printDo I really have to debate The Debate? What can I add about the Republican spat in Des Moines, Iowa, that has not been rehashed already?
I’ll set aside my ideological loyalties (which are with Ron Paul), and comment some on style and character. (Readers already know that I’m fuming because, given the status of the written word in news reports, there are no online transcripts. Just YouTube.)
Tim Pawlenty revealed himself to be a weasel. But no one in the media is making a call on character. Pawlenty is terrified of Michele Bachmann, and for good reason. She’s the man he is not. However, his tactics are underhanded.
Pawlenty responded “to Bachmann’s relentless repetition of her claim to leadership in Washington, pointing out that Democrats had rolled up legislative victories for most of her time in Congress and passed multiple bills over her objections, sometimes using her as a foil.”
This Pawlenty argument is plain wrong, maybe even devious; it’s the argument a consummate politico will make. What do I mean? Take Ron Paul. He celebrates victories in the arena of ideas. As he has pointed out, more and more of his rivals are moving in his direction, and adopting the truth where they once dubbed this truth kooky. On the Federal Reserve banking system, for example.
So the fact that Bachmann has not gotten her way with a cowardly Congress says nothing much at all about her “leadership.” After all, most of her Tea Party colleagues in the House voted to raise the debt ceiling for a mess of pottage, a meager cut in the rate of government metastasization.
“If that’s your view of effective leadership with results, please stop, because you’re killing us,” Pawlenty snarled Bachmann.
In other words, what Pawlenty has implied is this: if cleaving to the right ideas doesn’t penetrate the wrong heads, a real leader should “stop” agitating for the truth as he or she sees it. By the Pawlenty logic, Paul ought to have given up ages ago on talking sound money and foreign policy.
Pawlenty stuck out as particularly statist.
More later.
UPDATE I: MY Straw Poll Prediction. The 2011 Iowa Straw Poll: My sense is that R. Paul and M. Bachmann will win out. This win will highlight even more my long-standing contention that, to take the country back, these two have to collaborate.
UPDATE II: VALIDATED. I called the straw poll (above) 36 minutes ago, as the Talkers pontificated on the TV. Isn’t it time to stop reading and listening to television’s political whores, who never call anything as it is? I describe these Big Mouths’ shtick in the post, “Talkers fear Losing Top-Dog Status.”
Not one (as far as I can tell) of the paid pundits on TV predicted that Bachmann and Paul would win. Yet I’ve been saying the same since “September of 2009, when this column had already picked the GOP’s winning ticket: Ron Paul for commander-in-chief; Michele Bachmann as second-in-command.”
But I’m afraid that the voting public is probably right. For a winning ticket, the order of the ticket needs to be reversed. Bachmann is just that talented. It’s not my choice, but it’s reality.
Bachmann secured 4,823 votes, narrowly besting Texas Rep. Ron Paul who had 4,671 votes. Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty was chosen on 2,293 ballots, placing him third. … Part country fair and entirely political, the Ames Straw Poll has helped take the pulse of a campaign’s strength since 1979. It’s also the first opportunity for the tens of thousands of voters who weighed in Saturday on which GOP president candidate they support.
UPDATE (Aug 14): Clearly the candidates know very little about immigration policy and the labyrinth of visas the bureaucracy peddles. Most American know nothing about the topic. Herman Cain had a good line about there being a path to American citizenship: legal immigration. Back to Mitt, who complained that here in the US, we qualify PhDs in physics and then send them back “home.” Nonsense. The US has “unlimited access to individuals with unique abilities through the open-ended O-1 visa program … that is if the US really wanted it.”
Read about the O-1 visa (awarded to my spouse).
Gary Johnson on immigration? He’s just insane.
UPDATE IV: BRAVO LA TIMES. A transcript of the Iowa debate at last. I was looking for the Newt Gingrich segments, because the man did make a few vital points, but of course, reporting being what it is, I could not locate his words verbatim.
“… repeal Dodd-Frank, repeal Sarbanes-Oxley, repeal Obamacare.”
Very good practical points. “The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, courtesy of the Republican Party, cost American companies upwards of $1.2 trillion. The capital flight it initiated caused the London Stock Exchange to become the new hub for capital markets. Given America’s habit of forcing its habits on others, SOX struck fear into quite a few Liberal Democratic hearts in the House of Lords. Lord Teverson worried about the ‘increasing danger of regulatory creep from American regulators that threatens [Britain’s] own light-touch approach to financial regulation.’”
I wasn’t much of a Pawlenty fan to begin with and he certainly didn’t win me over with his contrived logic. Sometimes leadership means standing up for the right ideas, win or lose. I don’t think Pawlenty has the brass “parts” to do that.
I didn’t see the debate. I have seen clips of Ron Paul’s response to questions asked him. (Really, this was not a debate at all, but a question and answer session.) He was clear, concise, and practicle in his answers.
One thing I have trouble understanding is the contention that he “mumbled or fumbled” his answers. Nonsense. How can a man be anymore precise?
Both sides will marginalize Paul and Bachmann. Why? Because the elites are absolutely terrified that either one would actually do something.
And I suspect more than a few of them are deathly afraid that their actions would produce such fantastic results that it would forever change the comfy but impotent dynamics upon which their success depends.
Under all that diatribe no one thinks Paul is ‘kooky.’ On the contrary, they fear that he is right.
Rick Perry dominated. By not being there.
Watched the debate. Paul and Bachmann had some principles, Santorum was a doofus, Romney was banal, but Pawlenty was outright odious. He was attacking Bachmann for not having “ACCOMPLISHMENTS”.
A reminder of 8 years of Dubya-era ACCOMPLISHMENTS: doubling the debt, TARP, Auto Bailouts, American Dream Downpayment (Housing Bubble) Act, TSA, Homeland Security, Patriot Act, doubling the Department of Education with Leave No Child Behind, Prescription Drug Act, Sarbanes-Oxley, Iraq War, Afghanistan Nation-building Occupation (after kicking out Al Queda), numerous defense department boondoggles, “Enemy Combatant” doctrine, expanded Drug War. ethanol subsidies….
On the other hand, ALL the Republicans seemed to imply (led by Bachmann) that the economy could be magically turned around in 3 months. When asked whether they would accept $ 1 in tax increase for every $ 10 in spending cuts, they all said no. Would I agree to cut $ 1 Trillion from the federal budget for $ 100 Billion of more taxes?? – in a heartbeat! Pushing the tax burden onto Fed Counterfeiting and future generations is obscene.
Paul and Gary Johnson are the ones I trust the most. Bachmann is a bit of a mixed bag to me – and the others are plutocratic fascists.
My reading of the cross tabs in the various polls sez Paul/Bachmann has the best chance of winning in 2012
1) Ron pulls center/left away from Barry, MB runs the center left back to Barry ( a real key in 12 )
2) MB as VP will give center/right the push to support Ron much the way Palin did for McCain in 08
3) Ron has a more consistent record of standing on principle folks on all sides of the aisle respect that makes folks who may not agree with Ron on everything respect him so they can justify voting for him , MB as VP is more of a fire brand & will shore up rank & file Rep. which Ron will need to win a general election
4) Ron almost beating MB in her home State shows broader strength in support
5) Ron has a much more solid base of support , he has consistently risen in the polls & support & has not gone up or down like most of the others
6) things in politics can change on a dime but at the current trend Ron is on pace to be the front runner going into Iowa NH
7) Ron is the one the establishment fears the most , look at the way Rick S attacked him in the Iowa debate
“Millions for defense but not one penny for tribute.”
The idea of feeding the federal pig even one more penny in taxes is odious.
As Ilana writes, now is the time to stand on principle.
Hopefully, the Obama nightmare will result in a 2012 blowout in favor of Rand Paul-types, rendering the FOX newsboy’s question moot.
Tim’s gone. Fox said this morning that he had withdrew. Good! If all you can do at the supper table is gripe about the person on the other side of the table, who needs you. Fox is still calling Romney “The front runner.” I could agree to a Paul/Bachmann or Paul/Johnson ticket.
That goon Pawlenty is OUT – but other than winnowing out some self-annointed world-savers, these “straw polls” are not very meaningful.
It is difficult to conceive the Republican Country Club giving the keys to Ron Paul – Goldwater got the nod once and half the establishment (including Papa Romney) sat on their butts rooting for LBJ. Reagan managed to win against a pathetic Carter, a John Anderson 3rd party and with a dreadful economy and an Iranian hostage debacle. The Statist Establishment will not go down easily.
Don’t know where Mitt thinks we have a Physics Ph.D. shortage – if so, why I am hustling my a** all the time like a cheap street hooker trying to get funding????
Link to Johnson is down.
Yes, good riddance to Pawlenty. And no doubt Ron Paul is, on most issues, the best of the lot. Unfortunately, he has all the charisma of a beached haddock on a hot day. Nominee will be Rick Perry, who is good on only a couple of issues: limited gov’t & Guns. And that’s enough for me. Ultimately, outstanding issues in America are going to be resolved by bullets not ballots. 1860——–>2012.
Ron Paul is the bees knees but he is unelectable because the msm has already declared such. They’re trying to declare Michelle unelectable but she’s too savvy and has too much red state support. I like her. I’m waiting, like everyone else, for Rick Perry to start rolling. I like him but I’m wary. He is too pretty and too slick. He looks like a Southern Baptist music director or a democrat congressman. I still like him until he shows feet of clay.