Posted on 11/13/2011 2:25:54 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
For the second time in four days, the GOP presidential candidates took the stage for a debate. This one focused exclusively on foreign policy and national security. The first hour aired live on the CBS network. The final half hour was only available online and the CBS feed was lousy for the first 15 minutes of that. So, most viewers only paid attention to the first hour. This recap covers the entire debate.
Here is a look at how each candidate fared, along with winners and losers:
Michele Bachmann: Once again, the Minnesota congresswoman was in command on the issues and offered plenty of substance. She also failed to stand out, again. Bachmann had a good line about Obama “allowing the ACLU to run the CIA”. Often ignored, she practically begged the moderators for time on two different occasions, but was shot down. Bachmann held her own, but did little to sway voters.
Herman Cain: Without the ability to use “9-9-9” as a crutch, Cain struggled. He provided his answers with a slow, methodical delivery, probably trying to avoid a gaffe. Much like Cain’s stances on social issues, some of his foreign policy answers were indecipherable.
Cain proclaimed, “I do not agree with torture. Period. However, I will trust the judgment of our military leaders to determine what is torture and what is not torture.” Huh?
Six months after officially declaring his candidacy, Cain is still giving the same non-answer on the war in Afghanistan. Cain called Yemen’s corrupt president “our friend”, and still believes we can somehow undermine Iran’s nuclear program by drilling for oil here. Cain received few applause breaks from a lively South Carolina crowd. It was not his best night.
Newt Gingrich: Once again, the former House Speaker commanded the stage better than anyone else. He provided strong, substantive issues. Gingrich projects an aura that he knows the issues better than anyone else. Probably because he does know better. It was another very good performance.
Jon Huntsman: Although I still believe Huntsman is running in the wrong party, this was a very good performance. Unfortunately for the former Utah governor, most GOP primary voters disagree with his stances. However, he provided strong arguments for his views, which include immediately pulling our troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan and opposing waterboarding. If this were a general election campaign and Huntsman was in his rightful spot as the Democrat, he would have fared very well.
Ron Paul: The Texas congressman’s foreign policy stances are what prevent a lot of Republicans from seriously considering him. As expected, he disagreed with most of the candidates on stage. Paul gave a much better answer regarding Iran’s nuclear program than he did at the Ames debate in August. Although he still opposes going to war to prevent it, Paul said, “If you do, you get a declaration of war and you fight it and you win it.” I thought Paul did a good job presenting his arguments. It seemed like he had very few chances to speak, however.
Rick Perry: After the “Perry Plunge” on Wednesday, I thought his campaign was over. Now, I’m not so sure. This was Rick Perry’s best debate. He was relaxed and provided lots of substance. He scored with the audience by joking about Wednesday’s brain freeze.
Perry gave a terrific answer in regards to foreign aid. “The foreign aid budget in my administration is going to start at $0.” He later added that Pakistan doesn’t deserve any aid and stuck to his answer later in the debate when asked if his $0 policy would include Israel. Perry even got a compliment from Gingrich in regards to his answer. This might signal a rebirth in the Perry campaign.
Mitt Romney: The former Massachusetts governor was his usual polished self. Romney is well versed on every issue and has become an excellent debater. As the presumed frontrunner, Romney handled this debate very well.
Rick Santorum: The former Pennsylvania senator again showed he has a command of the issues. He even disagreed with Newt Gingrich in regards to how to handle Iran’s pending nuclear weapons, but the moderators did not allow the two to argue it out. Calling Pakistan “a friend” probably raised some eyebrows among GOP voters. Santorum was not given a lot of time to shine, which he desperately needs at this point in the campaign.
Overall Winner: Rick Perry. In the aftermath of Wednesday’s gaffe, we have seen a much more human side for Perry. He actually did well in that debate, except for the 53 second brain freeze. Saturday, Perry shined. While he might not have delivered the most style and substance, I believe he helped his campaign more than anyone else. That makes Perry the winner.
Overall Losers: CBS and Herman Cain. Cain avoided any major gaffes, but was clearly the least knowledgeable candidate on the stage. As for CBS, what kind of network only airs an hour of an hour and a half debate? Then encourages people to watch the rest on their website, but provides a feed that pauses every four seconds? Wait. I know the answer. It’s the same kind of network that tried to alter the 2004 presidential race with phony documents.
So. The spammers do that on every Perry thread. It’s what they post that is spam. It’s nothing more than unsourced cut and paste tripe that gets posted every day on any thread that mentions Perry. It’s like they can’t help themselves.
Now, back to the topic.
Given that this was first debate where Perry, held his own.....and being described as so much more relaxed and as well; ‘more on target’; cannot help but wonder if Adderol did not come to his rescue. Hope not ..though, personally; cannot help but wonder.
Herman Cain always answers the questions without a lot of embellishment.
His weakest point is foreign policy.
His strongest points are his ability to give this Country a Leader that inspires the Country to do great things to the benefit of all the people.
I think Herman Cain’s time has come.
GO HERMAN!
Cain is inexperienced!
Watch this and see what I mean,
my bad, I just posted at the wrong thread.
I personally think he's only had 1 bad debate. That's not saying the others were great, b/c they weren't. There was his 2nd or 3rd debate where he just looked dead tired and out of it. The entire performance was bad. The other performances had enough small soundbites that overshadowed any other positive parts. Prime examples are the heartless comment, and the brain fart last week. Last week was a solid performance, minus the 50+ seconds. But, as is politics, it's what gets replayed on the news cycle that counts. He's a big boy, and I thought he handled the brain fart aftermath as best as he could, which was with humor. The McCain camp absolutely killed Palin after her brain fart with Couric. They just hoped that the whole incident would go away if they didn't respond to it, and the image stuck. And it hurt.
Perry's has a lot of work to do to repair perception, and I know that his campaign knows that. We'll see what happens over the next month and a half. If he handles the next debates like he did last night, it can't hurt him.
I really don’t know, we’d have to ask that *one* teacher and the local school board. I don’t think I’d recite the pledge.
However, it was not official State business at all. http://www.theblaze.com/stories/blaze-exclusive-tx-high-school-students-made-to-recite-mexican-national-anthem-pledge-of-allegiance/
Newt said they don’t. I believe some courts have said that it is illegal, our guys still argue.
Calm down. CW said “Perry threads” while talking about a pattern. In fact, don’t you think the post CW complained about was without relevance to the conversation about last night’s debate?
And he's LIKEABLE, many on the live thread commented on how likeable he is. Your endless spamming of the same halftruths, that have been explained over and over, seems to be your only goal the past few months. It's odd........
I was responding to this. Why are you bring up CW? Are altura and CW the same person?
To: muawiyah
CW was not objecting to your posting on this Perry thread.
She may have objected to your posting really stupid stuff, but she is too nice to say what she probably is thinking.
172 posted on Sunday, November 13, 2011 12:17:37 PM by altura (Perry 2012)
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alture said this is a Perry thread. It is NOT.
He didn’t say Bachmann won. He listed the candidates in alphabetical order.
So it’s up to the judgment of the leaders involved since it’s obviously legally ambiguous.
They don't think you are, so you aren't.
So, CW operates under just two names now?
Cain is not “winging it”.
Cain has a good grasp of policy and issues, if people would just take the time to learn about him instead of spouting liberal and RINO talking points:
http://www.thinkersvoice.com/content/cainscommentary
economicfreedomcoalition.com/press-opinion.asp
I’m not saying that! lol I’m just curious why my post to one poster elicited a reply regarding a different poster. :)
Could be someone is typing names in ~ or, spontaneous human combustion. One of those two I am sure.
Thank you for your calm and thoughtful response.
If anyone disagrees with your opinion, they become and idiot.
You on the other hand are a just calm, reasonable jerk off.
You have no idea what I have or where it came from and all my grand parents gave me way more than bonds, they came to America and gave me opportunity.
Idiot indeed.
Learn to read English and maybe we can talk.
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