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In last night’s Fox News GOP Republican presidential debate, the junior varsity came out to play…and made us all hope the varsity team is much better. My concluding observations are below. But, first, some thoughts on the debate itself.
Ron Paul drew the most applause, and Herman Cain overwhelmingly won the hearts of the Frank Luntz Fox post-debate show.
Neither of them will be President in 2012…or ever.
Paul said everything he has said before. The crowd applauded. Most viewers yawned. Cain was likeable and decisive, but short on details on everything except his fair tax defense – which was too detailed. On national security, he said something to the effect that he couldn’t articulate a strategy until he was President and had access to classified (or “confidential,” as he said) information. “Vote for me so I can have access to information so I can make a decision about Afghanistan” isn’t a winner, no matter how well delivered.
Tim Pawlenty – who stands a better chance of winning the nomination than anyone else on stage last night - began with a boilerplate 30 second “Thank you Fox News for hosting us…” and ended with a boilerplate “Visit TimPawlenty.com” infomercial. I expected him to dominate. He did not. He nicely defended his time as Minnesota governor but was too general at explaining what he would do for the nation as President. What does the Tim Pawlenty reform agenda look like? It’s still hard to articulate.
The others were no better. Rick Santorum speaks with conviction. And that was part of his problem. He is passionate about social issues, defense, and economics, but he didn’t lay out what a reform agenda would look like. He was principled but looked as though he had spent more time rehearsing his delivery than his content.
Gary Johnson, a man whose arms above the elbow seem permanently wired to his torso, was nervously committed to his talking points on drug legalization and abortion. He made some sense on the corporate income tax, but otherwise was the guy waving furiously (below the elbows) for attention off to the side. He is 10 feet above ground, and falling fast, with a parachute that hasn’t opened.
The Fox News interrogators were the winners – they had a lackluster field to interrogate, and they handled it seriously and professionally, though I couldn’t help but wonder if they were on the verge of cracking up with laughter from time to time.
That said, the debate was sorely lacking on real substance, and Fox is partially to blame for that. The interviewers and the interviewees seemed to steer clear of the big issues. Sure, all big issues were cited, but they were not the subject of debate. And a debate is what we were supposed to be watching.
- What about the deficit? We left the debate not knowing what each of them would do. Do they support entitlement reform? Defined contributions in Medicare? Cuts to defense? Changes not just to tax rates but to provisions within the code? These are the big issues of this generation, but not of the debate last night. Santorum talked Medicare, Johnson corporate income tax, etc., but there was no debate.
- What about tax reform? Same thing as the previous point.
- What does victory in Iraq and Afghanistan look like? Aside from Ron Paul’s predictable barn burner on the topic (let’s leave out of imminent respect for the sovereignty of the people of those nations), there was no real debate on this issue.
- Remember jobs and growth? What about those? The Senate Republicans just released their comprehensive jobs plan the other day. That would have been a good starting point for a debate on the issue. We got virtually nothing on the topic.
The debate last night wasn’t a serious affair. It was forgettable. And the sooner we forget it, the better.
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