(Pic courtesy of DonkeyHotey, via Flikr)
It was a wild night at the GOP Goat Rodeo.
The candidates were in trouble from the start, what with this being a debate about economics and them all being either really uninformed or bat-crap insane or both on this particular issue.
One thing was clear from the start, the moderators were not going to let them just sound bite, they were even warned that the moderators might interrupt them if they were not answering and get them “back on track”.
For a nation that is facing the worst economic crisis in generations you would think that these folks would be prepared, even by the soft bigotry of low expectations that has been the presidential primary debates thus far, but that is where you would be wrong.
One of the first questions was about Italy and what if anything the United States should do to help avert the debt crisis there. Not a single candidate could even conceptualize that if the third largest economy in the euro zone collapses it would seriously affect the US ecomony and the banks here.
The Mad Elf of the GOP, Rep. Ron Paul insisted that we had to let the whole world debt market collapse before we could have any hope of economic growth. This was pretty much his mantra last night, that the only way to fix things is to have a completely unfettered and unregulated market.
He was so staunch on this that he admitted that he wanted to end Medicare and the Student loan program. His contention is inflation is always caused by the government pumping money into any program, even when it achieves a social good. Being an inflation and gold standard hawk, of course he would think this way.
Newt Gingrich made some news by agreeing that we should end student loans as they are now and move to some kind of work study program for all students who need financial aid, like the College of the Ozarks does.
Then there were the real goat rodeo moments. By now you’ve probably heard about or seen Gov. Rick Perry’s complete destruction of not just this campaign but any presidential aspirations. He started to explain what three departments of the government he would abolish if he were president and simply could not remember the third.
When you can’t stay focused enough to explain a three part answer there is something seriously wrong. Is it medication? Is it that fact that he left his brain in his other suit? It does not matter at all, the whole minute long incident has put a giant stone over Perry’s tomb and unlike the deity he worships he won’t be getting up in three days or even three decades. All it would take is a campaign ad with this footage and that is the whole story.
Hell I am unsure if there is even a future for him in Texas now.
Then there was Herman Cain who seemed to be channeling Rudy Giuliani last night. Sure it was a debate about the economy but he was so predictable about saying a noun, a verb and 9-9-9 that it washed over into self parody. At one point he was asked a question and started down this path and the entire audience and all the candidates laughed at the ridiculousness of it all.
It was so bad that in the last question of the night Jim Kramer of Mad Money actually prefaced his question as saying it was one that could not be answered with 9-9-9 or “bold plan”. Even then Cain was unable to resist saying bold plan.
Of course there was a question about his alleged sexual harassment of 4 women (and counting). He gave a very odd answer, saying that for every woman that accused him of sexual harassment there were thousands that did not. That is not really a defense.
He then managed to make things worse by referring to Minority Leader Pelosi, when she was the Speaker of the House as Princess Pelosi. One of the things about a debate is that it tends to put the candidates under pressure. When he was under pressure Cain went to a disparaging remark about a powerful woman. To me this is another piece of damning evidence that he indeed views women in a way that would allow for the kind of behavior that he has been accused of.
Last night was a pretty good night for Jon Huntsman, though it won’t matter. He was doing what he has done all along, and been a more reasonable voice than the rest of the goats, but it is only by comparison that he gets this title.
Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum were really there just taking up space and time with their attempts to be relevant in a nominating contest that has decided they will never be the nominee.
Then there was the presumptive nominee himself. Mitt Romney was sporting a messy hair do that was really distracting to me. I know it is shallow to even mention it but I think it was an intentional decision. One of the knocks (and like all of them on Romney it is true) is that he is always so plastic looking, always so perfectly coiffed. For his team to let him go on stage with little stings of hair hanging over his forehead has to be an attempt to make him look more….er…human I guess. It pretty much failed.
It was a sign of how weird things are in the Republican Party that when he insisted that he was a very consistent person, even on a question about his inconsistency no one laughed. Not a candidate, not a moderator certainly not the audience.
That brings us to the audience. They are an integral part of the Goat Rodeo and they did their job last night. In this case that job was trying to protect Herman Cain from the consequences of being accused of serial sexual harassment. When any question about his character in this regard was voiced they dutifully booed. The good news for the GOP, is that at least they were not cheering executions or booing gay service members.
As always I lament that more folks will not have watched this debate, especially the moderate rank and file Republicans. Exposure to 90 minutes of the goats going through their events should be enough to make any person who is serious about the problems facing the nation recoil in horror.
If there is a bright side I think it is that we will see a winnowing of the field shortly, Perry has no business attending any more of these debates and Cain’s scandal is not going away any time soon and is a career ender.
The down side of that is that it will leave more time for us to have to listen to Gingrich, Bachmann, Santorum and Paul.
The floor is yours.