I know this is late, but a few thoughts on the republican debate last night . . . -- (edited)
Posted by
pmb (aka pmb)
Dec 16 '15, 13:13
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First I thought Jeb! had a good night, until the closing statement where he absolutely botched it and looked like a deer in the headlights. I wonder if that undid any good he had done earlier.
My daughter showed me a tweet that said that Ted Cruz look like the offspring of Mrs. Doubtfire and Dracula. That is eerily accurate.
I know it's going to be all about bashing Obama, but the extent to which they make these assumptions that he's doing nothing because it's not public is silly. I have little doubt we are responding in kind to the Chinese cyber-attacks, but that's just not going to be publicly acknowledged. They pretend it's not happening.
Listening to Chris Christie argue that he's the best man to fight terrorism because he did it as a federal prosecutor is hilarious. Sorry, but prosecuting a terrorist in a US court of law is not the same as fighting ISIS in the Middle East.
Virtually all of them (Rand aside) seems to think that acting tough and provoking our adversaries is the way to get them to do what we want. Being tough has its place but it is not the only tool. This goes to Bill Clinton's statement that people would rather hear people talk tough and be wrong that sound weak and be right.
The idea that Obama should not have pursued the Climate Agreement and instead have been pursuing more attacks on ISIS shows a massive misunderstanding of the relative dangers we're facing and overlooks the shocking possibility that the president and his staff can pursue more than one issue at a time. It would be nice if all issues waited their appropriate turns. They don't.
I'm more convinced than ever that Trump still hasn't figured out that if he wins this he will actually have to govern and try to deal with complex issues. The only response to anyone challenging his viewpoint is "my poll numbers are higher than yours". He just thinks this is a game he's supposed to win.
Rubio again did well, but I'll be curious whether getting challenged on his immigration views (and painted as aligning with the democrats) will resonate with that audience.
Finally, I'm not sure I can sit through more of these. It's ungodly irritating to watch.
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