[Psudo]

The Environmental Protection Agency is not a department of the federal government, nor is it a part of one. It is an independent federal agency. When asked what department you would cut if you had to cut a department, "the EPA" is a factually wrong answer. Sorry, Mr. Cain.

If the Terrorists in Pakistan took control of Pakistani nuclear weapons, the US should instantly move to destroy those weapons. The Pakistani government should be informed and all action should be taken with an eye toward protecting Pakistani law and order from terrorism, but if ever there was a time to beg forgiveness rather than ask for permission nuclear terrorism is that time. Why was everyone so wishy-washy on that point?

In fact, why were everyone's foreign policy answers so vague, simplistic, and shallow?

There is never an appropriate time to boo a US soldier. Not if hate the war he's fighting, not if he's gay, not if he disagrees with you, not even if he's Senator Kerry. That was just wrong.

Gary Johnson wins "Best In Show" for his joke about his neighbor's dogs creating more shovel-ready jobs than the Obama Administration.

According to my numbers, Ron Paul is second rather than (as he claimed) third in the polls. Maybe yesterday and today's straw polls will change that, but he couldn't possibly have had those figures when he spoke. Does he mean national opinion polls instead of Republican straw polls?

It's bizarre how high-budget and exciting an affair these debates have become. These are just party nomination debates, but they're clearly about ten times the production value of the Carter/Reagan debates, and back in 1980 they ask the audience NOT to respond with approval or disapproval. When did politics become Monday Night Football?

[xerxes]

I'd say these GOP debates are more excruciating than exciting. Mainly because all of the candidate (Save for Huntsman) are operating on a set of beliefs and ideas that are completely divorced from fact and reality.

And if the GOP was smart, they would start banning the audiences from these debates because so far we've seen people cheer an unprecedented number of executions by a single governor, cheer the death of an uninsured young man, and now boo a soldier, simply for being gay.

[Murray_Smith]

I am becoming convinced that the Obamanation is the Antichrist. The Satan is obviously keeping his political opponents steeped in incompetence so that the Lord of Socialists shall easily triumph over the puny populists. And shall be given authority to govern for 48 more months.

[BartSimpson]

My favorite quote from last night:

Mitt Romney wrote:

...there are a lot of reasons not to vote for me!

Finally, he says something I agree with!

[Proculation]

I have a question for the Americans here: It seems Ron Paul is showing as the winner or the second in the debates in the popular polls but, the media never talk about him. They talk more about Santorum or Huntsman than Ron Paul.

Why is that ?

[xerxes]

Because he's the right's equivalent of Ralph Nader. He tries hard, makes good points, but everyone and their momma knows he hasn't got a hope in hell of winning.

[Proculation]

That's very interesting haha

[Proculation]

xerxes wrote:

Because he's the right's equivalent of Ralph Nader. He tries hard, makes good points, but everyone and their momma knows he hasn't got a hope in hell of winning.

Ralph Nader didn't stand in the front runner of one of the Big Two parties candidate polls.

[Thanos]

Ron Paul's important because he's almost single-handedly responsible for bringing all the right-wing kooks in American politics from out of their exile in the wilderness and back into the forefront of the Republican Party. Even as recently as 2004 all this libertarian/Randian claptrap was kept in a corner by the GOP and firmly told to shut the fuck up. Then the internet discovered Ron Paul and all the dreck that had been successfully flushed down the toilet for decades by real conservatives like Bill Buckley, Barry Goldwater, and Ronald Reagan came floating back up to the surface. And, unfortunately, the current GOP seems to enjoy having these idiots hang around. Hence the enduring popularity and current spotlight on Ron Paul and his rotten legion of orcs.

[Gunnair]

Thanos wrote:

Ron Paul's important because he's almost single-handedly responsible for bringing all the right-wing kooks in American politics from out of their exile in the wilderness and back into the forefront of the Republican Party. Even as recently as 2004 all this libertarian/Randian claptrap was kept in a corner by the GOP and firmly told to shut the fuck up. Then the internet discovered Ron Paul and all the dreck that had been successfully flushed down the toilet for decades by real conservatives like Bill Buckley, Barry Goldwater, and Ronald Reagan came floating back up to the surface. And, unfortunately, the current GOP seems to enjoy having these idiots hang around. Hence the enduring popularity and current spotlight on Ron Paul and his rotten legion of orcs.

For all your pissing on him, during the last televised debates, he was the only guy with the stones from either party that stood there in front of the US and said that 9/11 did not occur in a vacuum, and that US foreign policy had a hand in stoking Jihadist ire against the US. He was also the only guy that said flat out that the US was not being attacked because of its freedom and liberty but because of its meddling foreign policy

Two thumbs up for this guy on that point.

[sandorski]

Ron Paul is an interesting character. He's so right on some things, yet so wrong on others. Despite that, he's the most intellectually honest of the bunch of Republican candidates. Unfortunately he suffers from the same problem the others do. That is, he's an Ideologue to a fault. He'd make a good Foreign Minister/Advisor, but beyond that not a good President.

[Thanos]

Finding a single sensible policy point in the mire of Paul's overall agenda doesn't justify or legitimze the rest of his wacky worldview. Being right on the Iraq war was easy. Promoting crap like bringing back the gold standard, gutting the federal government into essential non-existance, or trumpeting all this crypto-neoConfederate "state's rights" nonsense is something different altogether.

[Gunnair]

Thanos wrote:

Finding a single sensible policy point in the mire of Paul's overall agenda doesn't justify or legitimze the rest of his wacky worldview. Being right on the Iraq war was easy. Promoting crap like bringing back the gold standard, gutting the federal government into essential non-existance, or trumpeting all this crypto-neoConfederate "state's rights" nonsense is something different altogether.

Nobody was arguing it was. I do point out that he does make some good points and some of those points are quite brave really - he took a good booing at the debates over that point but didn't back down or get all mealy mouthed. More can't be said about others - left and right.

[Psudo]

xerxes wrote:

[Ron Paul] tries hard, makes good points, but everyone and their momma knows he hasn't got a hope in hell of winning.

I hope that's true more than I believe it's true.

[Proculation]

Ron Paul is authentic. He has a moral and an ethic. That's what drives his views. I think that's why he's ignored in politics. That's not values that are important in politics to be moral.