Winners and Losers for the week

Winner: Joe Biden

Lost in the shuffle of the Sarah Palin hysteria was Joe Biden's performance Thursday night. While people were expecting Palin to fumble like she did in her Katie Couric interviews and were disappointed that she didn't, Joe Biden talked specifically about the issues. Senator Biden did not dance around the issues. When asked about rights/benefits for gays, Biden addressed the issue and didn't spend his entire time talking about gay marriage. When asked issues like "which is worse...Pakistan or Iran?", Biden talked about those two countries. He didn't drift and talk about other countries like Palin did.

Biden has gotten little notice for the moment where he choked up when talking about losing his wife and child...giving notice to single parent families. Single parent families are very common in today's society. Following that, Governor Palin said she has an "average American family." Really? I don't know of many large families where the husband works on an oil rig. The wife is a former beauty queen, sportscaster, and governor. A son is off to Iraq. A 17 year old daughter is pregnant. It doesn't sound like an "average" family to me. When has Palin ever said she has identified with those who have lost jobs, lost a house or had someone denied health care coverage?

Oh, by the way, Conservatives who claim Palin won the debate are basing their reasoning on Palin not fumbling and her "folksy" style of talking. While she said, "you betcha," "There ya go again," and used the phrases "maverick" and "reformer" several times, her answers lacked content. Period. Many of the major cable network news channels are replaying the v-p debate tonight and Biden hit it on the head when discussing the "maverick" label, when has Palin and/or McCain said how different they are from President George Bush?

More Winners of the Week
Check this story out about the Hiram College football team. This is from the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

Tipoff: Hiram team shows signs of kindness; Homer tussles with voting process
by Michael K. McIntyre/Plain Dealer
Friday October 03, 2008, 7:53 PM
The Hiram College Terriers football team had lost its last 26 games heading into its season opener against Gallaudet University last month. That's almost three full years of losses.

So during practice, Coach Bob Wolfe took time out from blocking and tackling drills to teach his players some new moves. Specifically, how to say "Nice game" and "Good job" using American Sign Language.

Gallaudet is a school for the deaf and hearing-impaired.

Gallaudet coach Ed Hottle, who is not hearing-impaired and learned sign language after he was hired in 2005, was blown away by the sight of Hiram's players using sign language during the post-game handshake, writing a letter of praise that Hiram President Tom Chema distributed campuswide.

"For the last four seasons I have been the head coach at Gallaudet, we have played some 40-plus games and Hiram College was the first school that has made any effort to communicate with our players following the game," wrote Hottle. "Coach Wolfe and his staff are to be applauded for taking time out of the precious few hours we have to coach the game and teaching these young men some true life skills. . . . For me, personally, it was wonderful to see."

Fittingly, Hiram won that day, 20-14, in overtime. And they took their next game against Kenyon.

The winning streak ended last week with a loss to Carnegie Mellon, but after the Gallaudet game, the Terriers will always be winners.





Loser of the week: O-J Simpson

It's about time. Talk about unlucky. This news is from Las Vegas, Nevada.

From the Associated Press: "O-J Simpson was convicted of an armed robbery that happened on Sept. 13 and was found guilty on the 13th anniversary of his Los Angeles murder acquittal. The Las Vegas jury deliberated for 13 hours after a 13-day trial."

Hopefully, this is "good-bye" for the Juice.