Honestly, it wasn’t even close. It was a solid debate overall for these two, and the divide between the haves and have nots tonight couldn’t be bigger.
Tim Pawlenty came out of the gate very strong, absolutely hammering Obama on the Boeing debacle (”preposterous” decision and “outrageous” line that the admin has crossed) and then very eloquently thrashing Obamacare being rammed down our throats (”The answer to our healthcare problem is not to drag it into D.C. and create a top-down, federal run system.”)
Pawlenty was also subject to some of the harder grilling by FNC personalities, including Juan Williams coming after him on intelligent design and Chris Wallace bringing up Pawlenty’s toe-dip into cap and trade (which he has repeatedly called a mistake) and questioned his budget credentials (which Pawlenty quickly and succinctly defended).
In a word: presidential. In the interest of fairness, I should point out I have been a T-Paw supporter for a LONG time, so I was waiting for him to come out with some fire in his belly and show some spirit. He did tonight.
Herman Cain, the businessman with no political experience, had some of the best one liners of the night, and was definitely a lightning rod. He certainly has the fire, and he has the tea party following, but honestly I am still not a believer that he can win the general election. He’s going to go a long way toward keeping everyone else on stage honest, though. One of his better lines was his response to if Obama had a shoe-in for re-election due to Osama killing:
Rick Santorum was his usual bombastic self, hammering away with some great-sounding quotes on foreign policy, attacking Obama over spending and really harping away at a lot of social issues that repeatedly got asked to him. Someone must have given him the memo that he needed to answer everything through gritted teeth, though. Very angry dude tonight.
Gary Johnson, well, I’ll let someone more attractive than me describe his debate participation:
You have a guy coming out to a Republican debate who advocates legal abortion “until a fetus is viable” (what does that even mean?), pushes for legalized pot and generally takes a myriad of other positions usually reserved for hemp-wearing hippies and 87 year old former KKK members residing in the Democratic Party. He honestly would have been the comic relief of the night if not for…
Ron Paul. All over the map as usual, the libertarian doctor continued to build upon his legend of absurd comments & insanely rude supporters. From rants on “nation building” within 10 seconds of his first opening statement, to tirades on gold & militarism and a fantastically awkward exchange with Chris Wallace where he advocated for “heroin” and “prostitutes,” Ron Paul was at his absolute best tonight.
And by “best” I of course mean completely and utterly out of his mind, but you know, it’s good TV.
Can’t wait for the next debate. Maybe Romney will show up so the GOP candidates can actually mock him in person.
