Nothing happened.
That was the big thing that happened.
It was an opportunity lost, either to make a case against Trump or to distinguish oneself, but no.
I expect to see references to Shakespeare's Macbeth later today when I read the punditry about the debate. The "debate" had candidates strutting on a stage, soon to be heard no more, idiots full of sound and fury signifying nothing. The reference is so apt, except the candidates aren't idiots. They are capable people, earnest, but failing, in their ambitions to replace Trump. They have the impossible job of changing minds of people whose minds are made up. Too many people in the audiences they address have decided that Trump is a great man of courage, a hero, a successful leader, whose detractors are dishonest and illegitimate. A cook needs to break eggs to make an omelet, and they are happy Trump is an egg-breaker.
Only Chris Christie looked directly at the camera and addressed Trump. He did not criticize him for crimes against the Constitution and democracy, a point central to his fitness for office. Christie criticized Trump's campaign strategy and weaved in a schoolboy taunt.
You’re not here tonight, not because of polls, and not because of your indictments. You’re not here tonight, because you’re afraid of being on the stage and defending your record, You keep doing that. No one up here is going to call you Donald Trump anymore. We’re going to call you 'Donald Duck.'
The venue audience may have laughed, but if so the TV microphones did not pick it up.
So what happened for those two hours? The situation felt familiar. It was like being at a bar near a boisterous group of people drinking heavily and well into an evening. Their table got loud and angry. People interrupted one another, talked over one another, each refusing to give up the floor. Much of it was unintelligible with three or four people shouting at once, trying to make their points. They bickered. Candidates came prepared with a highly misleading characterization of another's action or policy. Look what you did, a candidate would charge. No I didn't, the other would say, trying to explain amid multiple voices simultaneously accusing, defending, counter accusing.
There was no bar manager to tell them to quiet down. Fox hosts presumably could turn off microphones from interrupters, but did not.
Once again, Vivek Ramaswamy claimed his time and some of everyone else's, playing role of Mr. Let Me Explain Things To You Idiots. This time the other candidates realized that GOP audiences rewarded this behavior. They had learned this wasn't a policy debate. It was a shoving match, and the winner was whoever pushed himself to the front.
Policy matters very little in this nomination race, but a split in opinion and policy has emerged. Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy join Trump in wanting a quick end to the war in Ukraine by abandoning Ukraine and telling it to give up territory. Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, Chris Christie, and Doug Burgum support Ukraine and oppose Russia, warning it is Ukraine being attacked today, Poland next.
Pundits are putting up stories this morning, drawing the same conclusion: Nothing last night changed the structure of the GOP nomination. Both Christie and Pence have been making the argument that the GOP should abandon Trump and return the GOP to a Reagan-style path of smaller government, commitment to democratic principles, respect for the law, and a strong national defense to protect democracies. They did not assert this at the debate, and they were at the ideal venue for it, the Reagan Library.
They didn't do it because the GOP electorate has moved on. Readers of this blog who voted for Reagan, Dole, both Bush presidents, McCain, and Romney are now registered in a party that calls those people RINOS, and Trump calls them "enemies of the people." The party left you. Trump convinced a majority of the GOP electorate that it wants populist authoritarianism. Trump is the genuine article who will offer it. That is the GOP now.
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11 comments:
I tuned in just long enough to hear Nimrat Haley screeching at Ramaswamy calling him a liar, immediately switched to a favorite movie "Spotlight" about a real incident which took place when Newspapers were necessary to telling the truth about bad things, and journalists were actually reporting real events.
Now that Republican candidates had their second debate, I wonder who the frontrunner will be. Oh, that’s right – it’s the Republican Party we’re talking about, so the frontrunner will be the madman who tried to overthrow the government and didn’t participate in the debate. And why are people so enamored of such a monstrosity? For the sake of being empathetic and understanding, suffice it to say that birds of a feather flock together.
In two days the government will shut down, but Republicans have become so dysfunctional that instead of addressing the issue, they’re holding a hearing to try and come up with a pretext for impeaching President Biden. What they have so far is that he’s Hunter’s father.
I had a tooth pulled yesterday. It was more enjoyable than the Second Republican Presidential Candidate Debate. In the former something of consequence got done, in the latter I wasted two hours of my life.
How about: “Or have we eaten on the insane root. That takes the reason prisoner?”
I watched the first half of the debate before deciding it was useless and turning it off.
I am going to wait and see what happens in Iowa in January, when actual voters get to have their say. In the meantime, it’s just irrelevant noise.
I feel sorry for Peter because he had to sit through the entire debate. After all he writes this blog and is expected to report back on what he saw and heard. After all, that’s his unpaid job here and we depend on him to do it for us . I, on the other hand was free to do something far more interesting, like watch an old movie, which I did. It was a movie starring Gregory Peck called 12 O’Clock High. Good movie and far more dramatic than watching 7 Trump wantabes step over each other being careful not to offend the Biggest Loser. Okay, Christie did, but his polls within the GOP are lower than whaleshit. So he doesn’t count. On the other hand…
Next week’s trial on fraud will be more interesting than any old movie. I won’t need Peter for that.
Best comment I heard was someone referring to that obnoxious little yapping dog as Ramasmarmy.
It was a trainwreck. No one expects Lincoln-Douglas in this soundbite culture, but this was particularly cacophanous and unsubstantive. Fox and the RNC did no one any favors, least of all the GOP candidates. The format and the stated rules, ill-conceived enough already, were not even enforced. A missed opportunity.
A previous comment that I was still working on was cut-off due to a service interruption (I think).
It is unfortunate that This Guy finds it necessary to resort to an old-fashioned (not in a good way), typical sexist comment about Nikki Haley "screeching."
Somethings and some people never change. If more explanation is needed, I will try. But it should be obvious in the year 2023.
Hint: It reminds me of the criticism of Cornell West's hair comment in a previous blog.
Correction: Cornel West
I did not watch. I will never again vote for any republican. I used to be one, too.
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