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Republican Debate Open Thread
I’ve been out for a few hours – I was speaking as the Jewish representative at a Gay Pride Week Interfaith Service. What did our Republican candidates have to say?
Chris Cillizza at Washington Post’s The Fix
New York Times’ The Caucus
CNN’s Political Ticker
Some Comments from Blogtopia:
John at AMERICAblog: The “gay stuff” from the GOP debate
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11 Responses to “Republican Debate Open Thread”
Holly,
You’ll probably be upset to hear that of the ten Republican candidates, not one of them supported gays being allowed to serve openly in the military. Each of them explicitly stated their support for the current “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.
In fact, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain even went so far as to argue that the current “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy is working great. And this was AFTER the moderator pointed out that this policy was responsible for causing the discharge of numerous badly-needed Arabic translators.
This was a lost opportunity for Rudy Giuliani to demostrate the gay tolerant wing of the GOP.
And for that matter, it was also a lost opportunity for Ron Paul to articulate the libertarian position on gays in the military (i.e. sexual orientation should have no basis in deciding who should and should not serve in the military).
Wow! In terms of giving all the candidates equal time, these debates are a complete joke:
The Democratic Presidential Debate:
The Republican Presidential Debate:
On the Democratic side, Clinton, Obama, and Edwards are so far ahead in the polls, the last thing they needed was for Wolf Blitzer to give them an edge during the debate. Obama receive three times as much air time as Gravel did.
And on the Republican side. Giuliani, Romney, and McCain are far head in the polls, and–surprise! surprise!–Wolf Blitzer gave them far more air time than the remaining seven candidates.
Maybe we should run Wolf Blitzer for President!
I really didn’t expect that any Republican candidate would call for the abolishment of DADT – tactically it would have been awfully stupid for them to do so.
Rudy proved once again that he nothing but a fear monger. How is he a serious contender?
McCain appealed to me the most- with the sincerity of his answers- Romney was channelling Reagan- very artificial, Huckabee’s personality is appealing, Paul made some good points about the war, the rest of them were just scary as he**!
At least 5 have no chance at all- Hunter, Tancredo, Gilmore- who has a terrible record as former governor of Va., Thompson, and Brownback.
My favorite is Paul, with Tancredo coming in a distant second.
I love how they all don’t want to ask George W. Bush to do anything if they become President. Except the one guy who said he’d send him to high schools to teach about compassion.
Does anyone think that Paul and Huckabee have a chance at it? I don’t.
Tancredo had the best answer about what to do with Bush, Chris. LOL
Even the idea of sending him to high schools is an embarassing non-position, when you compare the Democrats who wanted to make Bill Clinton Secretary General of the UN!
How could the guy say Bush has an honest character with a straight face though?
Holly- Paul is too out there for the party. He has a libertarian following, but it won’t be enough in the primaries. Huckabee might get on as a VP- as he is a good communicator and is likeable.
The ones I think really won’t go anywhere are Gilmore and Tommy Thompson.