Hmm, so what of that Iowa debate? Well, before we get into that, let’s preface with some fireworks that began even before last night’s GOP debate in Iowa.
Mitt Romney gave a speech in front of the Des Moines Register Service Center at the Iowa State Fair and confronted several liberal plants with some surprisingly solid answers!
Where’s this guy been? Seriously! This is the Romney that folks want, NOT what we’ve heard prior to this in regards to man-made climate change and other shenanigans. After confronting these ‘geniuses’ in the crowd, once he began answering on the debate stage, it was vastly more comfortable (and you can check that out in the links to the entire debate at the end of this post). And moving on to that…
At the beginning of the debate, Bret Baier gave an introduction in which he requested that the candidates ‘try to put away the talking points’…however, the panelists didn’t seem to want to put aside theirs, and Newt came to life with what many have wanted to express to the media themselves…
on the Mickey Mouse games of the media…
…and on the sham of a super-committee…
Again, I’ll ask the same question as with Romney…where’s this Newt been? Look, I’ve been highly critical of both these guys, but I was impressed last night, and if this is genuine principle shining through, then KEEP IT CONSISTENT! Although my skepticism remains alert, for the first time in a rather long while, I actually liked what I saw of these two…but I want to tap into Newt’s points after quickly running through the rest of the roster:
I thought Bachmann stood firm on principle, while Santorum stood strong on morality. Cain presented his ‘point’ approaches towards pro-business ‘growth’, while Huntsman came off pretty irrelevant. Pawlenty attempted to play the part of attack dog, and it wasn’t pretty; while Paul came off as the usual Ron Paul isolationist libertarian allowing his lunacy to outshine his conservatism (along with his annoying band of Paulbots hootin' & hollarin’ with every answer, while heckling other candidates).
Now, this debate was vastly different from the prior, primarily in the fact that there was much more sparing than the last, and here’s some of those moments…
…and there were many more. While this is to be expected, I don’t think this should be the crux of the debate. Let me simply cut to the chase: these moments represent the parts of the night that the Fox crew 'loved' (and this begins to tap into Newt’s points). What I mean by this is if you can’t see how over-produced and manufactured this debate was, then we weren’t watching the same show. They turned this into an entertainment program.
Moments like this, where the media (drooling through this morsel) gave little air time to Santorum, but plenty of elaborative room for Paul (with Paulbots roaring ever more feverishly), provides a perfect example of how little of an actual ‘debate’ the Fox media allowed…
You know, when given that this debate was roughly two hours, why not take an approach that allows for more actual debate between the candidates, rather than brisky running through the benign treasure trove of usual media talking points directed towards Republican presidential candidates? How about sticking to say the top three most relevant issues that we’re facing at this critical moment in time? Or better yet, how about stop antagonizing the candidates into bickering among themselves for ratings or for ‘one hell of a rumble’ and let them all work hard towards differentiating themselves through contrasting their ideas with our current failure of a president (as I believe Newt was suggesting). The media MUST STOP trying to pick 'our' nominee for us; rather, allow Republican voters to choose for themselves!
Here’s the entire debate to view at your leisure:
