"He who is devoid of wisdom despises his neighbor,
But a man of understanding holds his peace."
Proverbs 11:12
Last night's AWFUL G.O.P. Presidential "debate" reminded this website of the early-2000's television show "Elimidate."
The premise of the show was to have either 4 men competing over one woman or vice versa.
Whenever 4 men would compete over one woman, the results were predictable. During the opening round, the overwhelming majority of the guys would act cartoonishly hyper-masculine in a lame attempt to "out-alpha" each other. Meanwhile, the quietly confident guy ALWAYS made it to the second round.
In the awful "debate" last night, the overwhelming majority of the field tried too hard to impress and jockey for position. In doing so, they seemed desperate and pathetic. Position in the polls did not matter. Donald Trump and Carly Fiorina were just as terrible as Chris Christie and Mike Huckabee. Against this backdrop, the only candidate with the good sense to keep his mouth shut was Ted Cruz.
As Neil Strauss explained in his 2005 book "The Game":
Where the other guys on the show tried to suck up to Allison, Grimble leaned back and acted as if he were the prize. Where the other guys bragged about how successful they were, Grimble took the advice of his new guru and claimed to be a disposable lighter repairman. He made it past the first elimination.One of the most challenging tasks in politics is to avoid a rigged debate. Last night, CNN successfully provoked a "GOP Wrestlemania" among the overwhelming majority of the candidates. Ted Cruz was the only candidate who didn't play along.
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Ted Cruz is my guy, he is at the top of my list on who I support I even gave him money which is un heard of for me, but he was just so so in the debate last night. I grant you he did not get as much time as the others and he did not play the yippie little dog that some others played but even when he was asked a question I was not impressed with his answers. Yes he is still my guy still my number one but he did not meet my expectations of him last night!
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand Chris Christie who is at 15th position (with Bush being in the 16th position) on my list of who to vote for, did what I thought was a great job in the debate.
Carly had some good parts but her constant yammering to get her 2 cents in when it was not her turn turned me off.
I am always surprised how much I like Rubio after the debate is over until I remember he has a voting record that is as bad as most of the Rino elected officials!
Ben Carson did not do himself any good last night.
Kasich and Paul were the big losers from my perspective.
Trump made his first blunder of the Campaign by making the George W. attack.
It also always amazes me how all of us watch the same debate and come away with different winners and losers.
I thought that the debate was "cringe worthy", to use a Seinfeld phrase. I'm not sure why Hugh Hewitt was there. He seemed to be irrelevant, yet at the end of the debate he praised himself and the debate as if it was successful. I was happy to see my Statesman of the 21st Century, Ted Cruz, avoid getting in to the fray as much as possible. When CNN hosts a debate I am always cautiously optimistic. My instincts were right on target. It was a sham and a shame.
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