Debate

We watched the Republican debates yesterday – both of them – and there were no big surprises.  I do think the Fox anchors who moderated the “happy hour” debate did a better job than those handling the prime time event. 

Ted Cruz got fewer questions than the other top ten candidates, and Megan Kelly even refused to allow him to respond to one question.  It made me wonder if the Fox gang has already written him off as a viable candidate. 

Nobody in either debate, with the possible exception of Carly Fiorina, really gained ground over the others.  I thought, and all the pundits are agreeing, that she stood out over all the other bottom seven hopefuls.

Rick Perry handled himself much better than four years ago, and Jeb Bush comes across as a lot smoother that his brother.  Donald Trump, while I may agree with him on several issues, comes across as a jerk – someone I would be embarrassed to support. Ben Carson was quietly impressive, and had what was easily the best closing statement of the night.  

I suppose that it was an unreasonable expectation, but I was hoping to find one candidate in the field that I could really get behind – the idea of Hillary Clinton as president is too awful to consider – but what we got was a whole bunch of folks who were only slightly better than the alternative.