VP Debate Post

The question asked of these vice presidents is will there be anything this campaign promised that they will not be able to keep because of the Wall Street bailout? My group is asked to discuss the implementations of ethos in Sarah Palin's response to the question. Governor Palin begins her response by stating, "The nice thing about running with John McCain is I can assure you is he doesn't tell one thing to one group and then turns around and tells something else to another group..." This immediately establishes some credibility for the McCain campaign. As the audience, we can go back through former speeches and debates to see if this is actually true. Obviously, Governor Palin is a convenient source for this statement but nevertheless can be checked out.

She then turns her attention towards the energy plan, and at the same time turns her body towards Joe Biden, indicating that she is focusing on an event his campaign was involved in. She states that Barack Obama previously voted for this energy bill that allowed oil companies to recieve large tax breaks. Again, we can check voting records to see if, in fact, Obama did vote for this. She then turns the tables on this subject by telling of how she had to fight these oil companies for the goodwill of the people to rise above the greed of the oil companies. This is an example of pathos as well as ethos because she is showing the audience a hardship she had to perservere through. However, she also tries to downgrade her opponent's reputation by showing a contradiction in Obama's voting history versus what she is trying to promote.

Governor Palin talks shortly later about how "The people are going to come first." By saying this, she is telling us, the audience, that she will make the people come first while her campaign is in office. She also says that the tax breaks will not be given to the oil companies when it "adversly effects the people who live in a state, and in this case a country," another example of ethos. She also gives off an authoratative vibe when she says, "You know what I had to do in the state of Alaska? I had to take on those oil companies."

Finally, when asked to confirm that there was nothing that might be taken off the "to-do list" if the McCain-Palin campaign reached the White House, she quickly states that "there hasn't been a whole lot that I've promised..." She previously said shes "How long have I been at this, like 5 weeks?" so we know there is not a whole lot of time to make a lot of promises. She also says this sort of jokingly so that we might shrug this factor off. This last joke gives the audience a sense of confidence from her and that she is backing what her running mate is standing for.