Today on Face the Nation, Norah O’Donnell interviewed vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan. At the end of the interview, rather than asking him one last question about any of the pressing problems facing our country (and it’s not like there aren’t enough to choose from) she chose the completely-irrelevant-to-anything-going-on-in-this-world marathon time. And to top it all off, she believed a sound comparison was Al Gore saying he invented the internet. How nice.
The man misspoke, he acknowledged the error and has a perfectly understandable reason for making it. Of course, as Ryan acknowledges in the interview, it’s just another distraction.
It was an honest mistake. I was 20 years old. I hurt my back when I was about 23 or 24 and I had to quit running. I herniated a disk in my back. So I’ve just lost perspective on what normal times are. I ran an ordinary race and I thought the answer I gave was an ordinary time. Obviously, it wasn't. It was 22 years ago.
You know, I think what's happening here is the president doesn't have a positive story to say, so they're trying to use this kind of rhetoric. My brother's been busting my chops ever since I said that because he is an actual marathon runner and he's been saying, "Are you crazy? That's crazy fast." Look, it was just an honest mistake.
