Clear winner; surprise loser in debate

Contrary to popular opinion, I thought all of the pressure for a good performance in last night’s debate was on Jeb!  He's the one who has dropped like a stone in the polls. There was one big winner last night.  It wasn’t - Jeb!  So he lost.  Bush will not regain momentum until there is no other viable candidate in the Republican field.  Sadly for Bush, there are plenty of other viable candidates.

Winners:

Carly:  Clear winner by any score card.  Best line was when she declined to have a woman replace anyone currently pictured on any denomination of our paper money.

Marco:  Solid performance.  Clear leader in foreign policy.  Needs the field to winnow to shine.

Cruz:  Why Cruz?  He’s my guy.  It’s my blog.  What do expect?  It was clear that CNN, like Fox, was freezing Cruz out. 

No damage:

The Donald:  All 14 other candidates were given an opportunity to take Trump out on multiple occasions.  11 took the opportunity and failed.  The Trumpsters and others like me will conclude that the first 30 minutes in total and much of what followed were set up questions asked specifically to nail Trump.  He survived.  CNN failed.

Christie:  Was engaging and plausible.  Leaning so heavily on the podium was bit a off putting.  What you can stand on feet for three hours?  No.  No I can’t.

Failed to break out:

Rand:  Had it not been for his what seemed to be an endless defense of legalized marijuana - particularly for “medical purposes” against other candidates who had already conceded the “medical use” low ground – Rand could have climbed into the “no damage” category.

Hucksterbee:  Very Smooth.  With fewer people on the stage would be a commanding presence.   

Kasich:  Nice performance for a guy running to be a vice presidential candidate.

Carson:  The only memorable thing was calling Trump an “OK doctor” and putting his mom on the $10 bill.

Walker:  Hmm, can’t recall a thing he said.

Losers:

Jeb!  See paragraph one.

CNN:  WTF?  Break it up into 3 two hour debates on separate nights and shuffle the candidates.  By the end I just wanted it be over.  I’m glad I stayed until the bitter end though.  Carly had a smashing close.  But the CNN staff like the Fox staff heaped great praise on the moderators for doing such a great job giving the other candidates an opportunity to bash Trump.  Americans are fair minded people.  Any over the age of four could see what was going on.  Why did Jake Tapper have the other two on stage?

The under card:  All four plus Jim Gilmore should announce that they are dropping out of the race today.  None has a chance.  As much as it pains me, only Lindsey Graham seemed presidential.  He is of course totally wrong about demanding that every candidate pledge to put 20,000 ground combat forces into Iraq and Syria or they are not fit to be Commander in Chief.  With his demand Graham proves he’d be a bad CinC.  The answer is: “After directing the military what I wanted to accomplish, I’d commit whatever forces my military advisers recommended to me to accomplish the mission I had laid out for them.”  It may require more than 20,000.  But hell yes I’d kill every one of the Islamo-Terror-Fascists I could find over there.