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Byron York: GOP aims to ease bloodshed in 2016 primary debates
Pottstown Mercury ^ | 2/7/13 | Byron York

Posted on 02/08/2013 9:28:48 AM PST by dirtboy

“While we were playing footsie debating each other 22 times, they were spending $100 million on technology,” Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said recently, referring to his party’s rigorous debate schedule in the 2012 GOP presidential primary season. The last campaign, many Republican insiders said during a recent RNC meeting, had too many debates, the result of which was a GOP arguing with itself while Democrats prepared the way for Barack Obama’s victory.

There’s no doubt the Republican debates produced many damaging moments for the party. There was Mitt Romney’s $10,000 bet offer, which helped cement his image as an out-of-touch rich guy. There were any number of gaffes from Rick Perry, culminating in Perry’s painful-to-watch “Oops” moment. There was Michele Bachmann’s HPV vaccine blunder. There were bare-knuckle fights over immigration. And there was warfare between Romney and Newt Gingrich, in which Gingrich prevailed in South Carolina only to be flattened by Romney in Florida. By the end, there was a lot of blood on the floor.

(Excerpt) Read more at pottsmerc.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; Politics/Elections
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To: dirtboy

without the debates Perry would have won the nomination and the election.

The debates utterly destroyed Perry.


21 posted on 02/08/2013 10:20:37 AM PST by TexasFreeper2009 (Obama lied .. the economy died.)
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To: ilgipper

There are people like us, who are forced to sit through every agonizing detail of all the endless debates because we are addicted to politics, and some of us actually care. This ought not be confused with the general public, which may have been sick of Republicans by the time the general election rolled out. But not because of endless debates. They don’t pay attention to those.

I don’t know why exactly. Maybe through half-remembered two second clips on tv or headlines bumped into online. Which has something to do with the endlessness of primary season, and more to do with media coverage of it. Anyway, my point is don’t confuse the fatigue of those who actually paid attention with the apathy of a majority if voters, who don’t reliably pay attention before the Dem-Pub debates, if then.


22 posted on 02/08/2013 10:22:15 AM PST by Tublecane
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To: dirtboy
...by silencing Conservatives no doubt.

And they had better be figuring out how to close the primaries to Republicans only, or else 2016 will be yet another repeat of 2008 and 2012, only with Biden, Cuomo, O'Malley, Emmanuel, etc. wiinning on Obama's coat tails and using his big fraud machine.

23 posted on 02/08/2013 10:24:53 AM PST by Timber Rattler (Just say NO! to RINOS and the GOP-E)
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To: dirtboy

Voting died,,,, Nov, 6th, 2012.........


24 posted on 02/08/2013 11:17:44 AM PST by hosepipe (This propaganda has been edited to include some fully orbed hyperbole..)
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To: dirtboy; ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas; Gilbo_3; Impy; NFHale; BillyBoy; fieldmarshaldj; GOPJ; ...
RE :”The last campaign, many Republican insiders said during a recent RNC meeting, had too many debates, the result of which was a GOP arguing with itself while Democrats prepared the way for Barack Obama’s victory.”

Of course the next election Dems will have a competitive primary too unlike 2012, and I suspect the Dems will being lining up to take a shot at the WH seeing so much GOP blood.

Looking back the R primary reminds me of that twilight zone were the bad genie gave the shopkeeping couple three wishes and they all went bad.
The candidates all tried to up each other making wildly unrealistic promises that were appropriate for an electorate that doesnt exist, or no longer exists.

Example : “Would veto $1 in taxes for every $10 in spending cuts” they all lined up for. That was twilight zone, and a got-ya yes-no question too.

So like MCain before him Romney ended up opposing the things he really believed in by the time the primary was over.

McCain : amnesty
Romney : socialized medicine.

No wonder they were sitting ducks for Dems.

Ya think Rubio is the next Romney-McCain- Dole?

25 posted on 02/08/2013 11:22:19 AM PST by sickoflibs (Losing to Dems and Obama is not a principle! Its just losing.)
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To: Tublecane

That’s easy enough. Newt is no threat to the Left and never will be, now, in a country so ignorant as to be actually anti-intelluctual.

Conservative ideas put into action have been suffocated, but history (that is not re-written) will be kind to Newt, compared to the conservative platitude pushers of today who ride on the stars and stripes but whose body of work nationally is as thin as a piece of paper but big on rhetoric.
Not so with Newt. In office, he delivered.

Be happy. There’s always some moderate the Establishment will coronate. They despised other conservatives, but they had felt Newt’s lash, on both sides of the aisle, and had to dread a replay.


26 posted on 02/08/2013 11:33:48 AM PST by RitaOK ( VIVA CHRISTO REY / Public education is the farm team for more Marxists coming.)
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To: dirtboy

The Vichy GOPes think moving left will win them votes, they forget this has lost the last 2 elections


27 posted on 02/08/2013 11:37:31 AM PST by GeronL (http://asspos.blogspot.com)
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To: dirtboy
I agree with most of your post...but not the part about technology.

I made this point numerous times during the election: Obama and the DNC absolutely commanded Facebook, Google, Yahoo, you name it, with ads. I saw that in 2008 and hoped the GOP would catch a clue...but alas...they did not.

And as far as debates goes...for crying out loud...let's get some conservatives moderating them.

28 posted on 02/08/2013 11:39:34 AM PST by NELSON111
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To: NELSON111

Facebook,Google and Yahoo are arms of the DNC at this point, fundraisers and everything else. So you think the GOP should pour their funds into the coffers of the Dems?


29 posted on 02/08/2013 11:47:17 AM PST by GeronL (http://asspos.blogspot.com)
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To: COBOL2Java
Hey, I have a radical idea, how about limiting participation in the Republican primaries to members of the Republican party? Nah, that’s crazy talk!

LOL...Funny...True, thou

30 posted on 02/08/2013 12:10:52 PM PST by ExCTCitizen (More Republicans stayed home then the margin of victory of O's Win...)
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To: GeronL

Kind of like Socialism, isn’t it? No matter how many times it doesn’t work, the next thought is to do it again.


31 posted on 02/08/2013 1:28:51 PM PST by Anima Mundi (Envy is just passive, lazy greed.)
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To: sickoflibs

It’s not clear that the Democrats will have a competitive primary in 2016. If her health isn’t so bad that she can’t run, Hillary may be in a position to strongarm all the other potential candidates out of the race, except perhaps for one or two minor candidates from the lunatic fringe, who will just permit the media to treat it as a horse race.


32 posted on 02/08/2013 1:45:16 PM PST by Verginius Rufus
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To: Anima Mundi

yes it is


33 posted on 02/08/2013 1:52:30 PM PST by GeronL (http://asspos.blogspot.com)
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To: Bidimus1
Good thing these guys are the smartest guys on the planet. What kinds of stupidities would they come up with if they were just plain stupid?

Romney fought scorched Earth against Republican candidates and played pattycake with Obama. QED

34 posted on 02/08/2013 2:35:14 PM PST by Jabba the Nutt (.Are they stupid, malicious or evil?)
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To: Bidimus1

Too many debates results in the MSM having the opportunity to help select the most liberal candidate.


35 posted on 02/08/2013 2:54:55 PM PST by The_Media_never_lie (Actually, they lie when it suits them! The crooked MS media must be defeated any way it can be done!)
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To: TexasFreeper2009

La Raza Rick ? Please. Texas needs to boot his RINO ass.


36 posted on 02/08/2013 2:56:37 PM PST by fieldmarshaldj (Resist We Much)
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To: RitaOK

Gingrich was only there to suck up to the left wing media, whose respect he so desperately craves. I am glad he is back to being Nancy Pelosi’s errand boy, telling conservatives they should support gay marriage and climate change. What is his IQ? 60? 40?


37 posted on 02/08/2013 8:53:41 PM PST by nickcarraway
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To: dirtboy

STOP OPEN PRIMARY VOTING TO DEMOCRATS!!!! Tlk about the STUPID PARTY!!!!


38 posted on 02/09/2013 12:14:57 AM PST by Ann Archy (ABORTION........the HUMAN sacrifice to the god of CONVENIENCE.)
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