And we begin...liveblogging ABC's This Week. Happening now!

by: AdamGreen

Sun Apr 20, 2008 at 10:01

[10:02am]  Question 1 - John McCain's temperment on front page of today's Washington Post...former Republican Senator Bob Smith says he isn't qualified to be president. Hmmm...

[10:03am] McCain says he "gets angry" and "passionate" when the government has bad policies. A take-off on the ole' "What's your greatest strength and greatest weakness" interview answer.

[10:04am] Question 2 - The economy. Not sure what the question was, just "Talk about the economy" I think.

[10:05am] McCain attack number 1 - on Obama. Obama wants to raise taxes. And then says both Dems want to raise taxes.

[10:06am] Question 3 - How is a Medicare premium increase different from a tax increase? McCain: "It's going to be an increase in their payments, sure." "We have a trillion dollar unfunded liability associated with Medicare." And Iraq?

[10:07am] Question 4 - With your policies, you won't be able to balance the budget right? McCain: Of course I can. You can "scrub every agency of government." "Hundreds of billions can be saved."

[10:08am] George: Every estimate I've seen says only 18-20 billion. And will you cut military housing? McCain: "Of course not."

[10:09am] Question 5 - You're going to have to make deep cuts across the board to reach your projections. Are you really going to do that? McCain: Bashes wasteful spending. No mention of the math not adding up.  

[10:10am] Question 6 -- If Congress does not give you the kind of spending cuts you want, will you hold off on signing tax cuts? McCain: No!  Also first instance of him calling George "My friend."

[10:11am] Question 7 - good tax questioning. You used to say Bush tax cuts offended your conscience. What's up? McCain: "It's not taxes, it's spending that's the problem."

McCain lie unchallenged. McCain says he opposed Bush's tax cuts because there weren't spending cuts. George moves on to next question instead of pressing the offending the conscience part.

[10:12am] Question 8 - health care. McCain: "Obama and Clinton's plans are big government solution." aka My plan: do nothing.

[10:14am] Question 9 - Hmm.... George says Elizabeth Edwards says McCain has govt healthcare, why shouldn't all Americans get that quality health care. McCain calls it a "cheap question." Then says there was once a time when he didn't have great govt health care, but it wasn't our govt. Unexpected POW reference...hmmm...

[10:16am] Question 10 - Obama and Ayers. McCain attack number 2 -- says Obama was wrong to defend an unrepentant Ayers, and to compare him to Coburn. WILL GEORGE ASK HIM ABOUT HAGEE, ETC?

[10:17am] Question 11 - Obama disagreed with him. McCain: "He disagrees, but will he condemn?"

[10:17am] Question 12 - George asks about Hagee! Do you condemn? McCain: "Sure" Wow! This could be the big news. Though later he says he's proud of the endorsement, I think...will have to see the video.

[10:19am] Question 13 - Iran.

[10:21am] Question 14, 15, 16 - Iraq. No real hard-hitting questions. Pretty much, "Please talk about Iraq."  

[10:24am] "If we can keep these casualties down" Americans are ok staying in Iraq. Interesting -- not "no casualties" -- just keep them down...for 100 years?

[10:25am] Question 17 - Age

COMMERCIAL BREAK: Ok, there's breathing room for my critique now. I usually wouldn't have done question-by-question like that, but felt it was important for comparison to Wednesday's debate. Good transcript here.  Seems like the Hagee condemnation could be big news. Seems like progressives could actually make a big deal out of his "keep casualties down" in Iraq standard for staying in Iraq...he first said "Americans care about casualties, not our presence" which is his justification for 100 years. But keeping casualties down times 100 years is a lot of casualties.  Media should start asking him: How many casualties per year are you willing to accept for 100 years, or are you promising zero casualties?

Also, a big story could be the seriousness of his questions to McCain, and even deference when asking about Hagee, compared to the "gotcha" tone and substance of Wednesday's debate.

[10:32am] Observation. Bad roundtable. George Will, Cokie Roberts, Sam Donaldson. Prepare for a combination of right-wing talking points and stale conventional wisdom from circa 1984.  Where's Donna? Katrina? EJ? Robert Reich? David Sirota?

[10:36am] Cokie: "I know you and Charlie are taking some heat, but the facts are these are types of questions that will come up in the general election." Ugh. Flag pins. Flag pins. Flag pins. Where is her flag pin?

[10:37am] George Will does what Dems should do...given a conversation about distractions he brings back the topic he started with: taxes. "Let's get back to capital gains taxes." Cokie and Sam have no idea what's happening...where is our progressive voice?

[10:38am] MoveOn comes up. George Will says her distancing herself from MoveOn is more validation for his long-running (and incorrect) premise that "America is a center-right country." Where is our progressive voice? Where is Sirota or Rachel Maddow? This is ridiculous.

[10:41am] Sam Donaldson tries to take on McCain's straight-talk image. Good for him. Unfortunately he does it with talk about "aggregate profits" for corporations...real emotionally compelling stuff.

[10:42am] Cokie on a president who promises change: "How? And why?" "The notion that some president is going to come and change everything is absurd." WHY IS SHE ON TV?

[10:45am] Blah. Blah. Blah. Discussion of McCain's age...George Will says we have an old country and age is fine...Sam Donaldson says people like irrational tempers. Man, I love "experts."

[10:46am]Cokie reveals the president invited her to ride in his limo with Jenna and Laura...and how he marveled at the Pope's morals, etc...pretty much, "Here's the story Bush wanted me to tell, so I'm telling it."

NOT A SINGLE PROGRESSIVE POINT OF VIEW WAS EXPRESSED IN THIS ROUNDTABLE. We heard over and over again that we live in a center-right country, and got a bunch of Republican talking points on taxes, with no rebuttal.

Interesting sidenote. A commercial, which I usually tune out, caught my attention. "Yes, we are an oil company...not corporate titans, but people who try to find newer ways to power the world." ABC Sunday morning chat with no progressive voices...brought to you by Big Oil.

Ok, so...the show's over. I'm pumped up and pretty disgusted...mostly by the fact that there was little news coming out of the McCain interview (unless we make a big deal out of the McCain "keep casualties down" line) and the roundtable was so rigged.  Usually, my inclination when pumped up like this is to blog about it...but...kinda already did that so....what now?

Well, for starters, if you haven't already signed the MoveOn petition to ABC, please do. It's over a quarter-million and growing by the minute. Whatever the final number is will be reflected in an ad this week.

Aside from that, anyone want to see the McCain "lower casualties" Iraq clip?