GOP California Debate: Aftermath
John McCain had big momentum going tonight in the wake of his Florida win, a Giuliani endorsement and an imminent Schwarzenegger endorsement. Romney tried to label him as insufficently conservative at the CNN debate, but gave no sign that he has any new moves that can change the trajectory of the race.
Gergen on CNN: "My sense of it was that Mitt Romney came in needing a couple of touchdowns. At best he got a couple of field goals."
Halperin at The Page gave McCain a B, Romney a D+, but took note of McCain's bad habit of wearing his emotions on his... face: "McCain laughs, smirks, virtually reclines in victory lap while Romney and two other guys flail to no end....As a testament to his strong position in the battle for the nomination, he showed off all of his worst traits – and still won!”
One possibility was that Romney could change the game by attacking McCain's "straight talker" strong suit and challenging him for twisting Romney's position on timetables in Iraq. Romney tried, but Crowley at TNR's Stump called his post "Romney's Missed Opportunity:"
"Boy, was that not the momentum-changer Mitt Romney needed. Overall I saw a mostly predictable news-free affair. But Romney looked to me like a rattled and somewhat defeated figure. Romney was handed one fine opportunity: A question about whether John McCain lied in Florida this week when he charged Romney with supporting a timetable for withdrawal in Iraq early last year. But Romney's response was a stammering, largely incoherent mess."
But still, there was criticism of McCain's sharp tongue and evident disdain for both Romney and his business background, lashing him as a mere "manager" and relishing every chance to cast him as an unprincipled opportunist:
AmSpec Blog:"I don't think there was a big enough moment to change the race, but I agree that McCain should have bit his lip. He should have kept his personal attacks on Romney's wealth to himself. He's the frontrunner, totally unneccessary. He should have been above the fray and presented himself as the leader of the party."
And ditto, from the National Review Online's Corner: ..."Romney... showed an admirable fighting spirit, though it's probably too little too late. McCain was very intemperate, and...his 'for patriotism, not profit' line is just unacceptable. So was the suggestion that Romney's business experience is somehow tainted because he had to lay people off.
McCain clearly doesn't like Romney personally, and it came through tonight in a bad way. That's not the way a frontrunner should act."
And, Andrew Sullivan at Daily Dish: "This struck me as McCain's worst performance of the campaign. He seemed - understandably - exhausted. He kept pushing some untruths about Romney's position on Iraq. He seemed vague and unfocused on the economy. He was also more aggressive in swiping at Romney who was more civil and more engaging than I have seen so far."
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Comments (5)
The REAL story on the debates is not the talking heads who seem to love ROMNEY and HATE McCain. Every time they TALK MCCAIN DOES BETTER.
BUT THAT RON PAUL IS STILL IN,
YES RON PAUL IS STILL IN IT.
EDWARDS IS OUT, RUDY IS OUT
BUT RON PAUL IS STILL IN.
HE KEEPS ON TRUCKING.
VJ Machiavelli
It's unfortunate that Romney and McCain were able to banter with each other endlessly like two brothers over who gets the middle seat on a long family drive. When Ron Paul is given a chance to interact, good old Anderson Cooper interjects. In fact, limiting Ron Paul's opportunities to speak by stopping him from talking and then not asking equal questions to all candidates is a shame. I think CNN is afraid of Ron Paul's answers as he would probably gain many Democratic and Independent votes in an election, thus taking away from glorious Hillary or Obama's winning potential. It seemed like Anderson wanted to poke a stick into the two fighting brothers, McCain and Romney, to just get them to bicker more to put mud on the face of the GOP.
I understand McCain and Romney are front runners right now, so they deserve much attention, but perhaps if the media would at least ask questions equally to all candidates Ron Paul's message would be heard and a different result would be showing right now. The Republicans are afraid of Ron Paul as Ron wants to cut government spending more than any other candidate in the GOP and the Democrats are concerned and do not want a strict constitutionalist taking away their party votes at the end of the day.
Ron Paul will continue though and people will hopefully notice what is going on.
What debate! To have a debate you have to involve all candidates. The debate mediators did a terrible job of keeping all of the candidates involved in the debate. Some of us would like to hear from all of the candidates. The media is trying to make this a 2 person race, and that is unfair to those of us who want to hear from the other candidates so that we can make informed sound decisions.
I find it a travesty that the major media outlets are not reporting on all of the GOP candidates equally. The major media outlets have pretty much stopped reporting on Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee even though many people want to know what these men have to say. Also, why don't the major media outlets talk about how ridiculous the California debate was last night, and the fact that the debate mediators basically igonored Paul and Huckabee. This primary is bogus and I along with many others are losing faith in this country to give a candidate a fair and equitable shot at the presidency. The media owes it to the American people to report on all of the candidates, and we demand and deserve the right to hear from these men during debates. The media needs to step up to the plate and acknowledge the unfair playing field. I am absolutely sick and tired of the media trying to influence this election. Do the right thing and let the people hear the voices of all the candidates.
No debate - just bickering - although anyone who watched cannot say that Romney clearly edged McCain. McCain is terrible and is no candidate of any change. It was so obvious he didn't have the backbone to stand up for what he believes in i.e. pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants - he dodged the question and was back to his past and soldiering for his country, strong foreign policy experience, blah, blah, blah. No way I can vote for someone like him. Paul made some great points!! Huck actually had a few...but again f'ckn CNN shut those 2 out of it.
I saw and heard the Republican debate and can testify that:
McCain performed very poorly.
He was very weak on economy.
When ask about his ability to fix the U.S. economy, he responds with his military and security experience. He even goes into details about his POW experience.
McCain did not study economic 101 or 300 while he was in POW.
The POW environment is not a college campus or university class.
Applying his POW experience to improve the U.S. economy is not the ideal President I would see in the White House.
McCain does not have a very good military background.
He was always on the bottom of this class.
He was not a very good pilot because he kept destroying multi-million-dollar war planes.
Lastly, he was captured and sentenced to POW.
McCain's military history is very poor and that is not the type of President American needs at this time.
Most definitely, he will perform very poorly on the national security issues and as the commander-in-chief.
I am now convinced that I will NOT be voting for McCain in Arizona.
I will be voting for Romney.