The desperation at tonight's Fox News Republican Presidential Debate was palpable - and pathetic.
One might think that a candidate for President would, at the very least, occasionally mention the current officeholder, especially when he hails from the same party. Not tonight.
All of the Republicans attempted to distinguish themselves not by discussing Republican President George W. Bush, but by comparing the other candidates to members of the "Democrat Party" - most often the Democrat was U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton. In response, Fox News moderator Chris Wallace cited multiple polls to make a most poignant point to the candidates: "All of you are losing to her."
And the 800-lb. elephant in the room? George W. Bush, who didn't get so much as a shout-out from any of the candidates through the first hour.
"The irony of this is the fact that the same Republican candidates who are campaigning on Bush's failed agenda are too chicken to even mention the President's name," Florida Democratic Party Communications Director Mark Bubriski said. "Instead of talking about solutions for the nation's challenges, the Republican candidates spent the whole debate attacking Senator Clinton and floundering to answer the question that few people care about: 'Who's the Real Republican?'"
In his first response, Mitt Romney used Hillary Clinton's name three times in less than one minute. He included her again in his second statement and also mentioned U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy. Just minutes later, Romney mentioned Clinton twice more. After the commercial break, he still couldn't contain himself by going over his allotted time to directly attack Hillary.
Fred Thompson used Kennedy against Romney and invoked Clinton to attack Rudy Giuliani. He even dropped Mario Cuomo's name to drive home his offensive on Giuliani, who came back and slammed Thompson because he "stood with Democrats over and over again" on tort reform. Later, Giuliani brought back John Kerry and Al Gore, while Thompson went after Hillary once more.
John McCain criticized Romney for emulating Howard Dean, and mentioned "HillaryCare," which was soon followed by Ron Paul attacking "Hillary brand" health care. McCain came back with two more attacks on Hillary later. Not to be outdone, extremist Tom Tancredo resorted to attacking filmmaker Michael Moore. Mike Huckabee, who had seemed to stay above the fray for the first part of the debate, slipped into anti-Hillary mode, and was followed by another attack on Clinton by Paul.
Unfortunately, the Realest Republican wasn't on stage tonight: Florida's own, Katherine Harris.
The Florida Democratic Party tonight debuts Part 2 of "Kitty vs. the Can'tidates" on the wildly successful http://www.DraftKatherineHarris.com. The latest video compares the Real Republican Harris to Governors Huckabee and Romney.
The following are selections from news reports on the candidates' curious omission of Bush in favor of attacks on Clinton during the Republican Party of Florida's convention this weekend.
"The candidates also took shots at Clinton, with at least 10 separate references made to the New York Democrat," the Orlando Sentinel wrote. "President Bush, the politically wounded two-term Republican president, drew barely a mention throughout the daylong convention, even from Greer, the state's party chairman."
"If there was a unifying issue, it was Hillary Clinton. The Democratic front-runner was name-dropped and drop-kicked more than anyone else...The two-term incumbent? Nobody mentioned him," reported the Miami Herald.
"Denouncing Democrats, but avoiding almost any mention of President Bush, party leaders and candidates sought to inspire their base," the Tampa Tribune noted. "If they didn't mention their own party's current leader, the top Republicans repeatedly invoked the names of their opponents to fire up their crowd... 'Their leaders are Jimmy Carter, Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy, John Kerry and Hillary Rodham Clinton,' [RPOF Chairman Jim Greer] said, inciting a repeated string of boos... if those are the dragons, many of the Republicans attending this event haven't settled on a dragon slayer. Significant numbers are still undecided."
"Florida Republicans, splintered by a crowded field of presidential candidates, opened the party's Presidency IV convention Saturday pledging to unify against Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton," the Sentinel reported. "Greer set the tone by using Clinton's position as the likely Democratic nominee as a pre-Halloween scare tactic designed to motivate GOP activists... 'We must support our nominee with every ounce of energy that each one of us possesses...If not, ladies and gentlemen, we shall have Hillary Rodham Clinton sworn in on the Capitol steps as commander in chief of the United States armed forces."
"Usually it's the party outside the White House that rallies against a common foe in a presidential election," the Palm Beach Post wrote. "Not so here on Saturday, where Republican leaders and the party's top presidential candidates drew the biggest applause and seemed to inspire the most unity whenever they slammed Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton. ...Clinton was invoked about as frequently as conservative icon Ronald Reagan during Saturday's events.
USA Today reported that all of the candidates "alluded to the 2000 Florida recount and said the state could reprise its central role in next fall's campaign, possibly against New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton... 'In 2000 you saved us from Al Gore,' Giuliani told more 1,000 (sic) party members. 'We're going to need you in 2008 to save us from Hillary Clinton.'"
"...the candidate whose name was on everyone's lips was Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., who has been widening her lead over the Democratic field," the Tallahassee Democrat reported. University of South Florida Professor Susan MacManus explained the Republicans' fear: "Electability is the only thing that matters. They'll get behind anybody they think can beat Hillary."
The Tallahassee Democrat quoted former state GOP Chairman Al Cardenas worrying that "it might be a tactical mistake for his party to build up Clinton as the strongest opponent. 'Bashing Hillary Clinton gets the best applause on the campaign circuit but it might not be a good idea to put her up on a pedestal," said Cardenas. 'We need to get our people excited about our own candidates first, then bash Hillary Clinton after that.'"