The Republican debate
Here’s a thread for all ye brave folk who are tuning in.
[NOTE: Stephen Green at PJ writes: “I haven’t seen this many people looking this uncomfortable being so close to one another since my first mixer.”]
The New Neo
A blog about political change, among other things
I’m having trouble understanding the purpose of these debates, unless it is to anoint a clear front-runner before the primaries begin and the voters get to have their say.
The Tigers really need a win tonight.
Here’s a comment from Ira Stoll that i agree with;
“The big loser in the debate was the Bloomberg News-Washington Post combine, which delivered so many questions animated by left-liberal assumptions – why won’t you raise taxes to balance the budget like Ronald Reagan? What will you do about the terrible problem of people being rich at the same time as other people being poor? How eager will you be to compromise with the Democrats to raise taxes? Why aren’t more Wall Street executives in jail – that the program at times felt not like a debate among the Republican presidential candidates, but like a debate between the group of Republican politicians, on one side, and the group of journalists, on the other. It’s not that the journalists were hard left, just that they were kind of conventionally left-moderate in a predictably, plodding fashion.”
Absolutely true. The MSM position is so relentlessly left of center, the questions always sound like some version of the old, “When did you quit beating your wife?” or “Why do you believe wife beating is good for the country?”
Ira points out where Mitt went wrong (His less than hard core conservative bent.) even though he delivered a decent performance. Read it all here:
http://tinyurl.com/3mxatnx
Herman Cain’s 999 plan got a bit of push back. As a resident of a state with a high sales tax, I am opposed to adding another 9% on top of the 8.5% we already pay. 17.5% will change consumer behaviours and not in a good way for an economy that is highly dependent on selling consumer goods.
Herman is a mixed bag, but so are the rest of the candidates.
What I care about is:
1. Fiscal sanity. (Cut government spending and intrusion)
2. The ability to be C-in-C. (Necessary inner toughness and heart to defend the country.)
3. Electability. (An ability to appeal to enough independents to win.)
Still no favorite. I like Newt’s brains and feistiness, Cain’s biography and business experience, Bachmann’s fighting spirit, Romney’s business experience. None of them impress me as being the ONE. When the dust settles, though, I willl work for and support whoever wins the nomination.
Maybe it’s because I live in Texas and we’ve weathered this depression better than most of the rest of the country but I like Rick Perry.
What I really don’t understand is why we cannot have some debates with some moderators from the various wings of the Republican Party. Why are the Donks getting to pick our nominee, again? It worked so well with McCain. He got the nomination, thinking the press would be his friends since they had been while he was so reliable in attacking conservatives. And then, on a dime, he became an evil ultraconservative.
I don’t understand why everyone’s griping about Perry so much: let’s give the guy a chance to find his footing. The primaries haven’t even started yet, and people in various blogs are already trying to convince themselves that Indigo Romney “won’t be so bad. At least he’s smart.”
Well, a hammer is a hammer, but it kinda matters what you’re pounding with it: a nail or your thumb.
And Stephen Green is hilarious. You get the gist of the whole darn thing in ten minutes’ reading, with black humor. (I saw only the idiocy of Michele Bachmann saying to Cain that “if you turn 999 upside down, you get 666!” Er, mark of the Beast? lady, are you kidding?) At that point, Green consigned her to the padded room.
<blockquote cite="Herman Cain’s 999 plan got a bit of push back. As a resident of a state with a high sales tax, I am opposed to adding another 9% on top of the 8.5% we already pay. 17.5% will change consumer behaviours and not in a good way for an economy that is highly dependent on selling consumer goods."
I think that is inaccurate. The effective tax rate under Cain's plan would be 18% nationally, assuming no deductions for income. I think that's probably an increase in the average. http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html (Average effective rate is 12.4%) Whether you have 10% less income or pay a 10% higher sales tax is irrelevant- it's basically the same in the aggregate (I am assuming the sales tax applies to services as well). A national income tax of 10% is equivalent to a national sales tax of 10%. It's pretty clear this a "tax break for the rich" who now pay around 20-23% average effective rate. Still, not that large of a difference really.
Sorry, not sure what I did there.
I, too, wonder just why it is that Republican candidates let the Left’s wholly-owned MSM frame and ask the questions and dictate the format of these debates? Can’t Republicans set up their own debates, with moderators and questions that are at least neutral, as opposed to”gotcha” questions based on the Left and Obama & Co. talking points, all designed to destroy them and to pit one candidate against the other?
I just finished watching the Republican debate in New Hampshire and my impressions were these:
Of the lower tier candidates, Ron Paul, while calmed down a little, is still the crazy uncle you lock in the basement when company comes, exquisitely groomed and costumed Huntsman continues to underwhelm, Bachmann–as a tax lawyer–really knew her stuff, Santorum is the furthest right of any of the candidates and, if he had a chance, I would vote for him.
Of the candidates who are currently likely within striking distance of the nomination, Perry is looking less and less satisfactory, and so is Cain, and Cain is just too glib. What does Cain have to offer other than “9-9-9”? For instance, how do Perry or Cain see the lay of the land and what are their positions and plans in the areas of foreign affairs and national defense? Moreover, I very much agree with Bachmann and Santorum’s point that, by imposing a 9% national sales tax, Cain’s 9-9-9 plan just gives the federal government a new revenue stream that, once given, will never be able to be wrested from then again. On further exposure, both Perry and Cain seem less knowledgeable and substantial than they first appeared to be, and after Obama we desperately need a knowledgeable and “substantial” President.
Romney looks the part and is, by and large, saying the right things, but my impression is that, in general, he is just too liberal.
After 90 minutes of questions and some debate, my overwhelming impression is of just how superior, just how much–head and shoulders–Newt Gingrich is above all the other candidates—more experienced, more articulate, more intelligent and well-read, more knowledgeable, thoughtful, and tougher, and a man with realistic, superior vision and comprehension of the intimidating challenges we face on all fronts–foreign and domestic, and of the solutions that will work, and I am not put off, as some are, by Newt’s marital problems.
I am hoping that, in the weeks and months ahead, as each of the other candidates weaknesses become apparent, Newt will pull into the front of the pack.
maybe they should just have guys like this sing at the podium, merge it with american idol of the xfactor… and voila…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QTfNEDgusQ&feature=player_embedded
Wolla Dalbo – I’ve been scared of admitting it, but I might as well come out of the closet: I’m with you on Gingrich. If I have to choose between two candidates with severe flaws, but also with the grit and intelligence to manage the hell the left will unleash in 2012, I’ll go with him over Romney in a heartbeat.
I don’t care if he can get the nomination. I simply can’t ACQUIESCE to Romney before he is a fait accompli.
I think me and you are the only ones on this bandwagon, though 🙁
All of the Republican candidates are more knowledgeable, articulate and thoughtful than &emptybama.
Why are we being so critical of our candidates.
There is a lot of merit to Romney’s 59 point plan and Cain’s 9-9-9 plan and Bachman and Perry would be head and shoulders better than &emptybama.
Yes we can find problems with each of them but they are the solution this mess because each of them understand that the federal government is the reason for the economic issues.
We are under seige from so many departments and agencies of the federal government. It isn’t one man (&emptybama) or one party or one branch of government. It’s from every angle that we are suffering.
Consider Harrisburg, PA and Vallejo, CA. Cities going into bankruptcy.
Consider business after business sitting on capital or unable to grapple with costs and going into bankruptcy.
Consider the american people with the entitlement complex or the amount of people holding onto their money knowing what is coming.
We need to get to an understanding of:
a) personal responsibility
b) national security
c) scaling down the government to meet the core issues spellled out in the constitution so as the safety net for the elderly and non-able bodied isn’t diluted.
bama
Kolnai:
That better be a pretty big wagon you’re on: I’m on it too, and I think a lot of others out there are inching closer to Newt after every debate. He’s a little supercilious (let me teach you hick something) but he truly knows his stuff, considers the options, and comes up with a good perspective. Can he run an administration? Can he delegate decision making to a cabinet of mere mortals? Those are questions we need answers to before we go in whole-hog behind him.
One thing I couldn’t help but notice as I watched this debate was the sense of superiority exuded by Moderator Charlie Rose and the other questioners, and especially by the Washington Post’s political correspondent, Karen Tumulty, and to a considerably less extent, by Bloomburg TV’s White House correspondent, Julianne Goldman.
In addition to all of the Leftist spin they put on all their questions, instead of being there to facilitate the debate in any way they could, instead of, essentially, being invisible in this debate process, it appeared to me that Charlie Rose, Goldman and especially Tumulty were under the impression that they were on the same footing, were just as important in this process–if not more important –than the candidates themselves. This kind of arrogance should not be allowed.
F –
Agreed. I’m by no means terribly enthusiastic about Newt, but in objective terms he can match and best Romney in every area (except, perhaps, electability. If he doesn’t go up in the polls, we’ll never get any halfway decent data on that).
My thinking on Gingrich is, roughly, this:
He’s politically as smart as Romney;
he’s the only person in the field who could mop the floor with Obama in a debate (what a cathartic sight that would be);
he’s no more mendacious or flaky than Romney, and his instincts are conservative, unlike Romney’s;
he’s as solid, if not more so, on foreign policy as Romney;
he’s grounded, in contrast to Romney, in conservative political philosophy, the principles of which, incidentally, he actually understands and can articulate beautifully;
he has real, rather astounding conservative legislative achievements under his belt, of which Romney has exactly zero (just compare what Gingrich achieved with a Democratic President to what Romney “achieved” with a Democratic legislature – I’d trust Gingrich to negotiate “across the aisle” far more than Romney);
and his personal problems are every bit as “baked in the cake” as Romney’s supposedly are.
Furthermore, he’s the one candidate in the field who can claim to have balanced the budget (whether or not it’s strictly true, it’s a meme, and people accept that it happened). I don’t know how far that and welfare reform can carry him in the general, but it’s something.
All in all I’m with you on your caution. I’m not convinced yet that Newt is electable, but at the same time, I think he’s more electable than anyone else save Romney. That may not be good enough, but for now I’m going to stick with Newt and see what happens.
Judging from the blogs, however, it looks like it’s just me, you, and Wolla on the bandwagon. I was happy to see the one Tea Party leader endorse him, but no one else of any import has stepped forward to lend any sort of words of encouragement. Not at NRO, not at Commentary, not at Red State, not at Patterico or Ace, not Jacobson, not Pajamas… no one.
There’s many good reasons not to support Newt, but as Cain flames out and Perry fades into the night, there will not remain standing another credible Not Romney in the race. The question then will boil down to electability, and it’s likely Romney will continue to look a lot better in that regard. I still won’t vote for him in the primaries.
Czech Major General Jan Sejna
and KGB Major Anatoliy Golitsyn 27 years ago
Soviet communism would fake its demise
promote European integration
(European soviet/European union)
End a reason for NATO to exist
End the split between Russia and China (cooperation)
all with the idea and intent to collapse the economies of capitalism, and have a war… or negate their power and sovereignty in a collective of states under one iron fist…
27 years ago…
Most predictions coming true by the 1990s
“In the new worldwide communist federation the present different brands of communism would disappear, to be replaced by a uniform, rigorous brand of Leninism”
in march, the people of russia only will have two choices… which arent choices… either KGB chekist Putin, or Gennady Zyuganov…
Russia’s Putin says wants to build “Eurasian Union”
ca.news.yahoo.com/russias-putin-says-wants-build-eurasian-union-222139037.html
“Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said he wants to bring ex-Soviet states into a “Eurasian Union”
Putin, who once called the collapse of the USSR in 1991 “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century,” said his new project would not resemble the Soviet Union.
“It would be naive to attempt to restore or copy something from the past. However, a stronger integration on a new political and economic basis and a new system of values is an imperative of our era,” Putin wrote.
another quote Putin writes:
We do not live on an island in isolation…
and while we are discussing mostly bs, the rest of the machine is moving its pieces and things into place as it has been for over 40 years… as the invention of nuclear weapons precluded direct over war, and allowed only a covert version
and thanks to stalin moving russian populations into each country by force, planting a loyal sub population… one which would either have to be removed or exterminated to prevent what comes. something he also knew the west would not do, so the end result was then fixed.
Latvia’s pro-Russian party rocks the vote
rt.com/politics/pro-russian-wins-poll-latvia-847/
elswhere:
Putin concludes that “the way out of the global crisis” is to be found through regional integration, mentioning as positive examples the European Union, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, North American Free Trade Agreement, and Association of Southeast Asian Nations. “These ‘bricks’ can assemble into a more stable global economy,” he states.
ah… so the critics that were denounced were correct?
Fold the European Union and combine it with Commonwealth of “Independent” States, Union State of Russia and Belarus, Customs Union, and CSTO military alliance into one Eurasian Union
from there, Shanghai Cooperation Organization can enter with China and Iran… The African Union, Union of South American Nations will also help
now… if only we can understand the tautology…
Tautology (rhetoric) using different words to say the same thing even if the repetition does not provide clarity. Tautology also means a series of self-reinforcing statements that cannot be disproved because the statements depend on the assumption that they are already correct.
different words to say the same thing so that people dont get it… if only they used the same words to hint to their people what they are… if only they dotted their speech and ways with words like league, democracy, union, equality, peoples, cooperative, collective, and tons more..
i mean what if neo liberal, fabian, socialist, communist, fascist, sovereign democracy, scientific socialism, marxism, communitarianism, third way, lennist, stalinist, maoist, trostkyite, anarchist, unionist, freedom fighter, revolutionary, and all that was not 30 things, but 1 thing seen from many angles?
Semiotics also called semiotic studies or (in the Saussurean tradition) semiology, is the study of signs and sign processes (semiosis), indication, designation, likeness, analogy, metaphor, symbolism, signification, and communication. Semiotics is closely related to the field of linguistics, which, for its part, studies the structure and meaning of language more specifically.
Speech Codes Theory – refers to a framework for communication in a given speech community. As an academic discipline, it explores the manner in which groups communicate based on societal, cultural, gender, occupational or other factors.
Proposition 1: Wherever there is a distinctive culture, there is to be found a distinctive speech code
Proposition 2: A speech code involves a culturally distinct psychology, sociology, and rhetoric.
Proposition 3: The significance of speaking depends on the speech codes used by speakers and listeners to create and interpret their communication.
Proposition 4: The terms, rules, and premises of a speech code are inextricably woven into speaking itself.
Proposition 5: The artful use of a shared speech code is a sufficient condition for predicting, explaining, and controlling the form of discourse about the intelligibility, prudence, and morality of communication conduct.
Factual disputes involve propositions about facts and are settled only by getting more factual information
Verbal disputes involve statements that people think involve controversies over objects named by their words, when they really involve arguments about the words themselves
Cannot be resolved by investigating facts
Statements that Involve Verbal Disputes
Analytic statements, tautologies, and definitions: the meanings for words
Contradictions, paradoxes, and oxymorons
Attitude axioms
Metaphysical statements
Tautologies – statements that assert that one term may be substituted for another
Tautology Proposition Examples
Samuel Clemens is Mark Twain
A yard is three feet long
All bachelors are unmarried
and of course.. socialists are communists
If no sense experience could verify or falsify a statement, then it is simply not about the world we experience with our five senses
Metaphysical Statements
Statements about things that cannot be observed in this life
Example: There is a God in heaven, There is life after death, There are seven astral planes
or that communism will lead to utopia and a better life for all….
Why Are There Misunderstandings?
We forget that
1. Language creates a social reality Whorf-Sapir hypothesis
2. Language is, by its very nature, incomplete
the hazy claim
ungrammatical incompleteness
the incomplete comparison
the non exclusive claim
weasel words
3. Language reflects culture
[and forget that despite believing we all live and share the same culture, a woman in a woman studies feminist course and in all that is actually in a different culture… as are black liberationists, anarchists, and so on… hint hint]
from teenagers constructing their own language
to codes speech… and windtalkers of WWII
the way to have a speech and have true beleivers and useful followers in the same room and not get caught is to construct a tautological speech.
when we say peace, we mean no fighting and a pluralistic world that gets along
when they say peace, they mean a world in which there is no opposition to socialism…
you see… such things allow a certain ambiguity.
you can know that league means communist, but then speech codes theory stops you from referring to the leauge of women as communists (Despite feminism openly saying they are such!!!!)
its like its ok to konw someone is a whore, you just cant talk about it.
its what allows helen thomas to be a nazi, and no one catch her till she slips.. she has a safe deniable language that can be used in which no one can call her on it… until she slips.
you have to ‘get’ that dragons are not scary to dragons, nor are they appaled by other dragons…
but what DO nazi, socialist, despotic dragons fear?
of course when i brought this up years ago, of course the group then didnt think it applies… but it does and its key… it allows a person to sit and have a conversation in front of others and they not get it.
this is how you can have a video with a person claiming that the goal of the far right is the destruction of the middle class… huh? the destruction of the bourgeoisie was always a marxist goal… but if you ‘get’ the tautology… then you get that right and left are both socialism… and so, they BOTH are for that destruction… so you standing to the left of the destructors you see, does not mean your opposite them, thats an assumption.
so… if you get the tautology, you will get the hints they HAVE to drop in speeches.
but if you deny that people speak in codes, despite you doing it yourself… or are you square, and not hip? are you with it man? the language games of the past and education was to loosen up the language so we could not determine meaning so much and so cant pin the fly to the wall.
the idea you can get degrees in this and have a phd and the common man doesnt even know it exists… is a big point…
Thinking about Cain’s signature “9-9-9 Plan”–which Bachmann and Santorum blew a pretty big hole in last night, with their point that giving the Federal government a new income stream i.e. a 9% national sales tax, would give them even more money to squander and, moreover, with no assurance at all that that 9% would not grow to become 12%, or 15%, or even a European sized 30% in the future–I am really starting to wonder about it.
Cain’s rebuttals, first, that as President he wouldn’t sign an increase above 9%–which doesn’t take into account the Presidents who will come after him, and his second point that, since the American people would be against such an increase, it wouldn’t get through the Congress, pretends that our recent history, and the duplicitous and forced passage of Obamacare and other major pieces of Leftist legislation that was rammed through Congress despite their rejection by a majority of citizens, just never happened.
All in all, very unconvincing rebuttals.
Thus, I am beginning to think that Cain’s “9-9-9” plan is just a catchy gimmick, not well thought out, and really no more substantial, or likely to be effective than Obama’s “Hope” and “Change,” assuming that most people didn’t understand the “Change” that Obama was selling to mean the destruction of our Capitalist economy, creeping Economic Fascism, and a headlong rush towards a Socialist government.
real hope:
We Are The 53%
http://the53.tumblr.com/page/7
its growing, and growing…
and no one is getting paid…
My understanding of the 9-9-9 thing is that it was derived from looking at current expenditures and finding ways to pay for them. Seems to me it might be better to look at cutting costs before baking those numbers in. I don’t accept that the current budget is worth preserving.
biden responds to the debate..
sort of..
Biden Warns of More Rapes and Murders If Jobs Bill Is Not Passed
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/biden-warns-more-rapes-and-murders-if-jobs-bill-not-passed_595784.html
Wolla Dalbo and kolnai:
I saw a couple of interesting things by reading a lot of comments on other blogs about last night’s debate.
One person made the point that he/she was glad that these debates are run by liberals, because it gives the Republican candidates lots of experience in fielding the kind of questions they will have to answer in any debate with Obama, the “gotcha” ones. Friendly moderators of the conservative sort wouldn’t afford that opportunity. These debates are not being watched by lots of people, but the presidential ones will be. So those who are watching now get not only an introduction to the candidates and a chance to see how they perform under fire, but under a specific type of fire: liberal fire. No use selecting a nominee in the primaries who cannot perform well in that sort of venue.
Another thing is that I’ve seen tons of conservatives in the comments section saying the equivalent of “Newt’s so smart, he’s such a good debater, too bad he’s Newt.” Lots of people seem to recognize both his huge pluses and his huge minuses. The latter, IMHO, make him unelectable.
I think a national sales tax would actually help cap taxes. It may be a different income stream, but it is completely transparent how much you pay with it. Everyone in the US would feel it, so when taxes need to go up to accommodate spending, there would be more resistance. When we don’t pay for the new spending and borrow as we currently do, government expands.
And, I think a mix of a sales tax with an income tax actually makes sense from a stable revenue standpoint; if incomes fall, and people spend savings, there’s still revenue coming in. We have such precipitous drops in revenue precisely because so few pay the income tax and the income tax itself is balanced on only a small portion of the upper pyramid of earners.
I also disagree that the 9-9-9 idea is as empty as hope and change. It reflects real ideas and a change in how we view and fund government. First, more people would actually contribute to the general revenue. We say, “The bottom 50 don’t pay taxes!” Opponents respond, “They pay social security tax and medicare!” Which, of course, is returned 20 fold in retirement, so it’s not really a fair comparison. The average couple receives $1m in ss and medicare benefits after age 65. No one in the bottom 50 pays close to that in tax.
And, yes, it’s arbitrary. But what’s so well thought out about our current tax brackets? They are meaningless percentages because no one actually pays the percent. The effective tax rate is always much lower because of all of the “tax expenditures”= deductions. So, a transparent and flat tax is really a very different way of funding government and represents a shift in thinking. I’m not endorsing Cain, but I think the idea is being dismissed as a gimmick when in fact our current tax code is rife with gimmicks, and conservatives just generally distrust large changes, even if those changes are positive.
Newt would make a kick ass white house press secretary for the next administration.
Also, in response to the Bachman/Santorum criticism- what guarantee do we have now that taxes will not go up? None. The highest marginal rate has been 92%! And was 50% during the early Reagan years until the 1986 reforms lowered it to 38%.
PS. The top marginal rate the first year of the income tax? 7%. Talk about gimmicky numbers 😉
I wonder whether Newt really considers himself a viable candidate. Perhaps he just wants to influence the tone and direction of the debates. If he doesn’t care about winning, he can say things that other candidates can’t without scaring away voters. His endorsement would also buy him a voice in the next administration, if not a position.
Say Newt became Secretary of State–a position that from her current looks is driving Hillary into the ground–what influence would he really have on policy if say, Cain, or Romney were President?
I have no idea what Newt thinks, but if I were he I would be trying to become President because otherwise–whatever influence he might have in a subordinate position–it would be much more limited than if her were President, and calling all the shots.
I favor Newt, too. What are all his negatives everyone refers to? The story on how he served divorce papers to his wife in the hospital is false. Is that part of it, though, the divorces and affair? Or was it the problem with the PAC? Or is he just a difficult person to get along with? He actually seems to have a social grace. So, what’s the baggage?
neo –
I’ve made the same point here (on the thread after Perry’s second debate). Bottom line: if a candidate can’t take this heat, he’d better get out of the kitchen, for the incinerator is coming.
Cathy –
I think the negatives with Newt are as much perception as reality, but as we know, in politics perception mostly is reality. I’m not entirely convinced yet that they make him unelectable, but neo certainly speaks for most (including conservatives) when she says his negatives make him a non-starter. The usual line I see on the blogs is something like this:
“Newt, as usual, was brilliant and articulate – too bad he’s temperamentally unsuited to be President.”
It’s taken for granted, and that’s a tough mountain to scale.
Did you see, however, Allahpundit’s piece at hotair today? He basically said what I did above: If Cain and Perry don’t really meet the full gamut of “Not Romney” needs, that leaves them with very little over Newt.
“Exist question,” concludes AP in typical fashion, “Second look at Newt?”
It couldn’t hurt, IMHO.
The phrase that comes to mind when evaluating Newt’s performance over the last years and months is “a command of the issues,” a command of both domestic and foreign issues that none of the other candidates has demonstrated or even come close to; I suspect (with good reason) that many of the candidates could not even identify the major countries of the world on an outline map if their lives depended on it.
I suppose Newt’s professorial air–some say his arrogant air–puts some people off. But, honestly, if you really knew what you were doing and did have a command of the issues–a one-eyed man in the kingdom of the blind–and were watching the clownish and feeble fumblings and stumblings of most members of Congress, Obama & Co,. and most of your fellow rivals for the nomination, wouldn’t you be a little disgusted with the whole mess?