MY FANTASY VP DEBATE

A lot of people had zingers on the tips of their tongues when Barack Obama and John McCain debated each other. While we weren't on the stage in front of the world, it seemed the openings they made for each other to say something that would put them on the mat could easily have been thought of. After all, they ARE running for President. Now we are facing what is being billed as the most entertaining debate in years. A policy wonk vs. a Hockey Mom. The prevailing "conventional" wisdom is that Joe Biden will wipe the floor with her. Well, he might. On the other hand, many feel that if Sarah Palin has the guts to tell the Karl Rove like foreign policy trainers like underdog David told King Saul - this armor doesn't suit me. I killed the lion and the bear (and perhaps a moose), and goes out with her slingshot, she will have five smooth stones and only one of them could change the GOP's seemingly moribund chances to win. The Democrats are hammering at Joe's head so he doesn't add to his seemingly endless string of embarrassing gaffes. Thursday night will tell, but a lot of people would like a spirited debate that would truly contrast their choices, so whether they are for Obama or McCain, they will feel reassured in their position.

And now ladies and gentlemen, stay tuned for our Vice Presidential debate between Democrat Joe Biden and Republican Sarah Palin. Moderating this debate will be Sarah's husband, snow machine champion Todd Palin! Oh, just kidding! That wouldn't be fair, would it? (chuckles) Let me introduce to you the real moderator, and in the interests of full disclosure (hey, we never USUALLY do that) author of the book praising Barack Obama to the sky called "The Breakthrough", Gwen Ifill. Now Gwen, don't repeat that dismissive look you gave in Minnesota when Sarah gave her speech putting a few chinks in the armor of your anointed one. Just be fair and balanced and put the personal stake you have in the success of Obama in selling your books aside for this hour, wouldn't you? (Hee, Hee) Before we begin, "Obama's Kids", 21 innocent children from Venice, California, will talk about the change our world needs so much. (Kids Sing). Wonderful, wonderful. OK, it's time for the big event. And h--e--r--e --- s-h-e --- is, from PBS, the network you taxpayers pay for that tells you how great the rest of the world is, G-W-E-N --- I-F-I-L-L!

GWEN
Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Thanks for that rousing introduction. You know, like most of the media I am inspired by Barack Obama and his epic achievement. I will be available after the debate to sign my book "The Breakththrogh". But we are not here tonight to sing Obama's praises. We are here to fairly compare Joe Biden, with 36 years of stellar experience in the highest legislative body in the United States, ye old United Senate, with Sarah Palin, a Beauty Queen, City Council Person, pawn of the Oil and Gas Commission, and because everyone else was hopelessly corrupt, imagine this - it can only happen in America - Governor of Alaska. This state so far removed from the Continental United States (both physically AND culturally, has fewer than 700,000 residents, fewer even than Tuscon (I did NOT say Phoenix), Arizona. Well some states are less populated than many middle-tier U.S. Cities, so I guess that explains it. Well, once in a while truth IS stranger than fiction, but rest assured I will take nothing off my fast balls, and I will be just like YOUR network, PBS. We are more fair and balanced than Fox News or anyone else (hold your applause). Now, here are the rules: You have two minutes to answer my questions and 2 minutes to rebut your opponent. Remember from the last VP debate I moderated in 2004 that if you are a Democrat like John Edwards (oh, wasn't his hair fabulous?) you will get 15 seconds grace, but if you are a Republican like Dick Cheney who took us to war in Iraq so he could give big contracts to his friends at Haliburton, we round off to the previous second (we have to mirror real life in the media, here, my friends). Everyone got it? My first question:

Senator Biden, we all admire someone who has proven faithful to his constituents for 36 years, many of those long years spent having to commute by train to go home to tuck your children in at night. How do you reflect on such a long an industrious career, Senator, and how do you see that immense knowledge base preparing you for the next logical step, Vice President of the United States?

JOE
Well, first, Gwen, let me thank you for the honor of being here tonight. I appreciate having you here, and since you wrote so many good things about my future boss, I won't need to. I have chair committees, I have been through wars, I have sat through hearings. This experience is what has prepared so many to be President or Vice President of the United States. My opponent here has been taking crash courses on foreign policy all weak. No one could be expected to learn 36 years worth of knowledge in a week, even if she is smarter than I am. I mean, Hillary was a better candidate than I was, but I had more experience.

GWEN
Well, uh, thank you, Senator Biden! Sarah?

SARAH
Thank you Gwen for coming this evening. I know I will get no softballs like the one you just threw, so under this turtleneck sweater is hardened metal to protect me from the lynching that people are looking forward to. Mr. Biden here has been sitting in those dusty chambers for 36 years, but he voted against helping the South Vietnamese after our pullout, resulting in an unspeakable end to many precious lives. He defied the will of eighty nations of the world in voting against the First Gulf War and he even voted against the surge which is working and will work unless the nation elects these folks who seem to think our nation's interests are served by deliberately losing a war. The Senator has a lot of experience - a WHOLE LOT of experience being wrong...

GWEN
Time's up! Now, a question for you Sarah.
Many people have compared you unfavorably with the esteemed Senator here since you simply don't have any foreign policy experience other than gazing at Russia from your snowmobile. How do you expect the country to take you seriously?

SARAH
Good question. While our gaffe-prone Senator here may enjoy putting down a couple of Vodka's in the Kremlin, chatting about the the days of Leonoid Brezhnev and perhaps playing Trivial Pursuit on the names of the Czars, I would take my cue from the 1984 USA Olympic Hockey Team who no one gave a snowball's chance in hell of winning either. I would tell Mr. Putin, or Dmitry Medvedev his likely successor, that goals don't count when no one is on the ice, such as happened in Georgia. I would put on my pads and look into those eyes. I would take the puck from him, checking him into the boards and go in full tilt for the score. We are talking about nukes in Venezuela, not parlor games that we like Neville Chamberlain from across the pond as they say have always lost. Don't you wonder, Gwen, why the polls taken in Russia show the Obama-Biden ticket winning 80%-20%? If those working against us are favoring one side so extensively, how come?

GWEN
You ARE one fiesty mama. Joe?

JOE
Well, Gwen, we all know that cowboy diplomacy doesn't work. I mean, Reagan tried that. Didn't he have the nerve to tell Gorbachev "Tell Down this Wall"? We all know the dismantling of the Berlin wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union had nothing to do with Reagan. It was the long diplomacy between the West Germans and the Soviets that freed the East. We have to deal with Vladimir Putin with kid gloves. They have nukes too, you know. We must be circumspect and be sure to gain the respect of the world community first. We will go to the UN Security Council First.

GWEN
Excuse me, Joe. Russia has veto power on the UN Security Council. Would you care to rephrase that?

JOE
Oh Sarah. I mean - Gwen. I meant the UN General Assembly.

GWEN
Next question, Joe.
The GOP has been courting women since Hillary Clinton conceded a long hard battle for the nomination. What do think women could possibly see in this anti-abortion right-wing nut?

JOE
Well Gwen, it still amazes me that some people still value a blob of protoplasm over the economic welfare of single women who developed an unfortunate condition. As my running mate says, why would he punish his daughters with a baby if they were to get pregnant? Like anyone with sense, I am cosponsoring the Freedom of Choice Act which will once and for all protect Roe v Wade from the challenges by those who care not one whit about women. It will strike down the nefarious state laws that still exist requiring parents to be notified and cause all taxpayers to fund abortions for those without the means.

GWEN
Senator, don't you think that would be better left unsaid? Why not focus on all those abortions due to rape and incest and those who will burden society with physical deformities? This Sarah here even wants THEM to have to be born.

JOE
Uh, right, Gwen. I got on the wrong train there, my friend John's Straight Talk Express. I meant to get on the Chicago Loco, I mean Local. Women should have control over their bodies and no one has a right to protect those innocent little lives within them.

GWEN
Sarah?

SARAH
Per a 2005 LA Times poll, 41% of Americans support a ban on abortion except for those RARE exceptions you mentioned. Another 12% agree with my more restrictive views. Only 4% agree with the Obama-Biden position of anytime, anywhere, for any reason. Look, I have experience Joe will never have if he is in the Senate for 100 years. I have had five kicking babies - not fetuses - in my womb, and from Track down to Trig, they voted 5-0 to be born and enjoy life. You want to kill my Trig because he has one extra chromosome? Not over my dead body. Why on earth, when my opponents are making sure dead people vote, felons vote, and their cronies voting five times each, is Joe disenfranchising all these babies who will one day vote - disproportionately minority babies, I might add? It is genocide, and where are the Jesse Jackson's, Cesar Chavez's, and Al Sharpton's when you really need them? I am a mama bear who cares for my cubs. I fight not only for my kids, but for the Eskimo children, the Black children, the Asian Children, and Hispanic Children. I was a PTA mom, and I will shake-up this abominable educational system held captive by the NEA that justifies failure for some students while lobbying to line their own pockets and to protect the incompetent. I will push for higher teacher salaries for the best and the brightest, and the removal of tenure from incompetent racist teaches who assume their students are going to fail. I'm for a Freedom of Choice Act, all right. But not the Obama-Biden plan that even has included infanticide - thank God Gianna Jesson survived that - stand up Gianna! I want all parents from Harlem to Watts to enjoy the same Freedom of Choice the dreaded rich folks have - to take their hard earned tax money spent for education to send their children to a school that will actually educate them and prepare them for the real world, not one that coddles failure.

GWEN
OK, OK. Time's up - we need to add twenty seconds to Joe's clock.

SARAH
No, Gwen, you spoke for my opponent just like all your liberal buddies in the mainstream media who investigate the mating habits of my dogs while ignoring the fact that Jim Johnson and Frankin Raines, two of the biggest perpetrators in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are now economic advisors to Barack Obama. It seems the right to privacy is rather selectively applied, wouldn’t you say?.Where is my privacy and the same privacy afforded Chelsea Clinton for my daughter Bristol? And, why do these crooks enjoy privacy from the same media when $700 billion of the taxpayers money is at stake? Are the American people ready for a health care debacle and bailout that will follow as surely as an extra point after a touchdown?

GWEN
Senator, can you knock those silly accusations out of the park?

JOE
It was the GOP who deregulated the banking system. I warned John about that over beers one night!

SARAH
And it was your side who fought regulation where it was REALLY needed.

GWEN
Now hold it, I am the moderator! This is out of order.

SARAH
Order, my foot. I will not be railroaded. The You-Tube video showed Barney Frank and Maxine Waters and others upset with having a Regulator while singing the praises of Raines and Fannie and Freddie. That was pulled by Joe's political goons. Gwen, why don't you ask the Senator why he thinks 12 people from Barney's own committee voted against the bailout? Why not ask why he says nothing when Nancy Pelosi plays politics - the thought of her being two heartbeats away from the presidency scares me - you'd better vote not just for John and I but for a GOP Congress or she will still be playing politics with the economic health of our country just like Obama and Biden have played politics weakening our country in a time of war!

GWEN
Well, Senator would you care to educate our friend here who is so very careless with the facts.

JOE
Well, Gwen, Bill Clinton said himself that Democrats were fighting him on this when he was President. Senator Obama and I are not running as Democrats. We are running to bring real change! Change you can believe in!

SARAH
Exactly what DO you believe in, Joe? Numerous Catholic Bishops say you aren't in good standing with your own church and won't give you communion. If you disagree with the Catholic church, why don't you just leave it? There are churches around who – can you believe it – celebrate abortion, homosexuality and surrendering to our enemies. Do you stay merely to get those coveted votes in Scranton? You can’t have it both ways, Joe! Stand up Joe! Oh, Joe can't stand up. He is in election mode. Let's all stand up for Joe!

BEDLAM

And so it was that the rest of the smooth stones in Sarah's hand could not be used. The one about Joe being in the pocket of the credit card companies who charge 30.9% interest to our most vulnerable citizens, the one about Bill Ayres being a lot closer to Obama that he has ever admitted, the one about his boss condoning racism because he heard it at the first sermon he heard Jeremiah Wright preach and still stayed twenty years... About why Muslims are so thrilled that he is doing so well... About why Christians supporting Barack Obama should read the book "The Faith of Barack Obama which clearly states he is no born again Christian and study Oprah's guru Eckghard Tolle whom Obama seems to mirror instead...

No, the reenergized Palin would have to save those points for a rejuvenated campaign and Joe would have to wonder what hit him... Perhaps it will be deja vu from his comment on Hillary and history will repeat itself - Joe will let it slip, "She is the better candidate."