Biden, Palin trade jabs in fight for middle class

"The notion that somehow, because I'm a man, I don't know what it's like to raise two kids alone, I don't know what it's like to have a child you're not sure is going to -- is going to make it -- I understand," Biden said. "I understand, as well as -- with all due respect, the governor or anybody else -- what it's like for those people sitting around that kitchen table. And guess what? They're looking for help. They're looking for help. They're not looking for more of the same."

Palin did not respond to Biden's emotional display, instead offering a variation of a line she used throughout the night. "People aren't looking for more of the same," she said. "They are looking for change. And John McCain has been the consummate maverick in the Senate over all these years."

From the first question, Biden steered most of his remarks toward McCain; Palin struck at Obama but also deployed criticism of some of Biden's more notable recent remarks.

She quoted Biden as saying that paying higher taxes was patriotic -- actually he said that it was a sign of patriotism for rich Americans to pay more than they do now.

"In the middle class of America, which is where Todd and I have been, you know, all of our lives -- that's not patriotic," she said, referring to her husband. "Patriotic is saying, 'Government, you know, you're not always a solution; in fact too often you're the problem.' "

After she segued from that to praise for McCain's healthcare plan, it was Biden's turn.

"Gwen," he told the moderator with some exasperation, "I don't know where to start."

"To say that not giving ExxonMobil another $4-billion tax cut this year, as John calls for, and giving it to middle-class people to be able to pay to get their kids to college -- we don't call that redistribution; we call that fairness."

In her zest to portray Biden as typical of the Washington establishment so despised by voters, Palin at one point made an argument that echoed Obama's thrust against McCain.

"I do respect your years in the U.S. Senate, but I think Americans are craving something new and different, and that new energy and that new commitment that's going to come with reform," Palin told Biden in response to a question about how each would end partisanship.

Over and over, Palin skewered Biden for what she characterized as his ticket's backward look at the Bush administration's failures -- a move the Democrats have made in their effort to link McCain with the unpopular president.