I detest John McCain, but I always had misgivings about Hayworth. With the infomercial, I pretty much wrote Hayworth off as the wrong guy to beat McCain. I had never seen Deakin before, so I had no opinion of him. That’s how I went into the debate.
In my opinion, JD won that debate hands down. To say that he just won is an understatement. He destroyed McCain. He delivered blow after blow, without seeming to be mean or angry. McCain was his usual self, repeating stupid nonsense like ‘there you go again’ to try and appear Reaganesque. It failed miserably. It was worse than any of the debates with Obama in 08, if you can imagine that.
More importantly than the blows he landed, Hayworth showed a command of the issues and ability to communicate them that the other candidates lacked. Last night, JD Hayworth looked and behaved more like the senator from Arizona than John McCain did. When that happens in a political race, it’s a game changer.
Deakin had an opportunity here to sink or swim. In my opinion, he sank. Not just because he fumbled with his words a few times, but because he seemed to be a one note candidate. I’m all for ‘just follow the constitution’, but that can’t be your entire campaign or you’ll start to sound like a broken record. He didn’t show any substance and didn’t appear to be a viable contender in the race to me.
Based on his performance last night, I would now be very surprised if JD didn’t win the primary. It was a performance that I wish we would see more often from more candidates.
Glad to hear that Hayworth came through.
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All politicians take money from contributors. And just about all politicians have someone donate to them that turns out to be a crook at some point.
McCain isn’t pristine on the subject. He takes hundreds of thousands of dollars from donors. It’s just luck of the draw that one of them didn’t fall out. And when you look at his intervention on behalf of Keating, one of them did. John received the most funds of anyone from Keating. John was very fortunate not to have been kicked out of the Senate. He failed to report gratuities for over seven years as required by the House. Still, no punitive action was taken. I think the scrumptious nature of having a Lefty like McCain in our midst, was too great a thing to pass up. The Left needed his help. He has certainly given it since.
Did J.D. provide quid pro quo for the funds from the problematic donor? I haven’t seen that suggested. McCain did.
Is J. D. as pristine as the driven snow? Of course not. Is he the letch McCain and his countless minions have portrayed him to be, no. Not hardly.
J. D.’s biggest mistake was participating in that commercial for free government funds. It was a philosophical mistake though. It looked bad. It wasn’t borderline criminal though. Compare that to John joining Kennedy, Kerry, Feingold, Lieberman, Terresa Heinz Kerry, the Tides Foundation and other Soros entities, George Soros... I mean comparing Hayworth to McCain is like comparing your dad to a very bad man. It just doesn’t fly.
I hope you’re right and good summation.
“In my opinion, JD won that debate hands down.”
Your analysis in post 12 was very well done.
I caught the first 30 minutes or more on the radio. I thought McSham sounded off-balance, was trying to remember his talking points (not very successfully), and sounded patently phony with “my friends”, “there he goes again”, and “facts are stubborn things”.
Deakin was certainly out of his league, and I would expect he will lose some of his 6-7% preference share in future polling. This should help J.D.
I thought J.D. did a masterful job of staying on message, not coming across as vitriolic, stating facts, and always pressing the attack on McSham’s lousy record. J.D. also put Deakin in his place a few times in J.D.’s follow-up time by reminding Deakin that Deakins’ answer did not match up with the question that had been asked.
If J.D. can perform as well tonight, I think this could be a very close race, despite McSham’s overwhelming money advantage.
From your keyboard to God's ears!
I've thought for weeks that McCain is running scared, and I've heard complaints about McCain's nasty ads turning folks off. JD looked GOOD last night!