Last Night's GOP Debate

While the Senate GOP blocked President Obama's job bill, the Republican candidates debated in New Hampshire on the subject of the economy. Recovering from these debates is a little like getting over a medical operation--your body forgets the procedure. If you recall the 2008 campaign, the GOP accused President Obama of coddling terrorists by his acquaintance with Bill Ayers, The Obama campaign released a photo of Obama body-surfing on the back of his grandfather at the time. Now Republicans are accusing him of being the cause of the great inequity of wealth in the country, which began when Barack Obama was a teenager. I guess the Obama campaign will have to release that photo of a hip young Obama smoking a cigarette.

So we learned that President Obama is responsible for all our economic woes. We learned that the Dodd-Franks bill to tighten regulations on banks must be repealed because banks aren't lending to small businesses because of crushing regulation. We learned that all of the canidates want to repeal Obamacare. We learned that some of the candidates supported the TARP program but Mitt Romney would have done it differently. We know that Ben Barnacke should be fired and the FED should be audited again. No one mentioned that the FED is making money hand over fist. We learned that Herman Cain loves Alan Greenspan and that Ron Paul liked Paul Volcker. We learned that Newt is worried about another financial collapse because of Europe but Mitt is skeptical. And we heard about Herman Cain's 9-9-9 Plan 85 times during the debate. We also learned that Michelle Bachmann spent her whole life in the private sector--somehow. We learned again how Romney would not have bailed out the auto industry.

What the audience never learned was reality. A Bloomberg poll conducted immediately after the debate showed that Ron Paul was overwhelmingly thought to have the answers for the economy and Herman Cain second and Mitt Romney a distant third.

Media coverage billed this debate as a do-or-die moment for Rick Perry, who was absent for the first 40 minutes and only appeared at the end. Frankly, I didn't think Rick Perry came off as badly as the punditry thought. Herman Cain took his place as a first tier candidate and basically didn't hurt himself, although it's clear that his 9-9-9 Plan would vastly increase taxes on the middle class and result in huge deficits. He is not going to wear well as people actually examine his ideas and how he listens to. Newt is obviously off his meds. This makes for fun television but his speech the previous day about how he would ignore the Supreme Court if he felt like it showed that he is channeling his inner cracker. John Huntsman actually got off a couple good jokes this time, including his snark that Cain's 9-9-9 plan was based on the price of pizza.

There were some strange moments like three former governors, all of whom claim the government can't create jobs, all bragging about the records in job creation. Then we had Frothy Mix Santorum say that poverty in the United States is created by the distruction of the family. And then at the end almost all the candidates with the exception of Romney claim they were all born in poverty or in a log cabin or something humble.

I agree with the pundits that Willard Romney won the debate and that no one laid a glove on him. What personally shocked me was how versatile a liar Romney is. In this debate he lied about small and big things and no one caught him out on it. It was a stunning performance. Democrats, the punditry and other Republicans are making a big mistake that Romney would morph in office into a moderate. Somewhere in the last ten years he has gone over the bend.

So how bad was it for Rick Perry? He looked really laid back and didn't look like he felt like fighting. I happened to think he handled the question about his corruption rather well. Perry had already done his damage to Romney that day through the appearance on every television show of the Baptist minister who said that Mormonism is a cult. Since the minister in question is the head of the Southern Baptist Convention his word has more weight than someone like Pastor Hagee, who backed John McCain and is anti-Catholic. Jon Huntsman has demanded Perry denounce the minister but that shows how oblivious Huntsman is to Christian politics. Also Perry has unleashed a series of well-produced ads aimed at Romney's flip-flopping. So ,in my opinion, Perry can just sit back until the Nevada debate. Let the media pick apart Cain's nutty economic ideas and let Romney pretend he is the nominee.

As for Romney, I believe he is going to become complacent and if someone doesn't take him out in the primaries, Obama will. If you are prepared, you can run trucks through Romney's economic positions. And I'm still not sure that given the current economic situation that the general electorate really believes someone posing as a businessman is really the solution to the country's problems.

Before the debate, there was a poll of Republicans about the economy. Basically, Republicans felt evenly split about improvements in the economy if Obama or a Republican won but a significant plurality believed that the election would not make a difference in the economy. Basically, for Republicans, the economy is no big deal. It may be a weapon to smash Obama in the head with but they have no interest in creating jobs or improving the economy. Very weird perspective.

I thought Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum's call for a trade war against China strange. Last year, Mitt Romney gave a foreign policy speech at the Heritage Foundation where he was even more belligerent against China than last night. Since the Chinese are probably following these remarks, can you imagine if they Googled Rick Santorum to find out who he was?

Now all the candidates have their act down so the debates come off a little more polished. But this adds to the surreal nature of the discussion. Basically, if you repeal or revoke everything that has happened during the Obama administration, you have the platform for the candidates. Everything until Obama was just fine. And despite all the talk about the national debt, all their plans would increase deficit spending for many years ahead. These debates are really like watching old episodes of the Twilight Zone and the candidates are now like a troupe of actors putting the same play on in new venues.