The slightly narrowed field of Republican presidential hopefuls gathered on the campus of Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa for yet another debate Saturday night – this one hosted by ABC News, Yahoo News, and the Des Moines Register with George Stephanopoulos and Diane Sawyer serving as the moderators.
While I’m certain many of you chose to spend your Saturday night watching the umpteenth GOP debate, many more of you found something better to do with your time. It’s the latter bunch there that I’m both jealous of and writing this for; because those that watched have no doubt already drawn their own conclusions.
As to the debate itself – the format, the moderators, the questions…
I followed along on Twitter most of the way, and the general reaction shared by most was that Sawyer was drunk, Stephanopoulos must have been sitting on pillows, and the questions were more than a little suspect. My personal take was that it was the latest in a seemingly endless series of debates and originality checked out back on number three and we have all been better for it. Sawyer rambled more than she asked questions and Georgie seemed to take a back seat deferring to the “Internet Participation Questions” for the questions he, no doubt, wanted to ask himself. The one that “blew my mind” was when he said 70% of the Yahoo/ABC comment stream was calling for more clarity from Gingrich and Romney on the “mandates” issue. How they came up with that number was either by using a mathematical equation I will never understand or just total BS from the word go. If that’s what 70% of viewers were hanging on, I sure overlooked the “pivotal” points of this debate.
There was one brief non-debate highlight on the night -an appearance from Former Tennessee Senator and 2008 Presidential Candidate Fred Thompson – plugging reverse mortgages. Oh how the mighty have fallen. Can’t wait to see which one of these candidates will be making an appearance for cash four years from now.
I suppose if I had to pick a debate-related highlight, it would have to be the absence of both Herman Cain and Jon Huntsman. With two less people on the stage to soak up the time, the questions were distributed more evenly and more candidates were able to speak to each of the questions. That said, I’m sure at least one of these candidates has already released a statement complaining about his/her time.
But enough of that. On to rating the performances….
So here’s how we’ll score this one. (10) is the best rating – and by ten I mean a hypothetical best-case dream scenario score that I’m fairly certain no candidate in this field is capable of scoring. (1) is obviously the lowest – we’ll just call that the Huntsman line as a tribute to the performance I’m sure he would have given if he had been in attendance.
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MICHELE BACHMANN:
Pundits post-debate were quick to assert that she’d scored “big points” with the Iowa faithful. While I do believe this was her best performance in a while, I still fail to see how her performance was worthy of such high praise.
Santorum nailed her, again, on her lack of successes as a champion of the Right. She responded by saying she “didn’t just sit on her hands – she was a fighter in a Pelosi-led House.” Fair point; but that sure sounded like an excuse-laden response, no?
She rambled on with a story about a visit to Israel when she was asked to play substitute moderator for a moment between Newt and Mitt. I’ll defer to her supporters for an explanation of the point she was trying to make.
I did think she scored some points when she shared a story from her childhood in response to the “describe a time when you struggled economically” question. She said her parents got divorced, her mom became a single mom, and she was forced to get a job at 13. (I do wonder, though, if that strengthens Newt’s “kids need jobs” argument?) She went on to say she’s still a “coupon clipper” and shops at “consignment stores.” Ready the shopping police to investigate every outfit she wears from this day forward.
Anyone want to place a “gentlemen’s bet” on the first Lefty rag to break down the cost of her outfit?
But then any points she may have scored, she quickly squandered by pandering to the former Herman Cain supporters. On two occasions, she threw a shout-out to the Cain Train. Did someone forget to tell her that his campaign just went down in flames? Either she’s brilliant by a variable unbeknownst to me or she’s really just not been paying attention.
“Win Win Win”??? Probably not. I give it a 5. It’s a good five because from whence she came – that being the bottom and Iowa, I suppose.
RICK SANTORUM:
It may surprise some folks, but I do believe Santorum was among the “winners” of this debate. Understanding that winning is more than a subjective term, I say he’s among the winners because the dude is making a very good case for why he deserves a second look.
As much as it may have pained me, I said half a dozen debates or so ago that I thought Santorum to be the most genuine and across-the-board conservative on the stage. I wasn’t so wise as to have predicted a Cain collapse or a Gingrich surge, but I was then – and am now – relatively confident that conservatives will be giving Santorum a look. For most, it’s probably a “first” and not a second, but a look is a look is a look.
I thought he wisely kissed up to Newt Gingrich while simultaneously calling him a sellout. At least twice he mentioned listening to Gingrich tapes as an impressionable up-and-coming political figure… and then added that the guy on the tape was no longer the Former Speaker standing across the stage.
I thought he landed what may have been the best hit-Gingrich line of the night when he reacted to Gingrich’s claim that “conservatives supported the individual mandate” as an alternative to HillaryCare by saying, “I was one of those conservatives…and I opposed the individual mandate.”
Like I said above, I think he effectively marginalized Bachmann by applauding her for her passionate defense of conservative principles; but then pointing out that she has no record of achieving anything for all her work. It gave him an opportunity to once again point out his own record and the fact that he comes from a Blue State and has demonstrated the ability to “win over” even those who most believe will “hate” his candidacy in the general election.
Like Bachmann, he too was asked to weigh in on the Gingrich-Romney Israel-Palestinian debate about Gingrich’s calling the Palestinians an “inventive people.” While his response, at first, appeared wishy-washy; he quickly fleshed out his full position after a brief interruption from the moderator.
He said “You speak the truth – with prudence – this isn’t an academic exercise.” Responding to Newt’s comparison to Reagan and the “Mr. Gorbachev, Tear Down this Wall” line, he pointed out that in dealings with the Soviet Union we “didn’t have an ally. We had people contained in gulags.” (paraphrasing) He said, in Israel, we have an ally capable of making decisions and shaping policy for itself. It’s our job, our obligation to support that ally by “speaking the truth” but being mindful that our words have consequences in that region. Fine point – and one I hope Mr. Obama was paying attention to.
Nailing down a score for Santorum is probably the hardest one to calculate here. Objectively speaking, I think he probably deserves a 8or an 8.5. Realistically speaking – given the fact that he’s the least known candidate on the stage – I think a 7 is probably more reflective. You can only score points when the people doing the scoring are paying attention. I’d score him higher, but I think it’s a little late in this race for a surge.
NEWT GINGRICH:
Considering that the biggest question heading into the evening was “is there anyone willing to go toe-to-toe with Newt Gingrich” and the answer was NO – save for the moderators and the people that wrote the questions – I have to say Newt emerged with front-runner status still very much intact. Bachmann continued along the line of the “Father and Grandfather of ObamaCare” rhetoric by calling the pair “Newt-Romney.” Clever? Who cares? Lame.
The subject/question of the night that will ultimately determine how people feel Gingrich performed – and whether he will emerge as the Party’s nominee – will likely be the matter of his past transgressions and infidelity. Once again, he owned his past, admitted wrongdoing, and asked the electorate to look at the “68-year-old grandfather of today” and not the guy once ran out of Washington.
That’s a tough sell by any measure. How does one look at the “New Newt” and not the old on the personal front, but still call upon “successes and accomplishments” of Old Newt while ignoring the political flip-flop artist New Newt has become?
On the illegal immigration issue, I’m not sure Gingrich clarified much, but I do believe he effectively made a case for how and why he’s been misrepresented in the media. Whether that flies with conservative voters or not… who knows?
I think this was his general position. Local knowledge is the starting point. The criteria for qualifying an illegal for some kind of special treatment in lieu of deportation would be something like this… 25 years, good local citizen, “may well belong to your church”, be a good citizen, have an American family sponsor. Then they’d get “residency” and be forced to pay a penalty. Oh and make deportation “dramatically easier” and make English the official language.
When asked to defend his Palestinians are “inventive people” comments, he was defiantly steadfast in sticking to his original assertion. He said he wasn’t speaking for the Israeli’s, but was simply speaking as an “historian.” He called upon Reagan and his “tear down this wall” proclamation of the Cold War and said “I’m a Reaganite – I speak the truth.”
And there was also this gem aimed at Romney’s recent attempts to attack Gingrich for being a “career politician.”
“The only reason you didn’t become a career politician is because you lost to Teddy Kennedy.”
On the whole, I think Gingrich held the front rather well – that is if his position at the front is more than a house of cards. He took a few minor shots, but his skill as a debater is still second to no one in this field – or in this race as we move toward next November. While I would certainly like to see him match up with BO, anyone voting for Newt based on seeing that heavyweight bout should probably go in another direction. Because there’s no way Obama’s camp is letting him debate more than once if Gingrich is the nominee.
I give Newt a 7. Given that I’ve been forced to watch Romney hold the top spot for months, it was nice to see someone perform the act without hiding in the corner hoping not to take a punch.
MITT ROMNEY:
Another solid debate for the Former Massachusetts Governor. Nothing gained; nothing lost. That is unless the $10,000 bet with Rick Perry rubs the rest of the country the same way it rubbed me. While school girl bickering with Rick Perry about a passage removed from Romney’s book about the national implementation of RomneyCare, Mitt casually offered to bet Perry $10,000 that he was misquoting the passage.
Let’s just be clear about one thing. I don’t care who is actually “right” or correct here. If I hear about RomneyCare anymore from these candidates I may actually vomit. If his supporting something similar to ObamaCare is a deal-breaker, consider it broken. What I do care about is a guy casually throwing around a $10k wager. Is that sort of thing even legal? Beyond that, who’s got that kind of loot just laying around tucked under sofa cushions that he casually bets $10k? I wouldn’t bet someone five bucks that I could accurately quote what I wrote about Bachmann at the top of this page. Are you kidding me Mitt? $10k. You just a third of the average Iowan’s salary as if it was a wager for the last friggin Oreo.
As to the rest of it… I guess the ABC crowd felt like poking Gingrich about his record of broken marriages, so they decided to use Romney as the conduit. He recently released an ad in Iowa where he shows off the Romney clan and was asked by Stephanopoulos if that sort of thing is “important”, or something. Romney quickly said the ad was released because an Obama PAC released an ad attacking his “core.” I’m sure it had nothing at all to do with the fact that Gingrich is on wife number three and Romney’s a Mormon still on wife number one… but who’s really counting?
He offered his alternative plan to Gingrich’s “amnesty” proposal by doubling-down on his previous statements that illegals should be granted a “transition period” and then sent home to “get in the back of the line” seeking citizenship. I’m sure that would have scored him points… if it wasn’t for the fact that the crowd “toughest” on immigration wasn’t also the same crowd that wrote him off four years ago.
He got into a bit of a childish back-and-forth with Newt over who knew BB Netanyahu longer – I’m pretty sure Romney was one syllable away from uttering nanny nanny booboo, but I can’t be certain. Either way, the takeaway was that Romney’s a supporter of Israel and he thinks Newt needs to watch his tongue on the campaign trail when “speaking the truth” about foreign policy. In a nutshell, it was more of Mitt attempting to look like the most presidential candidate on the stage.
From where I sit, looking presidential has never really been his problem.
I score Romney a (6). Nothing lost, nothing gained. And until I see that Newt can turn poll numbers into actual supporters, he’s still the front-runner by my calculation. I tend to overestimate “outrage”, so I can’t really gauge the reaction to the $10,000 bet. But if the rest of the Republican electorate is as much of a hot-head as I, that six may wind up looking more like a (0) – as in the straw that finally broke the back of Mr. Slow and Steady.
RICK PERRY:
Don’t Call it a Comeback…
Okay, probably not; but it was one hell of a performance from a guy that’s taken presidential debating to an all-time low. After a somewhat slow start, Governor Perry kicked it into high gear and almost looked like the guy most were begging to enter this race a few short months ago. He even dropped a list of three – and remembered all three.
Watching this debate performance, I’ve come up with what I like to refer to as the Rick Perry – Tim Tebow theory of debating; suck for three quarters (of the debates) and then come raging back in the fourth quarter for the “W.”
Alright, maybe not for the win, but at least to make this thing competitive. I contend that if the Rick Perry we saw tonight would have been the guy we’ve been watching for the last few months, that guy would be our nominee. He was funny at times, he appeared less nervous, he was still awake at the end, and he even dropped in a word of the day – Lexicon.
I thought he had a great line on the Newt Gingrich / fidelity question when he said a “Vow to God was even stronger than a handshake in Texas.” Folks were probably lapping that stuff up. And then he got to answer the “tell me about a time when you weren’t so rich” question.
Just a point of reference first…. I’m kind of a jerk. Specifically, the kind of jerk that wrote Perry off some where a debate or two ago. That said, his answer to that question made me listen a little differently to Gov Perry the rest of the debate – and maybe going forward.
He said his mom sewed his clothes until he went off to college. Luxury wasn’t even in the Rick Perry “lexicon.” He said his Social Security reporting for 1978 said $0. But then he closed by saying that he never felt like he didn’t have anything he really ever needed. That my friends will sink home with American voters.
His next best line of the evening came out of the Newt-Palestinian “inventive people” business. Much to my surprise, he pulled a Newt and blamed the media…. and sold it. He said it was an issue the media was blowing out of proportion while ignoring the fact that the current president dropped the ball on Iran, Egypt, and Libya. That’s also where he dropped in his list of three – as in the three choices President Obama had when the RQ-170 drone was lost in Iran – 1) Retrieve it; 2) Destroy it; or 3) do nothing.
Rick Perry – “This president is the problem - not something Newt Gingrich said.” Certainly among the lines of the night.
Governor Perry gets a 7. Considering that’s double what I expected him to score, let’s call this a big night for the Texas Governor. Heck let’s even call him a “winner.”
RON PAUL:
Did you know Congressman Paul got Rick Perry “intrigued about the Federal Reserve? Did you know his supporters are passionate and the only folk willing to sit outside a debate holding signs in the Iowa cold? Yes, no, maybe? Okay, well that’s what I learned about Ron Paul tonight. Everything else can be summed up with one simple question. Are you a Ron Paul supporter?
If you are, you thought this was a brilliant performance – a 10. If you’re not, you thought this was a 2. Conservatism and Libertarianism are on a collision course; and they’re going to meet in just a few weeks right back there in the small towns of Iowa. The consequence of the collision will be the future of the Republican Party – and perhaps, maybe even more.
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Let me first say this about Ron Paul. It may not have been his greatest debate performance, but then again, he is not the greatest debater. The format does not suit him and the way he answers questions. Having said that, I still agree with the positions he has taken and what he said during the debate. I also honestly believe he is in a good position to win the Iowa caucus.
As for the other candidates, Rick Santorum would be my next choice. I really like the guy and he is very consistent. I have often wondered why he isn’t doing better than he is.
Don’t get me started on Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney. They both did well in the debate, but that isn’t enough to garner me even considering supporting them.
Thanks for popping in LD. I actually thought of you when I was watching the debate as I believe you have made some of the most compelling arguments on behalf of Paul that I have read. I agree with you that debates do not suit him. I think folks like you and I that follow this stuff rather religiously can see that. I simply wonder what the average voter sees and hears when they watch.
As I’ve said before, I support much of what Paul has to offer: I simply believe the purpose of his campaign is not to win the nomination but to move the dialogue in a different direction. For that, I “support” him and respect his efforts. When I say I don’t think winning is his objective, I’m in no way saying I don’t think he can in fact win. Frankly, I think he will finish no worse than third in Iowa and if Santorum, Perry, or Bachmann manage to get a bump, I think second would be a disappointment for his campaign. He will not be winning over Romney supporters, but the support behind Newt can be swayed. If it fractures enough, Paul could have a window – because as you know- his supporters are locked in.
I too have wondered why Santorum hasn’t found more of a footing. I’m inclined to believe the Right of the Party has moved on – at least for now – from social issues; or has at least moved them down the list of things they consider pressing. I think he missed his window; or said window may be somewhere down the road.
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