Posted on 01/14/2016 10:25:44 AM PST by Kaslin
It doesn’t take a genius to realize that Ted Cruz regularly shines in the debates, such as the one airing tonight on the Fox Business Channel. Cruz has made the most of his opportunities, picking his moments and working them for as much air time as possible, while demonstrating his grasp on both policy and grassroots politics. Politico’s Shane Goldmacher and Katie Glueck sat down with Cruz in order to learn more about the strategy that the Iowa frontrunner has been refining from the first onstage showdown:
"The first couple of debates I sat back and very much let it come to me," Cruz said aboard his campaign bus in Iowa. But the moderators' attempts to play the candidates against one another, he said, had left him with "among the least speaking time of any person on that stage."
So Cruz made a tactical shift. "We made a conscious decision to assert myself more aggressively into the conversation," he said, "because if every question was going to begin with Candidate A will you please insult Candidate B, I didn't want to be involved in that. But I also didn't want to stand there silently for two hours, while others were throwing rocks at each other."
The results have been stark. After coasting through the early debates with a low profile, Cruz spoke more than any of his rivals in each of the last two debates. In the December CNN contest, Cruz spoke for nearly three minutes more than his closest rival, Donald Trump 16 minutes and 27 seconds to 13 minutes and 33 seconds, according to POLITICO's calculations. In November, he lapped his closest foe by one minute and 41 seconds at the Fox Business debate.
As a Senator, he’s also learned the art of the filibuster. In fact, his best example of that comes from the much-lauded FBN debate in November:
In one remarkable sequence in the November debate, Cruz spoke for three minutes and 25 seconds straight, slowed only by a 10-word follow-up from Bartiromo. Later in that same debate, Fox Business' Neil Cavuto asked Cruz a question and then followed-up twice. The result was Cruz answering questions for a full four minutes straight without any of his rivals butting in.
Cruz’ rivals might read that and argue that it demonstrates more than just Cruz’ skill. It shows that moderators can try to impose time discipline on stage, but someone with enough skill and chutzpah can still manipulate the rules and the moderators to seize control of the debate. That’s tough to do with nine or ten people on stage, but tonight’s debate will have fewer candidates — seven in the main event. That may give Cruz an even bigger opening to dominate the stage.
Neil Cavuto, who will once again moderate the main debate with Maria Bartiromo, expects to see fireworks on stage given the debate’s proximity to the Iowa caucuses. Excuse me, not “fireworks,” but “grenades”:
But presidential campaigns evolve quickly, and Cavuto believes he and Bartiromo are in different territory tonight when the cable business news network has its second GOP showdown in North Charleston, S.C., at 6 p.m. Pacific time (a free live stream will be available on FoxBusiness.com). With the first party caucus and primary less than a month away, there's a chance one of the candidates for the Republican nomination will get desperate. Moderators can be part of the collateral damage in such situations.
"They know it's getting very close," Cavuto told The Times. "Some of them are going to throw grenades. It's possible some of them are going to throw grenades at us. Even if Mother Teresa were asking questions they'd throw them at her. The fact of the matter as time runs short a lot of the candidates' temperament runs short. That's a whole new dynamic."
Part of that intensity is due to having the seven leading candidates on stage - the smallest lineup of GOP contenders yet for a main event.
"It's incumbent on us to stay cool and stay focused and not to take anything personally, recognize these guys are under enormous pressure and so are we," he said.
The biggest reason to suspect some fireworks isn’t necessarily its lateness in the cycle or the marginally smaller number of candidates on stage. It’s that Cruz and Donald Trump have finally gone on the offensive against each other over Cruz’ status as a natural-born citizen. The moderators will be certain to raise this as a question, and the mystery will be whether Trump backs off this argument or not. He has in the past chosen not to take the bait on attacking his rivals during the televised debate, and in this case he might be advised to steer clear of Cruz’ legal and debating skills in an area where Cruz’ expertise will far outstrip his own. I suspect Trump is smart enough not to get caught onstage having to parry demands from Cruz to explain court precedents.
How about the other candidates? For the most part, Jeb Bush has been focusing on critical national issues such as Marco Rubio’s footwear and height, and Rand Paul has been playing footsie with Cruz’ skeptics rather than going after Trump. Chris Christie can be relied upon to eschew all of the internecine squabbling and go after Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. If Cruz is the only one pushing back on Trump and Trump declines to engage, expect another easy ride for the national front-runner.
Here’s one signal to watch: How many of the people on stage will start going after Bernie Sanders as well as Hillary Clinton? That’ll be an indicator of just how much draft he’s getting in the campaign now. If Republican candidates start taking aim at Sanders, then they’re seeing his momentum as a real threat to Hillary.
There should be no more than 4 candidates on stage at this point.
Why are the republicans letting the democrat media control these debates, this is beyond stupid.
Debate Predictions:
1. Trump, the Moderators or Cruz will bring up the Birther Issue.
2. Cruz will knock it out of the park.
OK, some wishful thinking is certainly going on here. But Home Run or Not, Cruz will be armed to the hilt to respond to the issue. I’m pulling for him.
With both Trump and Cruz there this election cycle, the moderators are being exposed and hopefully marginalized to the point they can no longer push their agenda.
All the professors who taught Cruz at Harvard Law School saw his awesome debating skills. He would just about blow Hillary Clinton off the stage at any Presidential debate, in my humble opinion.
There won’t be that much fireworks between Trump & Cruz.
Cruz is a gentleman & Trump tries not to be too much of a horse’s ass in the debates. He seems to save that for the stump.
Harvard law professors are qualified to validate the awesomeness of Ted Cruz debate skills but not qualified to opine on his eligibility to run for President...got it.
That’s funny!
[There won’t be that much fireworks between Trump & Cruz.]
I agree. It seems that previous debates where their hoped a feud to break out between Trump and someone else, it went no where.
I do predict, though, that the others on the stage will hit Cruz with the NBC and Goldman Sachs matters.
Don't forget iYeb and Dondi. I predict they will engage in a side bar bitch slapping session while the adults have a debate. Kasich will be the entertainment... Oh don't forget, His daddy was a Mailman.
“All the professors who taught Cruz at Harvard Law School saw his awesome debating skills. He would just about blow Hillary Clinton off the stage at any Presidential debate, in my humble opinion.”
You know what you are missing?
The constant bragging about his debate skills sets up a scenario where Hillary can naturally keep expectations low, show up, hold her own, likely get assists from the moderators, have networks praise her on her performance, point out how “overly polished” (i.e. plastic) Cruz is, and slant the whole story that people dont pick candidates on debates.
Now short of there being debates every 3 days (which there wont) or that people actually change their vote based on it (which really doesn’t happen), then what is the point of Cruz being so great at it?
Did you know his father was a mailman?
LOL!
I’ve lost a lot of respect for Kasich this time around.
That is what I believe too
How do you like that. I didn’t know Cliff Clavin had a son.
FNB isn’t the rat media exactly like CNBC is
I agree with you.
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