Republican Presidential Candidate Debate #8 – Dearborn, MI 10/09/07

McCain is another guy that’s starting to remind me of Ross Perot with empty platitudes - except McCain’s platitudes also contradict his record in office.

Protectionism doesn’t work well for anyone.

I am not opposed to free trade as long as it is fair trade.

If the priority is fairness, everybody loses. "If you put fairness ahead of freedom you'll get neither. If you put freedom ahead of fairness, you'll get a great deal of both" - Milton Friedman.

Yeah I had 1 post about Fred over a month ago. Wow. He still is dull as dirt.

Ever read Lincoln's speeches (not the Gettysburg address, but campaign speeches, etc)? Dull but substantive.

With regard to public opinion, perception is reality. The perception that Duncan Hunter is floundering around 1-2% support is not flawed ... it is reality based on scientific polling data. There is simply no indication of a groundswell of support for Hunter.

Perception is not reality. Reality doesn't happen until January. Perception is fluid. Perception changes and there still is time for more change.

Support for candidates right now is soft. If you want to go by polling numbers, at one time John McCain was in the 30 percent range. His numbers plummetted. His numbers were never solid to begin with and when people start moving away from name recognition and start looking at what a candidate advocates, that soft support vanishes. What was once considered a strong candidate has become a longshot. So much for perception equaling reality.

Many people aren't really jazzed about the so-called top-tier candidates and when they find out about Duncan Hunter, they are impressed with him. But then it goes back to that point of mine of people getting scared away from backing him with false perceptions of "can he win?" and being manipulated into supporting Candidate B to keep Candidate C from winning. It's a game that entices people from voting for their favorite candidate.

And Dennis Kucinich and Ted Kennedy have been repeatedly elected locally ... that certainly doesn’t mean they’re electable on a national scale.

Missing the point that Hunter initially won in a Democrat-majority district. Hunter can draw from a vast voting base.

Polling data, fundraising, etc. are means of predicting that outcome. Duncan Hunter is not doing well thus far. You are certainly free to ignore or deny reality for as long as you wish ... but the reality is what it is. Don’t expect fellow conservatives like me to stick our heads in the sand along with you.

Predictions are for Vegas and phony psychics. Polls were used to declare Florida for Gore in 2000. Not only was it not true, but it was used to discourage voters. It almost succeeded too. People let the mainstream media manipulate them, to discourage people from supporting good conservative candidates.

And I can do without your petty personal insults. We know the poll numbers are low and the fundraising isn't as it ought to be. That's why we are here to promote our candidate as the best candidate and it's in the best interests of people to get on board right now.

Giuliani, Romney, Thompson and possibly McCain or Huckabee have a reasonable shot at beating Hillary. I believe Brownback, Hunter, Tancredo, Paul, Cox and Keyes are wasting their time - and ours.

I don't believe Giuliani or McCain can win. Giuliani has too much baggage Hillary will exploit. Giuliani and McCain will alienate too many conservatives and it'll be 2006 again. Romney will have a hard time getting elected with both Democrats and Republicans not wanting to vote for a Mormon. Thompson's too much of an unknown right now; mostly hype right now. And if you really want to go into perceptions, Thompson has a few negative "perceptions" but I won't go so far as to make a claim "perception is reality" to attempt to tarnish Thompson in what may be a false perception.

And perfection is unattainable. All candidates are impefect ... some more than others. I’ve yet to see any Hunter supporter give a convincing argument why to pick Hunter over Thompson ... outside of “vote your conscience”. Duncan Hunter didn’t register on my conscience.

As we saw from this debate, Duncan Hunter understands the problems of the threat of Red China and the trade imbalance than Fred Thompson. Hunter has command of international affairs and implications for our country and it shows in each and every debate. And Thompson supported McCain's disgusting McCain/Feingold bill.

Oh, but why do I bother talking issues when that old line of "perception equals reality" gets thrown around. Why have a debate? Let's all get touchy-feely with our "perceptions" and use that to pick a president. No wonder we have such mediocrity.

Strangely, this appeared in the news after my previous post:

Oman inflation hits 16-year high

by John Irish on Thursday, 11 October 2007

Annual inflation in Oman accelerated to 6.47% in August, the highest in 16 year, as food costs and rents jumped.

Oman, like other Gulf Arab oil producers, is struggling to contain inflation because its central bank traditionally follows US interest rate policy to maintain the relative value of its dollar-pegged currency.

The government considered measures including unshackling the rial currency from the tumbling US dollar and price caps to contain rising inflation but decided against such moves, the commerce minister said this week.

The consumer price index rose to 111.9 points on August 31, compared with 105.1 points a year earlier, data published on the Ministry of National Economy website showed. Inflation was 5.98% in July.

The food, beverages and tobacco component of the index surged 12.1%. Rents rose 7.5%, the data showed.

The dollar peg was partly to blame for rising inflation because the US currency's decline was driving up the cost of imports, Commerce Minister Makboul bin Ali bin Sultan said in remarks carried by the official Oman News Agency (ONA) on Monday.

The dollar fell to a record low against a basket of six currencies this month.

Rapid economic expansion, a construction boom, and the impact of record oil prices on transport costs were also to blame, bin Sultan said.

Inflation is rising across the Gulf Arab region, where a quadrupling of oil prices in the past six years is driving rapid economic growth.

Saudi Arabia's king asked officials last week to explain rising inflation, which hit a seven-year high in August of 4.4% from a year earlier. [ I hope the King's economists are better than ours!

In the UAE, the economy ministry took out newspaper advertisements this week to warn businesses against price hikes in the run-up to a Muslim holiday next week. Inflation hit a 19-year high of 9.3% in the UAE last year.

In May, Kuwait broke ranks with its Gulf Arab neighbours and dropped its peg to the dollar, saying the US currency's decline was fuelling inflation.

Oman, one of the five Gulf oil producers that agreed with Kuwait to peg its currency to the dollar to prepare for monetary union, was committed to keeping the value of its rial unchanged, the central bank governor said last month.

But like Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, Oman held back from reducing interest rates to match the September 18 cut in the US, saying domestic economic considerations took precedence when deciding monetary policy. - Reuters

Ohh.. Your post wasn’t clear whether that was your opinion or not but I understand now. Thanks.

Anybody have a link to the text of this debate? (I don’t have video access on my computer.)

Found it...

TRANSCRIPT

Very helpful. Thanks a lot. Ron Paul's text doesn't read quite a loony as his video presence seems to be to many people. He still comes across to me like a 2007 version of platitude-filled Ross Perot - hyping a pretty negative outlook with few substantive answers - and I think dodging clarity that might allow him to be nailed own on something.

Can you help me in getting the links to the other previous debates?

Sure thing. Here's what I have on-file (all but one)..

Republican Debate Transcript, Michigan - Published October 9, 2007

Republican Debate Transcript, Maryland - Published September 27, 2007

Republican Debate Transcript, New Hampshire - Published September 5, 2007

Republican Debate Transcript, Iowa - Published August 5, 2007

Republican Debate Transcript, New Hampshire - Published June 5, 2007

Republican Debate Transcript, South Carolina - Published May 15, 2007

Republican Debate Transcript, California -Published May 3, 2007

Thank you. This helpful. Do you also happen to have:

- The schedule for upcoming debates and TV stations and

- how I could follow the text if TV station/video not available?

Thanks again.

I've been using Wikipedia to keep track of upcoming debates. They tend to put up transcript links which is useful.