Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Republican debate: Up past Fred Thompson’s bedtime


Republican debate on Fox.


McCain suggests Fred Thompson isn’t here because it’s after his bedtime. Yeah, keep laughing old man.


Huckabee says we can track packages from Amazon.com (the NYT transcript has a hyperlink to Amazon.com here!), but the federal government can’t track illegal immigrants. I know that’s supposed to make me nervous about illegal immigrants, but actually it makes me nervous about the Tim Wiener history of the CIA I just ordered.

Romney (who moderator Chris Wallace accuses of letting illegal aliens mow his lawn) is against “sanctuary cities” for immigrants. He is for the “sanctity of human life” of fetuses.


Duncan Hunter says when the R’s have people with problems like Larry Craig, they leave, but when D’s do, they make them committee chairmen. A shot at Barney Frank, I assume.

Huckabee says we should care about fetuses as much as about those miners in Utah. Actually, he said “we need to show the same kind of respect for life whether a child is in the womb or whether in a coal mine or in a long-term care facility”. So he wants children to work in coal mines. Out of respect.


Ron Paul calls for airplane passengers to have guns. To huge applause.

Romney says both that we’ll soon see if the surge is working, then he says that the surge has worked. Make up your mind.

McCain says it is working. He said something about the people of NH feeling saddened and frustrated and angry over Iraq and that “I share their anger, their frustration and their failure.” Up past your bedtime, old man?


Huckabee says about Iraq that “We can’t be divided. We have to be one nation under God. That means if we make a mistake, we make it as a single country, the United States of America, not the divided states of America.” The audience goes wild at the idea of making a mistake as a single country. So, let’s see, he wants us to make mistakes as a single nation, and we shouldn’t be divided, so the people who are right should just shut up and stop being right. Sounds like Bush’s position.

Every so often Fox cuts to a local diner, where very average New Hampshireites make very average comments and ask very average questions. But one who has sons (plural) in Iraq takes Romney to task for saying that his sons’ campaign work is equivalent to that service. Romney says there is no comparison, which is funny because he was the only one who made the comparison.

Romney, defending earlier remarks about wiretapping mosques, said the most important civil liberty “is my right to be kept alive.”

Next there’s some Guantanamo talk. Giuliani says we have to keep it open because other countries won’t take the inmates. I’m sure there’s something wrong with that logic, but I just can’t put my finger on it.


Hunter wants to take away their taxpayer-paid-for prayer rugs.

On taxes, Romney admits that while he didn’t raise taxes in Massachusetts, he did raise fees, including on the blind – do you have to have a license to be blind in Massachusetts? – but it’s the Democrats’ fault. I forget why. He says of John Edwards’ tax plan, which would give families only $250, he says “whoop de doo.” Between that and Paul’s line about guns on planes, everyone’s channeling Archie Bunker. And, he said, $250 is less than the cost of Edwards’ haircut. With that sort of cutting wit, he should be a blogger.

Huckabee said that his plan for a 23% national sales tax would end the underground economy by taxing prostitution and drugs. Um, right.

There’s some hypothetical about Iran. Tancredo says political correctness will get us all killed. I have no idea what he’s talking about, but I’m sure it sounds good to the average Fox viewer. And Tancredo is nothing if not the average Fox viewer.

Huckabee would “go with every bit of preparation, not only in my head but in my heart, to make a decision that would best protect the American people for generations to come.” And nuke the fuckers.

McCain said: “On January of 2000 -- of 1981, Ronald Reagan came to power and raised his hand as president of the United States of America. By more than coincidence the Iranian hostages returned on that same day. I would employ some of his methods.” Past your bedtime, old man?

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