Mitt Romney for President My Man Mitt: Debate Live Blog

I'm not at the debate tonight, but I will be live-blogging the debate here at MMM. If you want, feel free to leave comments at the bottom of the post.

Luntz Focus Group

Where in the world did Luntz find this focus group. Candidates pandering to the middle??

Will this debate be a prime decider? I am kind of thinking no. People seem to think that today is always the most important day, and Fox needs to promote it that way, it is their debate.

The Debate

Charlie Christ needs a shirt that fits him

Romney get largest applause, by small amount, nice to see the group one man smaller

Chris Wallace encourages fireworks between candidates.

Romney turns Thompson attack quotes from Walace into looking ahead and forming a strong coalition. Good move. Romney has a hair out o place, somethings wrong... :)

Wallace really wants people to fight. Thompson seems happy to oblige. Takes shots at Giuliani.

"Fred has his problems too" Giuliani- quote of the night. Giuliani nails him to the wall on tort reform. Thompson tries to back up his tort reform past, its a joke, hides under Federalism. Remember Fred is a huge recipient of Tort reform.

hris Wallace really wants some fireworks. HE won't let up.

I guess managing for profit thinks managing for profit is bad. Romney gives great compliment to McCain. Argues his conservative 94 stances, which in fact were there.

McCain realy hates Romney. Telling people he's been campaigning by fooling them. This guy is sad. "Don't demote me." Good point. Governor to Senator= Demotion. Romney ignores McCain's cheap shots, I think he his avoiding those and playing above the fray.

Romney does best when he talks about ideas, Dean Barnett is right. I hope he stays off of knocking the others. He made a great argument for marriage.

Rudy seems to support marriage ammendment in the end. Funny joke about marriages he performed hoping they were all men and women.

Huckabee is a little simplistic, but people seem to like it.

Thompson parses on his lobbying. This guy has a past, and he forgets about everything.

Talk on Healthcare, a good onversation, thank you for skipping th bashing Gwendle, or however you spell it.

Hunter takes on Romney's healthcare. Should be good. Romney explains the compromise. Lowered premium in half. Romney "We got the job done" Tnacredo seems focused on illegal aliens? That is breaking news.

Thompon seems a little more away this time. Atleast since the voters values.

Romney outines his worlwide business knowledge, makes a good point about lack of managment experience- "Learn to be presient on an internship"

Fantastic answer, a great answer. Romney engages crowd quite effectively.

Both Rudy and Romney play to the crowd quite effectively.

McCain gets standing ovation with joke.

Why is Thompson reading of cards for simple one liners? A good moment for him none the less.

Fred has a better game tonight.

No one can talk fiscal stuff like Romney.

Paul makes some interesting points. I don't know if he has a chance, but I think he is a good voice to have in the debates.

Hunter talks out against outsourcing. I call that looking in the short term. Level playing field a good thing, stop outsourcing, bad idea.

McCain asked, "headed back to cold war?" Not sure but they offer serious problems. We need a missle defense system in Eastern Europe. Good point.

Ron paul points out Bush 2000 is a little different in forign policy then Bush 2003? Knocks on having a harder defense. Takes some boo's. This is why I like him. I don't agree but I like someone who will take the boo's.

Romney knocks out statistics. He can do it like no one else. Data man. Then assimilates those facts into meaningful answers.

Ron Paul nails it on the head frankly. I don't agree with his non-interventionism, but the rest is spot on.

Gwendle asks Thompson on laziness charge. Thompson lists a bunch of mediocre things. Has a good punch line, but frankly 1000's of people in DC have those qualities.

Frank Luntz

This group hates Hillary.

No clear winner, gotta agree.

No one thinks McCain won.

Luntz caims Giuliani very clealy does well, only four people in the group actually thought him the winner. These questions are little lame.

Hanity

Fred really does some gymnastics on the abortion lobbying. Whats amazing is he admits making the choice to do it whenhe could have said no. Very interesting. He used to say he couldn't remember it.


	3 Comments: On Townhall.com they list the top 5 Hillary attacks from the debate. When they show Romney's line about Hillary never having run so much as a corner store, they show Rudy saying something similar from before the debate and imply that Mitt stole the line from him. Ridiculous, Mitt has used that line for months, he even posted it on YouTube. By Anonymous, at October 22, 2007 at 3:00 PM Romney's argument about the need for a federal constitution amendment to protect traditional marriage was spot on. Rudy's statement about supporting one if the country heads that direction in several states was absolutely ridiculous!!! As if it is easy to climb back up to high ground after sliding down the slippery slope. His answer ignores the reality that gay marriage once given, is hard to take away. Further, his response lacked any moral clarity on the issue. If an amendment would be good then, why not now? McCain's statement about Romney fooling people about McCain's record was absolutely silly since Romney had done nothing of the sort. Simply, a mean spirited and pathetic lie. McCain is not fit to be commander-in-chief if he is going to act like that. I don't want anyone with their finger on the button when they are just plain vindictive. By the way, among the items on Thompson's illustrious resume, can I say that shepherding John Roberts into Chief Justice Rehnquist's shoes could have been done by anybody remotely familiar with the confirmation process!!! The man was a shoo in. Now, if he could have gotten Hariet Miers confirmed, that would have been something. Of course, he would have been working against the greater good by doing so. Oh wait, wasn't that what he did when he lobbied for abortion groups? Thompson seemed to want to deliberately want to attack Giuliani and try to make it a two man race as it were. He was even given the opportunity to attack Mitt but then attacked Giuliani again. The problem with Thompson is that he is in no man's land. He is not winning in the early states and he is not winning nationally. You have to try something and he does not have the resources or energy to out canpaign Mitt in the early states. I used to think Ron Paul was interesting to have around for a debate, but I am growing increasingly concerned that one, he is sucking money up that might be put to better use, and two, he will be running as a third party candidate if he is not the nominee. I haven't yet heard a convincing commitment from him that he won't do that. He has done it before. Why not now? What a disastrous effect that would have. We could crown Hillary the day after the nomination if he doesn't drop out. Finally, I have been musing in my head about the possibility of having private retirement accounts that wouldn't take money from a portion of the social security tax and that phased in over time, would completely eliminate social security. You could start by having it be voluntary, but if you wanted to really replace social security, you would have to make it mandatory at some point. Not a very palatable idea politically because people wouldn't like the idea of being forced into saving money for retirement. But no one can say it is a threat to social security because it wouldn't derive any money from it. By Anonymous, at October 22, 2007 at 3:29 PM Hope we hear something new tonight. Also wish Mitt was still up running for the job. I build biodiesel processors which turn waste vegetable oil into biodiesel.We need someone to help implement change. As the other poster said, we just need to keep moving in the right direction. By Anonymous, at October 7, 2008 at 7:13 PM Post a Comment