Newt is making strides tonight. I’ll have to catch the rest of the debate later, unfortunately...
Chris Wallace is getting beat like a rented mule tonight.
/schadenfreude on
Winners:
Romney - articulate, poised and dealt handily with all questions; not a single serious blow by any opponent/moderator;
Gingrich - rising from the ashes, Gingrich demonstrates his intellect once again, but ads fire in the belly;
Paul - little to lose and delivered a good dose of reality on economics in particular, off the rails on Iran, but mostly right on foreign wars; stole the spotlight frequently
Losers:
Bachmann - more to lose than any other candidate being on the 1st tier margin. Was drawn down by Pawlenty and forced to scrap. Her own performance would have been solid, but she was a victim of Pawlenty. She'll live to fight another day however;
Huntsman - astonishingly unprepared for opening critical economic plan question. Needed a breakout performance. Didn't get it;
Santorum - totally marginalized and looked small denigrating Ron Paul. Not going anywhere;
Cain - needed a breakout performance after his disastrous Islam remarks to survive. LIkeable, but didn't get it;
Pawlenty - worst performance of the evening. Went from being weak in the last debate to artificially nasty in this one, with cheap shots and class warfare zingers. Not helped by his handlers. He's done.