Republican primary debate #5

Lots of tough talk about terrorists, ISIS, and how they would handle it.   Here are some impressions:

1.   Donald Trump was the big loser.   Even more than before, others stood up to him;  and, in his responding, he showed himself to be a buffoon and way out of his league.    Jeb Bush led the attack pretty effectively right off the bat.  Rand Paul later called Trump on trashing the Constitution with some of his proposals.   Trump even got booed by the crowd at one point.   His worst debate night, by far.   Yes, we know that his supporters stick with him, no matter what -- except perhaps when he looks weak.    Which he did tonight.    Down in the polls, finally . . . perhaps.

2.  Jeb Bush was the big surprise to me.    He seemed to have found his confidence -- and had his best debate performance, by far.    His best line (to Trump):  "Donald, you can't insult your way to the presidency."    Began to wear a bit with his continual trash-talk about Obama/Hillary Clinton.   But Christie did it even morso.   Ugh !

3.  In the anticipated dog-fight between Rubio and Cruz, I think Rubio clearly won.   Cruz did not do what he needed to do.   The surprise, to me, was that Cruz's vaunted debate skills didn't match Rubio's detailed responses.    Cruz's pandering to try to win billionaire donor Sheldon Adelson's support by praising Netanyahu was just so obvious as to be sickening.   (It was Adelson's own hotel in Las Vegas where the debate was held, and he has held off picking which candidate he intends to buy the presidency for until after tonight.)    And his absurd wandering from the question about national security to mention (yet again) his two little daughters by name and how it's President Obama's fault that the kids of LA had to miss a day from school because of a (prank) threat.    Ugh x2!

4.   I would Pick Rubio as the overall winner of the debate.    But that may be because merely the sound of Cruz's voice, or the image of his face, affect me like fingernails on blackboard.

5.  I was surprised to find myself agreeing with Rand Paul on foreign policy more than anyone else -- against regime change and trying to fix all the world's problems, some of which we caused by toppling dictators, which leads to chaos.   Pointing out that what some of the others were advocating would mean we would have to pull out of the Geneva Conventions of War.   However, his claque that cheered identically every time he said something began to sound like a recorded sound-track -- and therefore detracted.

6.  The main purpose of most of the candidates, most especially Chris Christie, seemed to be to scare the hell out of everyone about how unsafe we are -- and then promise that he would be the toughest guy of all to protect you.

7.  There were a lot of misstatements of fact, as usual.    Carly Fiorino did her usual head bobbing, staccato emphasis when she said how tough she would be, especially when she was misstating facts.   Emphasizing "finding solutions" instead of just "tough talk," she quoted Margaret Thatcher:  "If you want someone to talk about a problem, ask a man;  if you want someone to fix a problem, ask a woman."  It fell flat with the crowd.    Maybe some were too young to know who Margaret Thatcher was.

8.  Those I thought helped their standing:   Bush, Rubio, Paul.    Those who hurt their standing:   Trump (badly), Cruz probably stalled his recent momentum by not matching expectations.   The others probably didn't change anyone's mind about them.

That's enough. 

Ralph