So! That happened!
I didn’t watch the GOP debate because I don’t own a TV and also suspected it would make me unhappy. Luckily everyone else on Earth did and then wrote about on the internet, so we still have something to talk about. Mostly, we have to talk about Which One Is Going To Win based on this televised feelings-sharing event, which is not a particularly accurate way of going about it but is, I guess, how the world works. ANYWAYS.
First of all, who was there? Pretty much the usual suspects: Michele Bachmann, Rick Santorum, Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Tim Pawlenty, Herman Cain, Ron Paul, Jon Huntsman, Not Fred Karger Because He’s Gay, etc. Did I forget anyone? Was Gary Johnson there? I just forgot Gary Johnson’s name for a minute but was able to recall it immediately by googling “GOP + candidate + weed.” (If you would like a refresher on who at least the first six people plus Fred Karger are, lucky for you we have one!)
In a nutshell, you could think of the September 7 debate this way: PERRY ROMNEY PERRY ROMNEY PERRY ROMNEY PERRY ROMNEY. The consensus is that Romney and Perry, at least based on events up until today, are the two clear frontrunners, and therefore each others’ major rivals. Perry was one of the top-polling candidates before he declared he was running, which says something about the success he’s having in appealing to the kind of mythology that extreme conservatives and Tea Partiers are so fond of. I think this piece from the New Yorker illustrates it really well:
“Your state has executed two hundred and thirty-four death row inmates, more than any other governor in modern times,” Brian Williams, of NBC, said to Rick Perry in the Republican debate at the Reagan Museum and Library last night. Before Williams finished asking whether Perry worried about killing an innocent person—he said he didn’t—the audience began to cheer wildly.
Williams: What do you make of that dynamic that just happened here, the mention of two hundred and thirty-four executions drew applause?
Perry: I think Americans understand justice.”
Romney, on the other hand, is playing a much more moderately. Romney’s Mormonism and ties to things like Obama-esque healthcare mean that he would have a hard time winning over diehard Tea Partiers, but while the NYT describes Perry as “an unabashed Southern conservative who is unafraid to speak bluntly,” Romney comes across as cool, calm, collected, and most interestingly, better-educated on the issues. From the NYT again:
In one exchange, Mr. Perry quipped that “Michael Dukakis created jobs three times faster than you did, Mitt.” Mr. Romney shot back, “Well, as a matter of fact, George Bush and his predecessor created jobs at a faster rate than you did, governor.”
Fact-checking after the debate confirms that Romney is right on this one. In fact, fact-checking reveals a lot of things! Who would have thought! The Boston Globe followed up on several different statements throughout the debate, and found that both Perry and Michele Bachmann were incorrect about some bold declarations. Of course, a live debate is much different than a speech or press conference, and we should reasonably be more forgiving of mistakes. But Perry’s claims about global warming suggest that he’s in total denial or confusion about the actual facts of the issue, and it’s not just a slip of the tongue.
Also lacking a certain level of fact competency is, of course, Michele Bachmann.
Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann on President Obama’s health care overhaul: “As I go across the country and speak to small business people – men and woman, Obamacare is leading them to not create jobs…Obamacare is clearly leading to job-killing regulations not job-creating regulations.”
This statement relies on a Congressional Budget Office estimate from August 2010 that Obama’s health care reform will reduce the workforce by half a percent – around 800,000 people – “primarily by reducing the amount of labor that workers choose to supply.” In other words, workers will choose not to work, rather than employers choosing not to hire. The CBO explains that because Medicaid will be expanded, and subsidies for health care insurance provided through exchanges, which will be established in 2014, health insurance will be more affordable. That means some people will no longer seek employment in order to buy or gain access to health insurance.
In fact, this wasn’t a great night for Michele Bachmann in general — some are calling her the “incontrovertible loser.” Apparently she was “nowhere to be found in last night’s debate, failing to insert herself in any of the major conversations and often awkwardly unresponsive to the questions.” Bachmann has won over plenty of supporters in speeches, but those can be rehearsed — it’s possible that her personal brand of politically themed hucksterism doesn’t translate well to speaking extemporaneously. Although Rick Perry is no bed of roses, it will be great news if Bachmann really did have “her campaign [peak] last month, and that she will be increasingly irrelevant as the primary season continues.”
This is only the first of seemingly billions of Special Moments in the move towards a GOP candidate for 2012, and it’s possible that the national consensus on everything, including the frontrunner(s), will change plenty of times. For now, if you’d like to make your own decision, read the transcripts of the trial here.
Everyone! Everyone was the incontrovertible loser!
Us most of all.
i really would like it if michelle bachmann would disappear, at least from all credible news sources. she’s a joke and it’s disheartening that she’s been taken so seriously thus far.
also i feel like the photo of the candidates shaking hands has potential for a hilarious caption and i want someone funnier than me to come up with one.
I agree. The thing that bother me most about her (and Sarah Palin) is that these idiots are the type of women people see, and it reinforces the stereotype that women are unable to understand, you know, anything, ever.
I want her to disappear, but as long as she’s in the public eye I don’t think news sources should stop covering her. She does have a lot of support among the Tea Party and ultra-social-conservatives a lot of people who won’t care about her performance in the debate because they actually see being ill-informed and inarticulate as virtues. I think we dismiss her appeal to those people at our own peril.
My only hope is that the extreme right-wing ideologies of modern Republican candidates will make a reelection that much easier for Obama
If it were possible I would click the + button 1000 times.
What a line up, inspires as much confidence as a gun to the head. These people are absolutely frightening.
The guy on the bottom, second from the right, looks like Leeland Palmer from Twin Peaks. I am massively creeped out by all of these people, but he’s definitely the creepiest.
Rachel, I do love reading your political articles, because although it is obvious when you write about the GOP that you are on the left side of the spectrum, you aren’t “blah blah blah conservatives suck, every single one of them is a liar blah blah” – but I would love to see a few articles from the republican standpoint.
isn’t the tea party pretty unpopular with conservatives too? they just have more money and media attention than the more reasonable republican candidates.
I think probably until the Republican party as a whole stops hating gays Autostraddle can continue to opt out of including their perspective on events? That is my feeling.
I say “Republican party as a whole” as distinct from “individual Republicans who don’t hate the gays”, who I am aware exist.
So why not have articles from the standpoint of pro-LGBT Republicans? (Assuming there are pro-LGBT writers who are keen to write for AS, of course!)
thats exactly what I meant, being a pro-LGBT Republican myself. thank you Dina for articulating what I could not. blah my feelings get stuck in my mouth and never come out correctly.
Ugh. Personally, I think the whole “small business owners hate Obamacare/it kills jobs” thing is SUCH bullshit. I’m trying to keep in mind that anecdotes aren’t facts, but still, every small business owner I know or have talked to is in favor of a government healthcare option because they either feel guilty not being able to provide their employees with health benefits, or because they have to keep a job on the side simply for the purpose of acquiring health insurance for their families. The latter reason especially disgusts me… I can’t imagine owning a small business that is my passion or my dream, and having to work some 9 to 5 job on top of it just so I can have access to something that should be an inalienable right. Why is that the state of things?
I watched the post debate coverage and it was hosted by Rachel Maddow which made me less panicky after the debate. Rachel Maddow is pretty much the only reason I’m not panicking.
she’s like chamomile for my brain.
#stupidsimile
Dr Maddow is so dreamy…
i watched about two minutes of this before muting it because Rick Perry is scary. the post debate highlights with Rachel Maddow was easier to take.
ps. wasn’t this at the Reagan library in California. and didn’t Pawlenty already quit after Iowa straw poll?
I’m disgusted with how people cheered so much about the 200+ executions, killing that many people is not something to be proud of and included at least one person who was innocent (Cameron Todd Willingham).
Also, Romney may across as better educated, but that’s more a detriment with Republicans cause then he’s one of those elites and not a “real american”.
the ovation for record number of executions made my stomach turn
Watch Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert tear the media coverage to shreds!
They no longer allow Australians to watch those shows on the Daily Show/Colbert websites! So grumpy.
I don’t know whether to be encouraged by this or not. Bachmann is scary, but Perry is just as bad if not worse.
Pawlenty was not involved in this debate, maybe you should do some fact checking of your own.