Why they don't want Palin to debate Biden

She doesn't have the verbal skills, the depth of knowledge, the ability to think on her feet, does she? It's just now dawning on the McCain campaign?:

Her lack of depth was painfully on display last week when she was asked at a Michigan town meeting, "I'd like to know that all that oil we're going to drill here is going to stay here domestically and it's not going to be exported by the oil companies." You can listen to her answer here:

Oil of coal, of course, is a fungible commodity and they don't flag, ya know, the molecules where, where it's going to, where it's not, but and in the, in the sense of the Congress today they know our very, very hungry domestic markets that need that oil first. So I believe that what Congress is going to do also is not to allow the export bans to such a degree that it's Americans who get stuck holding the bag without the energy source that is produced here, pumped here; it's gotta flow into our domestic markets first.

Not quite Miss Teen South Carolina territory, but borderline gibberish, self-contradictory, and kind of pointless.

Let's forget that she starts by saying "of coal" instead of "of course." Could happen to anyone who is nervous. She is correct that oil is a fungible (i.e. completely interchangeable) commodity -- the world market doesn't care or have any way of knowing where the original oil comes from. But why add the "flag the molecules" line? Obviously nobody would flag molecules. If she thought "fungible" might not be understood by her audience, how could "flag the molecules" add either simplicity or clarity?

I betcha they won't be able to have the vice presidential debate. It will just be too hard for them to organize it around this awful ... ah... (a) economic disaster (b)war in Iraq (c)hurricane season (d)airplane part missing (e) dog that ate the debate schedule....

(Via JJ of Unrepentant Old Hippie)