The organizers of Monday night’s Republican debate apparently knew what they were doing when they lined up presidential hopefuls across New Hampshire’s St. Anselm College stage in a way that reflected the contest’s pecking order and ideological shape.
In the center — politically, ideologically and physically — was former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, looking very much the early front-runner polls say he is. Placed on the ends by the main sponsor, CNN, were former Sen. Rick Santorum and businessman Herman Cain, probably the most ideologically extreme in the solidly conservative field.
In between, two who seem more like interesting curiosities than true contenders — Texas Rep. Ron Paul and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich — and two Minnesotans who might have the best chances in this field of overtaking Romney.
Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Rep. Michele Bachmann may have provided the first major debate’s lasting significance. Pawlenty, touted by many Republicans as potentially Romney’s top challenger, underscored his weak persona by refusing to repeat criticism of the latter’s Massachusetts health care plan.
By contrast, tea party favorite Bachmann, who combines a Sarah Palin-like personal appeal with a more traditional political approach, made a stronger impression by speaking directly and knowledgeably on the issues. The two Minnesotans loom as major rivals in next-door Iowa’s caucuses before New Hampshire’s primary.
The debate generally resembled an echo chamber, as participants repeatedly attacked President Barack Obama and avoided criticizing each another.
They showed some differences on social issues, including how the federal government should combat legalized gay marriage in states like New Hampshire, and whether to overturn Obama’s decision ending the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy for gays.
Presidential debates often give the mistaken impression one person can single-handedly reverse U.S. policies. Gingrich, the closest thing to a truth-teller, essentially repeated his prior political assessment of the controversial GOP Medicare plan: “If you can’t convince the American people it’s a good idea, maybe it’s not a good idea.”
And he observed that to achieve its goals, the GOP needs to gain 12 Senate seats and 30 to 40 in the House — as well as win the presidency.
• Leubsdorf is the former Washington bureau chief of the Dallas Morning News.
Comments (10)
Add commentWhat's hollow was CNN and
What's hollow was CNN and John King. Leno or Letterman? What's that unemployment number again?
imports are killing the US economy
Find fault wherever you wish regarding the economy and the jobless rate. But let us not allow the candidates to escape from a position on how to deal with outsourcing and imports. Since the advent of the container ship (around 1960) the ability to move goods from around the world to the US has increased steadily. Every time you see a container ship think of how much of the contents represents goods not made in America; that equates to jobs. Regardless of how some wish to believe America can not return to the high job number industrial manufacturing complex of the past; its a nostalgic though and not reality.
Almost anything manufactured in America today is the result of new high speed automated production requiring fewer and fewer workers. You can not have full automation and high employment in the same factory. For the prime function of automation is to reduce the number of individuals needed to manufacture a product.
The problem is far from new in Alaska. For some will remember the advent of the "iron chink" in the salmon industry that replaced thousands of cannery workers. Timber production now uses machinery that almost completely eliminates the saw operated felling and limbing. Container shipping eliminated long-shore workers while computers have eliminated the typing pool and the copier has eliminated repetitive typing jobs.
Pushing 10% and climbing
I read somewhere recently that 80-90% of shipping containers that enter the US leave empty.
Debate
All we hear fron Republicand is their lame efforts to fix the deficit! They make NO mention of how to lower the unemployment problem! The only think they want to do is hurt seniors and the poor by cutting programs, but still want tax cuts
Politicians will continue to
Politicians will continue to avoid answering any questions truthfully, and blame the other side in order to gain votes. I find it disheartening that putting themselves and their party in power is more important to them than providing what the people want. The Democrats are scared to do anything that will really help, and the Republicans don't want to .. as a week economy plays to their benefit in the next election. Hence, the House has not done one thing to help produce a single job yet since the Republicans gained control, instead wasting time on things they know will not get passed
That's okay. Their
That's okay. Their demographic is disappearing--perhaps faster now that they're super angry all the time and believe healthy diets are a socialist plot--and soon no amount of gerrymandering will keep the minority in power.
"All we hear fron Republicand
"All we hear fron Republicand is their lame efforts to fix the deficit!..."
It's lame because they are being fought tooth and nail by the Democrats. It's critically important government spending under control or we will end up like Greece. In case you haven't noticed, Greece is on the verge of default and nobody benefits from that!
They make NO mention of how to lower the unemployment problem! The only think they want to do is hurt seniors and the poor by cutting programs,
The two are connected! It's basic economics. The private sector is more efficient at job creation than the government is provided the government gets out of the way.
"...but still want tax cuts"
Because taxes means less job creation. If you want less of something, tax it. The best thing we could do for jobs in this country would be to cut corporate income taxes by about half. There are trillions of dollars sitting corporate coffers overseas that could come back to this country if the corporate taxes weren't so high.
The only trouble is they
The only trouble is they don't really attempt to fix the deficit,
To do that they will HAVE to work together. Instead they take stands that they know will not be accepted by the other side, and do things like cut funding to NPR and Planned Parenthood, which wont solve anything but, but makes the social moral conservatives happy and hurt the only popular media that wont spin the news their way. These things won't help the deficit, only the party.
If they really want to fix the deficit , they wont continue the tax cuts to the rich, which were started because we had surplus when Bush took office..
The Democrats did not cause the deficit, tax cuts and 2 Bush wars had a lot to do with that
On top of that Cheney's ' Haliburton' ripped of the American Taxpayer for millions in their no- bid contracts in Iraq.
Reality Check!
1)Rich people don't keep all the money they make under their bed. Some they spend on a lifestyle, the rest they invest in businesses through stocks and investment instruments or create new businesses, which all creates jobs as well as new products and more profit. Higher taxes means fewer rich people and the truly rich will move or work around the tax increase. The economy can expand or contract based on actions by the Gov.
2)Automation in any business is to reduce the number of employees and stay profitable. The reason isn't greed or because they hate people, but to stay competitive to keep operational. If due to Gov Regs, OSHA, SSi, UI, etc a US worker is 5 times the cost of a third world employee, and a competitive product is produced elsewhere in our world economy, there are three legal choices. First automate, second make something special/different or third go out of business/offshore.
3) The government has no money of its own. Government employees count in US productivity measures but generally don't produce any product to trade or sell. The government cannot spend enough to get the country out of a recession. If government spending has a multiplier effect on local economies, tax increases have the same effect in reverse. If the government gets a $3 effect in the local economy for each dollar spent then each additional dollar of tax will take $3 worth of value out of the economy. Except people won't open a business if there is no profit in it.
4)Each deficit dollar must be repaid with interest. (see 3)
5) Democrats univerally supported "Bush's Wars". Just as "compasionate conservatives" like Lisa supported expaned entitlements and spending.
@AKcommonsense: 1) Rich
@AKcommonsense:
1) Rich people, by and large, invest their money and live off dividends or capital gains. Most of them don't create businesses, and higher taxes would do very little to change their spending habits. Remember that taxes are lower than they've ever been. During the big boom in the 50's, the top marginal rate was some 90%, and yet, believe it or not, people didn't become less greedy and stop trying to make as much money as they could.
2) The reason for automation IS greed. No business WANTS to compete--competition eats into profits and creates an environment in which the business may fail. Don't portray it as the poor multinational corporations just wanting to survive.
3) I don't follow your reasoning here. While it is true that a flat 300% tax rate would effect small businesses and individuals, our tax rate will never be that high nor that that regressive, and scale is definitely important in tax discussions. In actuality, up to a certain point, taxes have no effect on job creation. A business will operate as long as there is profit to be made, and it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to lower taxes when businesses are already profitable and doing so would only encourage the accumulation of wealth in the upper crust. Likewise, tax hikes DO make sense when businesses are profitable and will remain profitable afterwards. Especially larger businesses that have more power in the world business/political landscape.
4) Yes, they do, but inflation also has the effect of decreasing interest, and it is often necessary to deficit spend. But usually not on things like needless wars.
5) Democrats did not universally support the war in Iraq. How ridiculous. More than half of Democrats in the senate supported it, and fewer than half in the house did. Universally. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you just didn't look this up.