Debate analysis
November 29, 2007 at 1:34 pm by Wayne GarciaFor the multimedia-inclined, I appeared on Studio 10 this morning to discuss the debate last night, and here’s the link (they usually post the video later in the afternoon).
Overall, however, here’s some conclusions:
- The YouTube debate format was much livelier, much more productive and much more damaging to the Republican Party than the first one, which featured the Democrats. Gone were the goofy snowmen and the lack of probing followups. In their place were lingering and multiple questions on single issues that are tough for the GOP in a general election (immigration went on for nearly a half-hour, or about 25 percent of the debate time). In that sense, CNN was a winner …
- Until we found out late in the night that the pioneering cable news channel screwed up in not vetting the gay general properly to find out he was connected to the Hillary Clinton campaign. CNN’s statement on the matter:
Following the debate, CNN learned that retired brigadier general Keith Kerr served on Clinton’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender steering committee.
CNN Senior Vice President and Executive Producer of the debate, David Bohrman, says, “We regret this incident. CNN would not have used the General’s question had we known that he was connected to any presidential candidate.”
Prior to the debate, CNN had verified his military background and that he had not contributed any money to any presidential candidate.
Following the debate, Kerr told CNN that he’s done no work for the Clinton campaign. He says he is a member of the Log Cabin Republicans and was representing no one other than himself.
So in that sense, CNN was a loser.
- Hillary Clinton lost because even if she had nothing to do with planting the general’s question she will be blamed and it plays into the narrative about her trying to control the election process unduly.
- Mike Huckabee won the Florida Chamber instant poll afterward and showed that he belongs in the top tier. He fended off attacks and wasn’t exposed as a likely theocon, press-hatin’, rapist-freein’ danger. He has real charisma; being near him in the Spin Room after the debate was the closest you felt to real political power, it was palpable around him. He’s funny, bright and all those things, and several friends who are liberal said they really liked his performance. Mike Huckabee won.
- Ron Paul was comic relief.
- Fred Thompson initially looked great, very presidential and above the Giuliani-Romney fray on immigration. But then Fred got tired and got less and less screen time, it seemed. Fred Thompson did well, but not well enough to climb out of his tailspin.
- Anderson Cooper was brilliant, letting the fights go on when they needed to, not cutting to commercial to give time for a response to a video, and pushing Mitt hard, two or three times, on the question of whether he looks forward to a day when the nation is ready for gays in the military. Cooper was a big winner.
- Rudy Giuliani must’ve been back on his heels from the start as the pre-debate news focused on the politico.com revelation that extra security costs during a time he took trips to visit his mistress had been tucked away in several obscure city department budgets. Then Rudy came out swinging with an attack against Mitt’s hiring of illegal immigrants while governor and there seemed to be a gasp from the crowd initially. Not sure he looked good making the attack, and Romney fended it well except he never got to give his full explanation of how it happened. Overall, Rudy lost but not enough to challenge his national front-runner status.
- Mitt Romney gave and got all night long. On the upside, it was clear the race is really between him and Rudy. On the downside, he continues to look plastic. On the upside, Rudy didn’t do anything to him that will slow him down in Iowa and NH. On the downside, Mike Huckabee is doing that for Rudy. On the whole, it was a draw for Romney.
- No Florida-related questions, nothing on hurricane coverage, nothing on the environment. Downtown was dead after the event; even the protests were small and ineffective at denting the GOP message. Florida was a loser.
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November 29th, 2007 at 3:05 pm
The Clinton campaign has listed Mr. Kerr as an endorser for some time.
http://www.taylormarsh.com/print.php?id=26542
November 29th, 2007 at 4:49 pm
Politico.com has a good piece on all the places that Kerr was listed, including a HRC news release about him being named to her advisory committee.
Sloppy work by CNN.
The real question is what is Kerr, self-described as an LCR member, doing helping a Democrat. Can’t you get him drummed out for that, Jim?
November 29th, 2007 at 6:35 pm
If he was a member of one of the Florida RPOF chartered Log Cabin clubs, he could be booted. If the chapter he belongs to has a rule about endorsing a democrat, he might get the boot too. I don’t think that national LCR members (no local chapter affiliation) have any constraints and God knows there are bunches of single issue LCR members that routinely publically support the democratic candidate.
But I’ll play the Rush Limbaugh role here . . . . Do you really think it slipped by CNN or were they hoping that no one would find out??? Hummmmm????
November 29th, 2007 at 7:01 pm
Overall, Huckabee looked pretty good. But he looked good in part because the others looked either plastic, rattled, nutso, or feeble. The competition wasn’t exactly the first string, so feting him for winning that car crash is like saying I’m the best singer in the bar on karaoke night. It may be true, but the bar is so low that it’s meaningless.
November 30th, 2007 at 3:09 am
PoHo, you know I love and respect you, but your above coverage of Ron Paul in a concise snarky remark “Ron Paul was comic relief” sounds like something I would expect from Fox or the other MSM pundits.
I don’t know if it is just easier to ignore Paul or dismiss him because he is not a GOP factional puppet, but I think judging a ‘winner’ as the most charismatic or best able to spin a party line does more to perpetuate the divide and conquer two party system and further disenfranchise those of us out there looking for real change.
Even if Paul is unable to overcome the above mentioned hurdle, I applaud him for having the courage to shine light on the larger problems. Perhaps when everyone else is done slinging mud and pointing fingers about immigration and waterboarding (or whatever the hot topic of the moment is) these more relevant issues may get addressed (and no, I am not just referring to the IRS or super highway tin foil hat stuff).
November 30th, 2007 at 11:50 am
as I admire and respect you, but Paul is a dangerous guy. I get the attraction on how plainspoken he is on some key issues. I get that he has the freedom (since he doesn’t have to worry about calculating who will and won’t vote for him) to speak his mind and that is refreshing in an otherwise rehearsed debate.
But for the vast majority of the people at the debate and those watching, especially those who will vote in the Republican primary, he was an aside and not a serious player in the discussion.
I judged winners and losers not by their ideas but by how they helped or hurt their chances to become the next president of the United States.
As for ideas, the winner would be McCain; he was mostly lucid and pragmatic and critical of the usual GOP party line.
Some of Paul’s ideas are winners; but too many things would be really bad for this nation, IMHO (his isolationism, his xenophobia, his desire to dismantle the Fed Reserve banking system, the IRS, FBI, CIA, etc. and his general libertarian attitude that would dismantle way too much of government for my taste.
Having said all that, Paul is an honorable guy, who feels deeply about his causes, and who is very bright and deserves a bit more respect than me tin-foil-hatting him. As I said, some of his issues definitely deserve to be heard, and my earlier profile of him in CL covered some of that and the passion his fans have in a very nonjudgmental way. As to the snark, point taken, and thanks.
November 30th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Wayne, you mentioned Paul\\\’s desire to dismantle several government institutions, including the Fed. I heard a bunch about the Fed at the meet-up and have been tangentially aware the anti-Fed movement for some time. My question is, why does the Fed make sense? Why is it good for the nation to borrow at interest all it’s currency from a private bank?
November 30th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
sir you are an honorable man. well versed reply in which i was better able to understand your pov.
xo
jj
November 30th, 2007 at 6:41 pm
Until I get a few minutes off deadline, anyone want to attempt to answer Joe’s Federal Reserve question? Or explain the Gold Standard? Or William Jennings Bryan?
November 30th, 2007 at 7:05 pm
Or the Bull Moose party. What the hell kind of a name for a political party is that?
December 2nd, 2007 at 3:19 am
Joe,
Take this all with a grain of salt, I am not an economist - I am a philosopher.
I think the big problem with the Fed for Paul is that he believes it is unconstitutional. By putting the power to print/coin money in the hands of private interest, it keeps congress out of the loop (which is the unconstitutional part).
The real rub here is the trickle down with the system. Now you have a non government, private corporation with the power to set the value of the currency. Furthermore, the Fed, as a private corporation follows the business model of profit = success. Our government now pays a private entity to print our money (so we can use it) and borrows against the gold collateral that we bestowed upon the Fed to start this system up. However, with all the inflation (in part from over printing) there is not a standard to back the currency (again part of the unconstitutionality according to Paul).
The reason this is connected to the IRS is that the internal revenue (which, again, has some constitutionality objections, depending on who you talk to) which pays back the money our government borrows from the private banks.
Here is a link to a speech that Paul made in 2002 which explains some of his pov.
http://www.ronpaullibrary.org/document.php?id=677
December 2nd, 2007 at 3:20 am
After this, I realized you wanted to know why it was a good idea for us to borrow money with interest from private companies. I do not have answer for you that would be of interest to you or me. It seems, based on the model, it only benefits the corporations and the war profiteers. My guess is since they have the lobbyists and the general population does not, those are the interests that are getting served.
Regarding the Gold Standard, there are inherent issues with using a mined resource that can fluctuate in availability and thus not be with the pace of the economy. However, compared to the current system, I believe it has more merit. William Jennings Bryan was someone who advocated a bimetal system of gold and silver as a way to avoid some of the issues with a single metal and help control inflation and assist repayment of debts. What really killed all this was World War I. England, followed by most other nations involved with the war, moved to a fiat based currency which meant the country could print money that was not backed by something hard and tangible, but instead stuff like taxes, since most of the gold was used to finance the war machine.