Paul, Romney take debate

Some thoughts on the the Republican Debate last night:

First, Mayor Guiliani's failing's at the debate last night perhaps should not be quite so suprising. A quick summary of conservative blogs this morning contends that he was never that popular in the first place; voters simply know his name better than anyone else at this early stage in the primaries. Especially for the party's far-right base, he is not the right man for the job. They contend he is merely a RINO (Republican In Name Only), a man that before 9/11 was just a liberal mayor in a liberal city. Without 9/11 in the forefront of people's minds, he loses his most popular asset. Of course, he has raised the most money so far, so he can't be discounted entirely.

MSNBC voters gave Guiliani a 41% positive rating before the debate, and a 28% after the debate. With a staggering 34% of the vote, Guiliani won for having "avoided the questions." He did indeed seem quite unsure of himself.

In the minds of conservative's, Mitt Romney dominated the debate last night. Not only that, but the people who got George W. Bush elected, heavily conservative evangelicals, love this guy. With the support of James Dobson and the other "Jesus Campers" out west, I believe Romney has vaulted himself into first place after his showing last night. He did a good job of never mentioning that he was Mormon (although Chris Matthews did) because I think if people looked up exactly what Mormonism is, they would be quite turned off. Then again, I think that in literacy-challenged, deep south, Civil-War fighting states, a Mormon is still less scary than a black or a woman.

MSNBC voters awarded Romney as having "The most leadership qualities" and Romney came in second to Ron Paul as "stood out from the pack."

Outside of the Jesus Campers (everyone should watch that documentary, by the way, to see how Republicans get elected. Plus it reveals that GW got advice from Ted Haggard every Monday until Ted's gay-meth scandal) the clear winner was Ron Paul. With 26% of the vote, he was declared "the most convincing candidate." More telling was that before the debate, he had a 9% positive rating. After the debate, he was tied for first with a 31% vote.

In my opinion, he was the only candidate to stand out, and perhaps the most electable. He's conservative on all issues, and argues that getting out of Iraq is a conservative position. He believes it's always been the Repulican position to not play world police, and not play nation-builder. We should secure our own borders and defenses, and not expand our government and colonize Middle Eastern countries. Coupling this view with the extremely unpopular war, Paul may have struck a chord (well, he obviously did last night) What are Democrats going to run on, if their challenger also agrees we should leave Iraq?
Paul has vaulted himself into the national spotlight.

Overall, I think Texas Congressman Ron Paul is the best candidate on the Republican side right now.

An additional note: I keep bringing up Sen. Obama's phrase "The Audacity of Hope" because it's so true. I've never seen such a "rule by fear" mentality before. The overwhelming feeling at the debate was: If you don't vote for us, terrorists are going to take out America. We need to be afraid of everyone, check the terror alert today, it will tell you how afraid to be. If you vote for a Democrat, the terrorists have won. As Ron Paul said "In the Cold War, Russia had thousands of nukes and the means to use them, and we stared them down. Now some third world country without an air force or a navy builds one, and we have to go in and invade them."

Well said.