Rudy Giuliani had the biggest moment in the GOP debate in South Carolina Tuesday night when he broke in to challenge Ron Paul’s statement that America’s involvement in the Middle East was partly responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks. Visibly incensed and in high moral dudgeon, Giuliani called Paul’s comments "absurd" and demanded a retraction.
The crowd loved it. Giuliani shrewdly seized the moment to wrap himself once more in Sept. 11 glory, his strongest suit.
Mitt Romney was smooth and presidential-looking as usual, but he failed to stand out on anything, and John McCain inflicted damage with a comment about Romney’s opportunistic flip-flops on issues: "I haven’t changed my position in even-numbered years or . . . because of the different offices that I may be running for."
McCain repeated the old joke about Congress spending like drunken sailors. But Mike Huckabee topped him with the night’s best laugh line: "We’ve had a Congress that’s spent money like John Edwards at a beauty shop."
Sam Brownback mainly stood out when he defended his opposition to abortion even in cases of rape and incest. That may give even some pro-lifers pause.
The top three candidates continue to struggle to establish their conservative credentials, trying to explain away past votes and positions. They weren’t very convincing.
The Fox News team, led by Brit Hume, did a fine job of hosting the event, asking sharp, tough questions and follow-ups that forced the candidates to reveal themselves and stake out differences.
Overall, a pretty good debate.
Posted by Randy Scholfield
Registered?
Commenting on WE Blog now requires you to be a Kansas.com member. Use the links above to register, if you haven't already, or to log in.Contact us
Follow us
Daily Archives
-
Recent Comments
- BlueJay on Open thread 11/22
- Regular on Open thread 11/22
- Regular on Open thread 11/22
- Rage on Open thread 11/22
- cosmos_originally on Open thread 11/22
- Chas on Open thread 11/22
- BlueJay on Open thread 11/22
- Boxlock20 on Open thread 11/22
- satatom on Open thread 11/22
- JimJohnson on Open thread 11/22
88 Comments
Sorry, Randy.
You’ll never convince me that the network owned by uber-con Rupert Murdoch and run by super-pooper uber-con Roger Ailes (Reagan-Bush’s Karl Rove) can be good at anything — except slander, smears and scandal.
The Dem candidates were right and smart to boycott the Fux Network from hosting any of their debates.
And notice the modern-day journalistic “stance” that the media takes: it was “big moment” when Giuliani broke the rules of the debate and angrily called Paul’s statement absurd. “The crowd loved it.”
Absolutely no responsibility on the part of our “journalists” to investigate whether Paul’s comment WAS absurd or not.
There job is simply to report that a newsmaker SAID it was absurd . . .
Their (not there) job . . . oops.
Yeah Capn,
The same goes for the Communist News Network (CNN) that Ted Turner is a Liar as well..
Was Ted Turner hired as a political operative under a Democratic administration?
Did he produce and air negative campaign ads like the “Willie Horton” rapist-murder’s face morphing into Michael Dukkais’s?
Uh . . . no.
CapnThe debate obviously irritated you.On that score, alone, it was a success!Your bias has become so obvious it is amusing.Yes, everyone has bias on every issue.However, you take this moment to attack Fox News?
By the way, as far as the media investigating Ron Paul’s remarks, I think that many outlets HAVE done so.Ron Paul is a Libertarian.Ron Paul will be against most military action on that basis, alone.Ron Paul’s supporters are emailing blog posting and calling in to talk shows in droves today, trying to explain away his ridiculous comments.He said what he said.He sounded like a Democrat.It is not going over very well!
Rudy and others are making the point that terrorists were attacking Western interests long before Iraq was an issue.
Ron Paul looks like an anti-Israel hate monger. He seems to suggest that we should hand up Israel on a silver platter, and that the death of Israel would bring peace to America.
By the way, how did that Iraq funding bill do in the Senate today? I think your side got 29 votes!
Capn, that is bullshit
He has said he would do anything he could to get the Democrats back into office..
Econ–
I didn’t watch the debate.
“Rudy and others are making the point that terrorists were attacking Western interests long before Iraq was an issue.”
That sounds “absurd” to me.
Iraq was obviously not an issue on 9-11.
What Islamic terrorists were attacking America before the first World Trade Center attack in 1993?
And don’t say the Marine barracks in Lebanon. That was clearly a response to our occupying force injecting itself in the on-again off-again Civil War that we helped foment by denying the rightfully elected government in the late 50’s.
Apparently Romney said we should ‘double the size of Guantanamo,’ so the inmates won’t have access to lawyers. And the crowd loved it.
Says a lot about the base of the Republican Party.
Rudy Giuliani is too afraid of Israel to ask for any concessions that will bring about peace to the Middle East.
Rudy Giuliani’s unconditional support for Israel will not bring about peace, but the Arab League has offered a peace plan, which insures both peace and security for Israel and an independent Palestinian State.
According to the Fox News poll Ron Paul won the debates followed by Rommey then Rudy.
Tom,
I heard that too. That seems real interesting to me. Will have to look for those poll results.
I watched the streaming version of the debate on the internet. It was better than the first debate to the extent that it was not solely the candidates reciting their well rehersed talking points the entire time.
For anyone that’s interested, here is the portion of the debate dealing with torture:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/05/15/gop-debate-ii-romney-double-guantanamo/
John McCain describes his own experience with torture and the pride he felt knowing that if the tables were turned we would not stoop to our enemies level. Nary a peep from the audience. The other two leading candidates did their best macho-man and said ‘anything goes’ and ‘double Guantanamo’ to roars from the crowd. Pretty sad that overt bloodlust is so appealing to the fanatics.
Actually Ron Paul came in second behind Romney. It was a call-in poll and not a scientific sampling.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,272493,00.html
Ron Paul did not sound like a democrat, he sounded like a republican that lives in reality. He stated very clearly that our Constitution does not endorse proactive military engagements. He is right on a number of issues that seperates himself from the neo-cons. Paul is an old school conservative that wants to bring the party back to center and stop being so paranoid. That is what the country needs at this point…a healer/uniter. He seemed to be more of a leader than just somebody to continue with the status quo. Here is a scary thought, Obama/Paul ticket to run against. Why haven’t the dems invited him to share their stage?
Uh, Mike? Because they both serve the same masters?
“Pretty sad that overt bloodlust is so appealing to the fanatics.”
Well ya know, they are mostly evangelicals….
FarmiePaul actually makes the most sense of all the candidates…both dems and reps. The blood thirsty reich wingers do not want to hear from him. The dem’s should embrace this guy and give him a chance. Like I said upthread, scary proposition to the GOP would be a Obama/Paul presidential ticket. I personally think those two could win.
But the PERFECT ticket would be Gravel/Paul!
Make Gore the head of the EPA, make Bill Clinton the Sec of State, bring back Robert Reich as Sec. of Labor and Donna Shalala to HHS.
Make David Iglasius AG. Make Wes Clark Sec. of Defense.
And Keith Olberman could be the press secretary!
Ok, somebody pinch me. I must be dreaming….
Oh yeah, and make Posy the head of education!!!!
I suppose you could take governor leadership off our hands and make her the head of political ops. With joyce allegrucci as chief of staff.
Heheheh. Just keep them away from water policy. I nominate Wink for that position!
scholfield should stick to commenting on the dem’s debates and let the conservatives on the board comment on the Repub’s debate. That is, if there were a conservative on the board.
When there isn’t a dem to attack, attack the publisher. Right Fleet?
“When there isn’t a dem to attack, attack the publisher.”
scholfield isn’t the publisher.He’s a Lib editorial writer/columnist. Heldman is the Lib publisher.
Thanks ddub for the link. I got to this one from yours:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/05/15/ron-paul-vs-giuliani-on-the-root-causes-of-terrorism/
This was the defining moment of the debate. Ron Paul gave an honest answer to the question about the cause of terrorism. Paul is the _only_ politician (Repub OR Dem) has had the guts to be honest about the reasons we were attacked. This honesty does not excuse terrorists.
Simply put, it is not our ideas that they attack us for (freedom, democracy), but instead it is our behavior that motivated their attacks – military build-up in the middle east.
It seems very unlikely that we will ever succeed in the “war” on terror if we cannot truthfully examine why we were attacked.
“…but instead it is our behavior that motivated their attacks – military build-up in the middle east.”
Are you trying to blame Clinton? You must be, because Bush didn’t have the time to do the build-up in the middle east.
Concur Steven Davis. However, as long as the politicians use terrorism as a way to garner votes we will never be close to winning the war. Thats the way both dems and reps are playing it….because it works. Paul is honest for sure, and I like that. If the terrorists really hated us for our freedom they would keeping attacking. Car bombs would explode on our streets. They use terror tactics to get attention drawn to their cause. Which happens to be….get out of our land.
Paul posed a question that no Reich Winger has answered yet. What would we do if China started building military bases in Mexico? And GOP supporter want to answer that?
FleetwoodThats the point….you want to place blame instead of rectifying the problem. All the previous presidents hold some accountiblity. How do you propose we hold them to account? Instead lets figure out going forward how to prevent more attacks. Military response will get you no where. It will just create more terrorists. It has to be policy change, diplomacy, and honesty. Being honest with ourselves first and the world second. If we have stepped on toes along the way then you say sorry it won’t happen again. You do not say f*** you look at the business end of my M-16. That paints you into a corner such as the one we are in now.
well lets see.
this is not a theoretical question.. it really happened does anyone remember the cuban missile crisis.OH and we went to war or at least threatened to until Russia blinked…..
“….you want to place blame instead of rectifying the problem.”
The point is that you people want to blame America. Why not blame the terrorists?
You act is if we are so innocent in this. Yes hold the terrorist accountable. But we have bear some responsiblity don’t we? The American people elect officials that make bad foreign policy decisions. So yes they bear some responsibility as well.
Ever hear….do onto others as you would have done unto you? I think a pretty wise man came up with that. Why is it ok for us to go to foreign lands and build military bases etc? If China did that to us in Mexico we would be livid. We would threaten immediate military action. What makes us better than everybody else?
“But we have bear some responsiblity don’t we?”
That would be a no, unless you live in BlameAmericaFirst world.
What makes us better than everybody else?
Posted by: Mike | May 16, 2007 at 02:42 PM
There’s lots of things that make us better than China, in my opinion. If I thought China was better, i suppose i would move there. But, having many friends in China, I can tell you I won;t be moving any time soon
Exactly Fleett…
Capn conveniently forgets the long history of Airline (hijackings) and Ship attacks conducted by Muslim extremists for decades.
Steven Davis, go spend some time in a Muslim country and see if you come back with the same opinions you currently have.
“Steven Davis, go spend some time in a Muslim country and see if you come back with the same opinions you currently have.”
I agree, except for the “come back” part.
“”But we have bear some responsiblity don’t we?”"
Does this mean we should blame the rape victim because she wore a short skirt?
You are incouragable. You lack the intelligence to form a good argument so you pick a sentence to attack. Its blood thirsty a-holes like you that hold this country back. You are simple minded and get whatever you got coming. If I thought like you I would be very scared too. Comparing America to a “rape victim” shows your ignorance and simplicity. You still have not answered my question about China building military bases in Mexico, that figures because you can’t help your own cranial rectum inversion. I didn’t compare America to China LittleJohn. I didn’t say it was a better place to live. I posed a simple question, and because you can’t answer it honestly you spin it into something its not.
America’s foreign policy for years has been to crash around the world like Rambo on meth. In the process we have alienated a good portion of the world. We are not trusted by a good portion of Europe, Asia, Africa and South America. The Canadians aren’t too crazy about us either.
We cannot continue to prosecute a foreign policy that consists of shoot first, ask questions later.
The vast majority of Muslims in the world do not support terrorism, but they are anti-American. Contrary to the Republican Party mantra, we cannot kill them all – there 1.3 billion of them – nor can we attempt to intimidate them into being pro-Western.
Trying to understand their opposition to the US is not appeasing terrorists, nor is it a sign of weakness. Understanding Islam is good policy.
America cannot afford to become the world’s enemy, but a force first foreign policy will make us just that. This is no longer 1945 when America could pretty much do anything we wanted. It is a global community and we have to live in that community.
>Sam Brownback mainly stood out when he defended his opposition to abortion even in cases of rape and incest.
The Eagle has to stop reporting he’s running for President. That reasoning is very flawed on abortion.
Some lady, made the national news, is doing well now but learned her past searching for the mother.
The mother was raped and ashamed. Gave the child up for adoption. It was a boyfriend she just met, not incest.
That lady is on a political rant to end all abortions, because she turned out well.
If a female is pregnant by rape or incest must have that choice to not bear the child.
Every person’s life affected that way can’t have the same outcome. A baby created by an attacker, grows up well. The birth mother takes it well.
Brownback stands out because that’s dumb reasoning and should disqualify him for the President.
He would waste time trying to end abortions when its not reasonable to do.
Process to limit abortions, okay, it would help if religions allowed birth control products.
Governments supply birth control products, without pharmacists acting obstructive about it.
No political bent folks trying to limit birth control products because that’s a personal choice of protection!
Do yourself a favor WSClark, go to a Mosque on a holiday like Ramadan or some other and see what opinion you come back with.
Islam is one of the most oppressive, male dominated and barbaric judgmental religions on the planet.
Islamic women could give you an earful on how “good” they think Islam is to them.
mike-We were the victims of 9/11. Are you a victim-blamer?
Foreign Policy actions have consequences was the point Mr Paul was making. And its not just the Mideast that hates the US the US has a had a history of meddling in the Affairs of Central&South America, Caribbean, Asia, and it generally bites the US in the ass.
“Sam Brownback mainly stood out when he defended his opposition to abortion even in cases of rape and incest.”
Forcing a woman to carry the child of a rapist or molester is the height of arrogance. It’s Darwin in reverse.
LittleJohn. I didn’t say it was a better place to live. I posed a simple question, and because you can’t answer it honestly you spin it into something its not.
Posted by: Mike | May 16, 2007 at 02:59 PM
I didn;t spin anything. You posted a hypothesis about China, then asked what made us better than anyone else. I replied. However,I can make a list if you like.At this juncture intime, the Chinese military, through their civilian counterpart, controls the Panama Canal, giving them a good opportunity to control shipping, including military supplies, around the the southern hemisphere. I don;t think we have threatened military action. They have not built military bases in Mexico, so what? yeah, we would probably scream about it. I doubt that we would use car bombs to terrorize the locals there. All things being equal, they are not.
After 50 years of American influence in the countries how can you blame them? America was oppressive to women up until the last 25 years. Have we reached equality? Go ask a woman on the street and she will give you an earful. We walk around thinking we have it all figured out. How easy it is to forget our own past trespasses? So are we to cure Islam of their oppressive practices? If so please tell me so I can move to Canada now. If that is the agenda of the right then you will destroy not only America but most of the world.
They were the victims for the previous 50 years Fleet. Why are you blaming them? Because they did something spectacular to draw attention to your governments bs foreign policies? Are you blaming the original victims?
After 32 years of marriage, I can tell you that at least my part of America was not oppressive, and (joke) I wish women were ONLY equal!:)
“If so please tell me so I can move to Canada now.”
It is so. I hear Travelocity is having a sale. Say hello to the draft dodgers up there, eh?
“Islam is one of the most oppressive, male dominated and barbaric judgmental religions on the planet.”
When did it fall to America to overthrow the primary religion of 1.3 billion people? Because we object to that religion, the lives and treasure of America should be used to change their culture, using force if necessary?
I don’t remember getting a vote on that subject.
so MIke what you are trying to say is we had it coming..
LjThank you for finally answering my question.
yeah, we would probably scream about it. I doubt that we would use car bombs to terrorize the locals there. All things being equal, they are not.
Posted by: littlejohn | May 16, 2007 at 03:10 PM
They don’t have a military to go do their fighting. They screamed about it alot. We didn’t listen. They don’t have an airforce to attack us, so they figured out a way to get their message across. Do I agree with their method….no! But we would find a way, such as they did to get our message across. Its just a matter of time before some war monger just comes out and says what is obvious. We are better than them! Period! They worship a different god so that makes them inferior to us. It doesn’t matter what we do around the world, we will not be held to account. We have the bomb and you don’t so shut up, sit down, and toe the line.
Way before 9/11 fundamentalist Muslims were objecting to American presence in Saudi Arabia. Women soldiers driving trucks, infidels in the holy land of Mecca, all sorts of fundamentalist crackpottery (reference Jerry Falwell if you’re not familiar how fundamentalists distort reality vis a vis their orthodoxy).
The Saudi royal family’s control of its oil resources — as exploited by Western interests — most certainly engendered animosity among Islamic theocrats.
In so many ways Ron Paul is crazy as a hoot-owl, but he is the only honest voice of the principles of conservatism amongst the current crop of GOP candidates.
And the Republic Party HATES him for it.
Giuliani is the lackey of Wall Street, corporate power, and old money; the traditional bastion of the Republic Party’s power.
Mitt Romney is a pretender to the corporate power structure, tapping Mormon money to buy credibility among big business, conservative “Christians,” with a bit of pretty-boy media appeal thrown in.
McCain has hitched his wagon to George WMD Bush’s great Iraqi adventure; a strategy he hopes might help him eke out a majority of Republic Party delegates but is doomed when the 72% of Americans who oppose Shrub get to the polls in the General Election.
Since 1994, the margin of victory for the Republic Party has been the twice-born evangelicals. Sam Brownback’s only chance of getting on the 2008 ticket is if he can deliver the “Christian” Right. He failed miserably in South Carolina Tuesday night.
Why don’t ‘terrorists’ and fanatical Islamists target Canada and Australia? Could it be that they don’t push their views on the rest of the world like the US and UK?
“We are better than them! Period!”
Maybe we not as in individuals, but we as a society? Yeah,I think so.
“They worship a different god so that makes them inferior to us. ”
I think not. I think putting little children on road in front of your army so that the kid can get blown up by land mines instead of your army makes them inferior to us. I think peforming genital mutilation on women and “honor kiling” a woman makes them inferior to us, at least culturally. I think that they are entitled to live how they want, however. I have stated I was against this war from the beginning. If they want to kill each other fine with me. Same with the hutus and the chechens and whatever. Kill each other, treat each other like shit if you want. Kill innocent American civilians, though, We will hunt you down and obliterate you. I don;t care.
Our policy in the middle east was implemented and ongoing long before Clinton’s term. Of course we have to hold the terrorists responsible for their behavior.
Trying to understand what motivates your enemy seems like a no-brainer to me. Doing so, does not mean that one has to be sympathetic to Muslim culture. Doing so, does not mean that we hate America. How can you honestly come up with shit like that? Oh I forgot, honesty is not a conservative value.
I am amazed at the consistently stupid red herrings guys like you throw out all the time. It would almost seem that you are insisting upon having no real discussion on this issue. Wait, that must be the goal.
Mike,Clowns like Fleetie and Pub will never ever try to have an honest discussion on this subject. The facts are biased against them and though they are incredibly stupid, they are not so stupid as to not recognize this disadvantage. But, I probably give them way too much credit.
Trying to understand what motivates your enemy seems like a no-brainer to me. Doing so, does not mean that one has to be sympathetic to Muslim culture. Doing so, does not mean that we hate America.
Posted by: Steven Davis | May 16, 2007 at 03:31 PM
On that, we agree
Littlejohn, or anybody else for that matter,”I doubt that we would use car bombs to terrorize the locals there”.
Why is anybody so bent about using car bombs or suicide bombers to wreak havoc on an enemy? Why is that any worse than dropping a cluster bomb from 30,000 feet or lobbing a cannon shell from a few miles away? They all kill indiscriminately. Does not having the funds to build planes and bombs and cannon make it dishonorable to use whatever method at hand to kill your enemy? Of course 9/11 was a horrible thing, but from a military standpoint, it was pure genius. They used our planes to kill 3,000 of our people and only lost 19 of theirs. Hell, it costs us billions to get that kind of results.
Oh yes, tell me about how they use children. Please include some source to back it up. I doubt it’s that wide spread. And if it’s bad for them to kill children, what about when we kill them in bombing and artillery strikes?
Or rape and set them on fire.
Republican writes–”Capn conveniently forgets the long history of Airline (hijackings) and Ship attacks conducted by Muslim extremists for decades.”
Name any directed against the United States before 1993.
The Iranian nationalists took our Embassy personnel hostage in the 70’s, but that was a direct result of US support for the overthrown Shah.
There were some Palestinian hijackings against Israelis (Munich Olympics, Entebbe Airport) but there was no systematic terrorism against America until we planted troops in Arabia and left them after promising not to leave them there.
Republican writes–”Capn conveniently forgets the long history of Airline (hijackings) and Ship attacks conducted by Muslim extremists for decades.”
Name any directed against the United States before 1993.
The Iranian nationalists took our Embassy personnel hostage in the 70’s, but that was a direct result of US support for the overthrown Shah.
There were some Palestinian hijackings against Israelis (Munich Olympics, Entebbe Airport) but there was no systematic terrorism against America until we planted troops in Arabia and left them after promising not to leave them there.
I don’t think you guys should be labeling Ron Paul “conservative.”
He is a libertarian, which is a lot different from what passes for a conservative today.
If he is elected, the first thing he could help us in Wichita with is canceling the downtown arena, Waterwalk, and tax increment financing.
The we could start dismantling social security and the public schools.
This is the Ron Paul I know and love.
Okay. AMerica is evil. We will kill anybody that disagrees with us, rape them and set them on fire. We will revel in it. We are the greatest danger to world peace ever. Don;t believe it, just touch my oil, I will f**ck you up.
(this is the american voice, according to some)(sigh)
Republicans are the most evil people that walk the earth
Republicans steal elections, kill little children, hates gays and blacks, and want to establish a taliban theorcracy. REpublicans want to take all your money and give it to the oil companies.
xxx- the iraquis or the iranians, i forgot which, used children during their war with each other to do that very thing. I don;t really care if you believe it or not.
Take charge. Good luck to you.
And an end to the Federal Reserve system, returning to gold as the standard of value of U.S. currency, I forgot to add.
Well first, we have to understand that only the con-iest of the neocons were probably sitting in the audience at Faux News anyway.
So obviously their responses were aimed at revving up that crowd. Unfortunately they aren’t listening to Americans which is very telling of why they won’t win the real election.
I’m not a Ron Paul fan exactly, but I don’t despise him. And I used to be very comfortable with the idea of McCain running this country…I believe he DOES want what is best for us as a whole. But this new pandering to the RR and flip flopping (god I can’t believe he actually denied that) has hurt him badly. He should have stuck to his original campaign tactics from the past election.
The rest of em are crap. Rudy included. I wouldn’t want that weasel running anything even if he supports a woman’s right to choose. I see through him just like I saw through Bush…and I was so very right on now wasn’t I?
Also isn’t it funny as all get out that almost nobody has mentioned Sam on this board. The board from his own hometown doesn’t give two licks about his opinion.
Sam, it’s time to bug out buddy and save some money.
“The we could start dismantling social security and the public schools.
This is the Ron Paul I know and love.”
This is exactly why Ron Paul won’t win. Some of his ideas are good, but we don’t want to live in a third world country and that’s all that libertarianism supports. Like it or not, that would be the end result.
The women of Islam are trying hard to enact change in their society just like we had to. But you’ve got hardline fundamentalists who want to hold them down…just like we have here.
It will happen, they will do better. Have you listened to the women in those cultures? They are doing good things. And they know it’s a long haul, and they’re willing to take baby steps. But unfortunately Iraq took a step backwards in the women’s movement.
Paul blew Giuliani out of the water. Paul has proven that he way more about foreign policy than Giuliani. Giuliani wishes he knew as much as Paul. How can he have never heard of “blowback”? Any presidential candidate that doesn’t know about it should not run for president. Giuliani is a joke.
Giluliani will rid 9/11 just as far as it can take him! Kind of like bush.
Ron Paul is the ONLY real CONSERVATIVE candidate choice out there and a damned fine choice he would be. This country is going to hell in a handbasket, and people are beginning to wake up and use their brains. Ron Paul has won virtually every post debate poll. There’s a reason.
The Fox website poll naming Romney the straw-poll debate-winner results give us an Orwellian moment.
I arrived 20 minutes late to the debate, but watched the last 70 minutes. I watched the post-debate candidate interview show hosted by Hannity and Colmes, in its entirety.
Ron Paul had the lead when Hannity and Colmes’ “The Spin Zone” [their choice of words, not my sarcasm] went off-air. This was an instant-count electronic straw poll using cellphone text-messaging. The numbers varied only slightly with updates during the show, but after the first half-hour, Paul never relenquished the lead. Other candidates’ numbers didn’t change much, if at all.
It is highly suspect that the numbers DID CHANGE significantly AFTER the interviews ended. Here’s why: the poll asked people to judge the debate. Paul did suffer Hannity’s ham-fisted cut-offs and harangues, but if anything Paul should have gotten sympathy votes: he was not flummoxed in the slightest, it was just that Hannity wouldn’t let him finish his answers, and it was obvious he was being discriminated against.
Let’s model this. Suppose that 100,000 votes were registered during the telecast.
Romney would have gotten ca. 27,000, Paul 30,000 +/- a half percentage point.
Suppose AFTER the interviews, even though Fox programming stopped soliciting votes at the end of The Spin Zone, another 30,000 people voted.
For Romney to jump to 29% of total final votes, the new votes would have had to be 36% for Romney. That’s a plausible change.
For Paul to drop to 25% of the total final votes, his new votes would have had to drop to 8%, from a previous 30%. That’s not statistically credible.
This whole process was unscientific. Callers were self-selecting (which is also true for elections). Fox News didn’t post actual vote counts, only percentages.
Since this was unscientific, and Fox News has an agenda, and Paul’s after-broadcast votes suddenly tanked, there’s a reasonable statistical probability that Faux News fabricated the final “tally” to manufacture the “winner”. Initially, computers were spewing numbers out. Execs couldn’t intervene to change them until after the unexpected damage was done. That’s my take.
I picked 100,000 as a convenient convertible to 100% percent value. I picked 30,000–30% after-show voting increase, because the interview show ended at 11:30′ish Eastern time, and 10:30′ish Central, basically bedtime in each zone. We wouldn’t expect a lot of new votes after the network stopped asking people to vote, and that at a latish hour as well.
Most voting viewers who had strong opinions would have called in shortly after being invited to vote, and as repeatedly invited, not after the invitations had ceased being issued.
Assuming a 30% new-vote addition is reasonable. If we lower this to say 20%, the end-results become completely incredible, because Paul’s post-interview new votes would have had to be virtually 0%. The winner suddenly goes to zero support? Not credible.
If we increase the new-vote addition to 100% or more (100,000 or more new votes), then the new-vote disparity between Romney and Paul decreases, becoming more plausible in this respect, BUT LESS PLAUSIBLE overall; e.g. since it was earlier for Mountain and Pacific time zone viewers, we could expect them to have a greater post-interview call-in rate than their later-time-zone counterparts, since it wasn’t yet their bedtime.
But most of their strongly-opinionated Republicans tend to hold more Libertarian views than Eastern and Midwestern Republicans. They are anti-Washington per se. Paul’s message has higher resonance there.
Moreover, California has a huge population, and we’d expect political-junkee Dems to phone in, and they’d vote for someone with a new, non-Bushlike gameplan, which neither Romney, Guliani nor McCain has presented in the slightest.
It wouldn’t have originally suprised me if the real-time results showed Romney the straw-poll winner. It’s the belated major shift that doesn’t make statistical sense. To me, it seems disturbingly reminiscent of the statistically improbable disparities between exit poll numbers, based on real-time interviews of voters, and final “vote tallies” conducted behind closed doors, in the 2004 election in Ohio.
I hope Rudy wins the GOP nomination. I so hope so. When the videos of his cross dressing are put on TV, when people learn of all his wives and girlfriends and God knows what else, he will make Bill Clinton look like a saint!
Guiliani ranks with Bush as being one of the most idiotic people on foreign policy. It’s absolutely naive to think that our actions in foreign countries don’t have consequences. Ron Paul made absolute sense so it’s no surprise he wasn’t considered a true Republican. Guiliani thinks the answer to everything is an iron fist, but that’s how he ran New York City.
Later on only McCain went on to criticize the use of torture when the other thugs shouted out with glee how they’d torture people so harshly that Jesus would wince.
There you have it, the Republican party is largely represented by people who want to set up a tyrannical regime powered by a war machine and the populace kept in line with fear.
Let’s see- the second Rudy says “I accept the Republican nomination”, George Soros or a front group will have TV commercials ready. The first commercial will show the video of Rudy dressed as a female and say “Rudy is 100% in favour of the homosexual agenda including marriage”. The second commercial will show pictures of Rudy’s wives and girlfriends while his estranged son describes how Rudy abandoned his family for infidelity. The next TV commercial will show Rudy saying in his own words “I fully support abortion and we need 100% public funding of abortion” and the final commercial would show Rudy, in his own words, saying “we need a full ban on guns”. These TV commercials will pretty much insure that about 60% of the Republicans stay home on election day!
Mark, Mark, Mark… while I like your take on things the above was pretty fuzzy math, don’t you think?
That’s a given Kev. A freaking given.
Swift Dems for Truth or something like that.
“Also isn’t it funny as all get out that almost nobody has mentioned Sam on this board. The board from his own hometown…”
Topeka is where Sam lives now, mom. I am not sure where his hometown is.
Actually! The aborto-centrist turbo Christians who are hell bent to vote for nobody unless the candidate makes it their absolute number one goal to end abortion, then these people will end up giving the Democrats an easy win in 2008.
If they only can look past their feeble abortion only cause, then the Republican Party can actually have some great general election candidates.
Have you ever notice that most anti-abortion activist are men?
Actually! I’m going to to predict that Sam Brownback will lose his seat come next senatorial election.
Pat will stay until he dies, but Sam is a goner.
Where did the Republikahn and Fleettie, go? Surely those _ussies aren’t afraid of logic and reasonable discorse, are they?
I guess they are.
BIG suprise there.
“I’m going to to predict that Sam Brownback will lose his seat come next senatorial election.”
Joe, care to speculate who might take it from him? It is possible, but who could do this?
Oh, “suprise” should be “surprise”. Kinda like Gomer said, “surprise, surprise, surprise!”
I’m sure a strong contender will come up. Hell, People thought that Phil Kline was solid for re-election.
If Sebelius ran against him, she will win easily. Brownback is up when Sebelius is.
It’s a very strong possibility she will run for the Senate.
Joe!
That would be a very interesting race. I will have to consider who I’d vote for. Sebelius might be carried in by the anti-Bush storm that will be coming.
Don’t you think your party would be better served by getting Bush out of the WhiteHouse before 2008? I know that would help me find respect for the GOP.
“That’s a given Kev. A freaking given.
Swift Dems for Truth or something like that.”
Payback is a bitch isn’t it?
“Islam is one of the most oppressive, male dominated and barbaric judgmental religions on the planet.”
While that may be true, ask any gay person, and they will say the same about the christian taliban. They are indeed, oppressive of civil equality for all americans, almost exclusively male dominated…
…and do I even have to MENTION the truth that they are one of the most “barbaric judgmental religions on the planet”?
So let the gay bashing and flaming begin. The truth obviously hurts.
And, goddess help me, I agree 100 percent with Joe Williams’s post at 11:38!
I think Raj Goyle will run against Tiahrt, but running against brownback is possible
“Rudy Giuliani had the biggest moment in the GOP debate in South Carolina Tuesday night when he broke in to challenge Ron Paul’s statement that America’s involvement in the Middle East was partly responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks. Visibly incensed and in high moral dudgeon, Giuliani called Paul’s comments “absurd” and demanded a retraction.”
This show how tight the grip which the Ruling right-wing Zionists of Israel has around Giuiani’s throat. They control the vote he needs to get into the Presidency.
Giuiani is a typical sold-out politician and that has gotten us into the mess in Iraq.—–
I would vote for Raj over Tiahrt any day.