror to the rest of the political world, and revealing how the mix of talking points, bluster, obfuscation and BS that nearly all national politicians traffic in as a matter of course sounds when it's filtered through someone who isn't practiced in it, and isn't ready for the spotlight. Her performances reflect badly on her readiness for the vice presidency, no question - but they reflect badly on our whole compromised, spin-happy political class as well. ANOTHER UPDATE:  Jonathan Adler explains why Biden's answers to Couric were legally problematic as well

Here’s Katie Couric with both VP candidates about their thoughts on the Supreme Court: 

This is a hell of a choice.  On the one hand there’s an unstoppable gasbag who makes every question all about him.  And on the other hand there’s an idiot with no understanding of constitutional law beyond the 3X5 index card placed in front of her.  Neither of them have met a sentence that they can’t extend for another two minutes with their run-on syntax.  The debate tomorrow night might be the most painful two hours of television I have watched since  Temptation Island.  UPDATE:  Ross Douthat makes an excellent point

there’s a sense in which the apologists for her performance are getting something right: In the process of performing very, very badly on national television, Palin is holding up a mirror to the rest of the political world, and revealing how the mix of talking points, bluster, obfuscation and BS that nearly all national politicians traffic in as a matter of course sounds when it’s filtered through someone who isn’t practiced in it, and isn’t ready for the spotlight. Her performances reflect badly on her readiness for the vice presidency, no question – but they reflect badly on our whole compromised, spin-happy political class as well.

ANOTHER UPDATE:  Jonathan Adler explains why Biden’s answers to Couric were legally problematic as well

Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast. Twitter: @dandrezner

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