Blatant Reality

By Jonathan Williams

Since I seem to be experiencing a small bout of the flu, I have decided to stay home and blog about the debate. So instead of “drunk blogging” like Vodka Pundit has pioneered, I have decided to start something new called “sick blogging.” Hopefully this will be the last time I will have to do this.

 

UPDATE (8:02pm CST)

Well, before they started the debate, they had some folk song person sing the national anthem which seemed to have been a tape. Pretty weird.

 

UPDATE (8:20pm CST)

First Topic: Economy and Recession

 

Romney: He feels sorry about people losing jobs, but he does want to help…somehow.

 

McCain: Doesn’t believe we are heading into a recession and that we will never get some of the jobs back that we have lost in Michigan and South Carolina. Also wants to stop the spending and wont allow any more pork barrel spending. Plus he points out that he is called the “sheriff” in the Senate.

 

Huckabee: Supports fair tax.

 

Giuliani: Cut spending and cut taxes. Less regulation. Plus there is too much suing

 

Paul: He doesn’t want to spend more gov’t money to stimulate the economy. Artificially low interest rates are the reason for the recession.

 

Thompson: Points out that 5% unemployment used to be considered “full employment.”

 

UPDATE (8:22pm CST)

McCain said that climate change has to be addressed. I say, What if the change is natural?

 

UPDATE (8:28pm CST)

Thompson believes the Reagan revolution is over then he started a rant about how Huckabee is a liberal. The scary thing is that there was a long applause afterwards. Luckily Huckabee had a witty comeback that was just as long as Thompson’s.

 

When he was finished, Huckabee winked at the audience and they applauded. Has to be a good sign.

 

UPDATE (8:33pm CST)

HAHA! They just asked Paul about the “truthers” supporting him! But he won’t ask them to stop preaching their rhetoric. Then he insisted on joining the debate of the previous question as if he was a top tier candidate. He did get some applause though, which is scary.

 

UPDATE (8:45pm CST)

Next topic: Iran!

 

Huckabee: The commanders made the right decision when confronted by Iranian forces. Plus, all our enemies should be ready to face the “gates of hell” if they decide to mess with us. That got him some applause.

 

Thompson: Same question. He feels that if the Iranians went one more step farther they might have been introduced to the “virgins” that they are so willing to meet.

 

Giuliani : Iran cannot become a nuclear power and every country should sanction Iran.

 

McCain: Shouldn’t second guess the captains of those US ships. Suggests that maybe the Iranians think that we are weaker because of the NIE report. However, he believes that this was a very serious confrontation.

 

Paul: He would urge more caution and and compared it to a potential Gulf of Tonkin. Then he stated that speed boats couldn’t hurt the US Navy ships. I would just to remind everyone of the Yemen incident where a small boat actually did hurt a US vessel.

 

Romney: We need to put pressure on Iran. In fact, we need to put “extraordinary” pressure on them.

 

UPDATE (8:53pm CST)

Ron Paul: We should get out of the middle east and not support anyone. Ever.

 

McCain: Its all about the casualties, not our presence, that everyone is mad about

 

UPDATE (9:03pm CST)

Next Topic: Pakistan

 

Thompson: Democracy is important in Pakistan and it is in our interest for them to become a full democracy. He also mentioned that Pakistan is the only Muslim nation that has nukes.

 

Romney: Interests in Pakistan : 1) Nukes are secure. 2) Hunt down al Queda. Plus we need to move the Muslim world towards modernity.

 

Huckabee: Pakistan needs more accountability with our money. Plus we don’t want to just push Musharraf out because we don’t know who might take his place.

 

Giuliani: Make sure that that Pakistan hunts down al Queda.

 

Thompson: We shouldn’t be worried where the support money goes in the military in Pakistan because the military is what they are going to fight al Qaeda with. My question to him would be, “What if the money is going towards building more nukes?” That is the reason why I think there needs to be accountability in where our support goes.

 

UPDATE (9:14pm CST)

Huckabee responds to allegations that he raised taxes. He admits that he did and the reason was because he wanted to fix the school system, the roads, and the environment. He stated that in Arkansas, education was ranked 49th and now it is ranked 8th and the roads were the worst but after he was down they were the most improved.

 

By the way, Thompson is viciously attacking Huckabee in this debate.

 

UPDATE (9:16pm CST)

By the way, this whole “sick blogging” experience is exactly what its cut out to be: It sucks.

 

UPDATE (9:20pm CST)

They asked Huckabee a question about his faith and he joked about how he seemed to be the only one asked religious questions. He thought that it was normally off limits. He continued that maybe he should be allowed to pass around an offering tray. His answer satisfied the audience enough for him to receive a hearty applause.

 

UPDATE (9:23pm CST)

Here is Right Wing News’ take on Huckabee’s last answer:

10:19: A wife must submit to her husband? Mike Huckabee with a funny answer on religion. It is true. Very funny. Brilliant answer. Mike on marriage, Mike sticking up for God, Mike being funny. Huck turned this into a towering home run.

I completely agree.

 

UPDATE (9:35pm CST)

Next topic: Immigration.

Blah. Its the exact same answers from the ABC Debate.

 

UPDATE (9:40pm CST)

Finally its over. And the winner tonight I think is a tie between Huckabee and Thompson. Thompson would probably get my final vote as the winner just because I think he FINALLY stood out and wasn’t passive. All I got to say to this is its about time Fred.

 

UPDATE (9:50pm CST)

Here are some other posts about the debate:

 

Gateway Pundit
Michelle Malkin
Right Wing News