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Tonight in the PB NightHawks cafe…

February 22nd, 2012

…the 20th and possibly final GOP TV debate

Amazingly there have been nineteen separate TV debates in the fight for the GOP nomination. Tonight’s event, being staged near Phoenix in Arizona, is the twentieth and will almost certainly see Rick Santorum coming under close scrutiny. In all the previous events he’s never been centre stage and it will be interesting wathching how he performs and how the other contenders react to him.

A lot of this is not about the words that are exchanged but the overall impression that is given. Body language is as important as what is said.

All but Gingrich have vetoed other debates planned for March and this could be the last.

It’s on CNN and starts at 0100 GMT.

@MikeSmithsonOGH
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  • old_labour

    Odd that the party which is against the power of Government is on the verge of making compulsory the useof vaginal probes on women who seek an abortion in the first trimester in Virginia.

  • Anonymous

    A man, understood to be Labour MP Eric Joyce, has been arrested on suspicion of assault following a disturbance at the Houses of Parliament.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17136209?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

  • Anonymous

    And Neil’s beer fund goes into reverse…

  • Anonymous

    I’m not sure about BMW, but I thought Toyota had quite a substantial US manufacturing base?

  • MickP0rk

    It’s pretty much a Romney crowd. Santo is going to struggle with that.

  • http://profile.yahoo.com/VGEDM47IXSDSJV2G7CNMMV2HTE Iain

    Hey its America, anything is possible!

  • old_labour

     Yes, it does. Their cars are some of the bestsellers over there.

  • old_labour

    Was doing too many things at once.

  • Anonymous

    Scottish MPs – pressure of work? Don’t be daft. Most of the work is done by MSPs because the MP’s constituency workload is only on reserved matters. That leaves plenty of time for those not working for the referendum, or holding UK Government posts to hang around the bars. What else do they have to do?

  • MickP0rk

    Double 13 foot walls now. The circus gets more amusing all the time.

  • Anonymous

    mike murphy@murphymike

    It seems from the immigration/abortion focus that CNN thinks the GOP primary is mostly about Dem wedge issues

  • Anonymous

    James Pethokoukis@JimPethokoukis
    Romney was at 70% to win MI before debate on Intrade. Now he’s up to 75%
    Retweeted by Ann Coulter

  • Anonymous

    Four large demonstrations planned for Moscow this week ahead of the March 4th Putin coronation elections…

    http://en.rian.ru/society/20120223/171470321.html

  • Anonymous

    You are right. Everyone else has a 4 year cycle, but Westminster decided on a 5 year cycle which screws everything up. It means a coincidence every so often of a Westminster and EU election, and within the UK that local and devolved elections have to be shifted by a year.

    That Westminster are arrogant prats goes without saying.

  • Anonymous

    Rich Lowry
    @RichLowry (editor National Review, sceptical of Romney)

    i wonder if romney has actually been hurt most by the absence of debates recently

  • http://edmundintokyo.wordpress.com/ Edmund in Tokyo

    Is it just me or is Newt Gingrich sounding very convincing while Romney and Santorum both look petty and untrustworthy?

  • Neil

    “Everyone else has a 4 year cycle”

    Not Brussels!

  • old_labour

    Time for tea. 

  • Anonymous

    We may have to re-evaluate how popular Blair was…

    Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov was sworn in for a second term as the president of Turkmenistan on Friday following his election last week.

    Berdymukhamedov swept the February 12 elections with 97 percent of the vote. Seven other candidates had praised him in the run-up to the vote.

    http://en.rian.ru/world/20120217/171361189.html

  • Anonymous

    Thanks

  • Neil

    I think I’ve seen too much of Newt to find him convincing. The guy always plays to the state he happens to be in as well. When did he last mention the urgency over dredging the port of Charleston?!

  • Anonymous

    consistent – paul
    courage – santorum
    resolute – romney
    cheerful – gingrich

    Candidates describing themselves in one word.  Yet again an American candidate copying a failed Labour leader…

  • http://edmundintokyo.wordpress.com/ Edmund in Tokyo

    Sure, but at least he’s properly briefed on the policy detail of the appropriate pander.

  • MickP0rk

    Alex Castellanos
    @alexcast

    this debate is doing more damage to GOP than any so far. devouring ourselves. next TIME cover: incredible shrinking GOP #cnndebate

    That tweet nailed it.

  • MickP0rk

    pourmecoffee
    @pourmecoffee

    GOP debate tonight. Women, be sure to watch with notepad. You will be given instructions regarding your bodies and whatnot.

    Another one bang on the money.

  • http://edmundintokyo.wordpress.com/ Edmund in Tokyo

    It’s hard to believe that the current leader in the GOP polling is someone who thought the answer to that question should be a noun.

  • Anonymous

    I can think of a few adjectives to describe his performance tonight….

  • Neil

    He seems to have an impressive grasp when he’s quoting how he voted on an issue in 1986 and saying what Reagan wrote in his diaries about it. I cant shake the feeling that it’s all at a superficial level and quite prepared though. And judgement is more important anyway. He used to impress me a lot more earlier in the campaign, getting flattened by Romney in the last Florida debate took some of the shine off!

  • http://edmundintokyo.wordpress.com/ Edmund in Tokyo

    @LOLGOP
    You know who would agree this is the most dangerous president? bin Laden.

  • old_labour

    Newt:’I'm inclined to believe dictators’. 

  • Anonymous

     Its not arrogance, its greed.

    The term in Westminster has been five year max going back decades before Holyrood or Brussels, though in recent years its been 4 years if you think you can win, 5 if you can’t.

    Fixing it in advance there’s no way to know whether they’ll win or not, so basically the choice is to lose a year in power or not to lose a year in power? So unsurprisingly they chose not to lose a year of power. There was absolutely nothing noble, principled or anything else about that decision.

    If the consequence of not losing a year is Salmond gains another then so be it. At least there’s another 12 months in office.

  • http://edmundintokyo.wordpress.com/ Edmund in Tokyo

    A dirty bomb smuggled across the border. Mitt Romney just got his Iranian threat to America scenario out of Wag The Dog.

    Iran has had the capability to smuggle in a dirty bomb for years…

  • Neil

    So cutting spending is suddenly wrong when it’s 100 million to the Iranian opposition…

  • MickP0rk

    Romney bot malfunctioning again. If you elect Romney Iran won’t get a nuclear weapon but if you elect Obama Iran will because…. ???

    The Iranians fear his hair? The Iranians trees aren’t the right height?
    Obama doesn’t love all the little lakes like Romney?  Who can say?

  • http://edmundintokyo.wordpress.com/ Edmund in Tokyo

    cheerful – gingrich

    I’m starting to like Newt Gingrich. Is this something that requires urgent treatment, or will it get better on its own?

  • MickP0rk

    citizenrobot
    @citizenrobot

    I choose to blindly believe all these people clapping in the audience of the CNN GOP debate had Groupons to this event.

    Pretty good. ;^)

  • Neil

    Ask one of his ex-wives!

  • Anonymous

    No it’s treatable.  You like one of Speaker Gingrich’s many personalities.

  • Anonymous

    Gingrich/Romney effectively urging a repeat of the US policy toward Afghanistan in the 1980s, arming rebels in Syria.

    How did that all end?

  • Neil

    Did Romney just say Syria is Iran’s route to the sea?! Who’s his geography teacher, Santorum?

  • old_labour

    They might as well naturalise Bibi and appoint him SOS. 

  • MickP0rk

    Newt : As long as you are America’s enemy you are safe.

    As Bin Laden will tell you Newt.

    The GOP gives up reality for lent.

  • Anonymous

    Santorum: “I admit the mistake” (on another government spending bill he supported, this time in education).

    daveweigel @daveweigel
    RT @freddoso: Santorum says he “took one for the team” on NCLB. Because nothing says leadership like….that.

  • Anonymous

    Damn! You’re right! In which case, Westminster were utterly wrong to impose a 4 year cycle on the devolved Parliament/Assemblies. See? They’re still arrogant!

  • MickP0rk

    The final question of what could be the final republican debate…

    How much did Obama pay you guys for this circus?

  • MickP0rk

    This debate’s more like one of the early ones but with less people.

    Anyone who thought these debates or candidates would get better over time has had that theory comprehensively crushed tonight.

    We’ll all miss these whacky funsters. ;^)

  • old_labour

    Will three out of four use the phrase, ‘my wife, X of Y years’?

  • Anonymous

    Not one single original question was asked tonight, John King is a fine journalist but a poor moderator.

    Paul 7/10
    Santorum 3/10
    Romney 7/10
    Gingrich 7/10

    Unspectacular debate, the only difference with previous contests was that Santorum was exposed as being unready.

  • Anonymous

    John King poor tonight.

  • MickP0rk

    Mitt nailed that one again with his “people skills”. LOL

    Romneybot managed to get booed and annoyed with a softball question on misconceptions

  • Neil

    I agree Santorum was the big loser though he actually was presentationally better than he has been. Just a shame he’s so thick :(

  • MickP0rk

    Chris L
    @brittonlowe

    Not sure what the final question of the final GOP debate will be, but I bet Newt wakes up next to his first wife at the end.

    Another good one.

    Twitter seems to be 98% mocking the debate. And who can blame them?

  • Anonymous

    Nate Silver@fivethirtyeight
    Debate #20 grades: Paul B+, Romney B+, Gingrich B, Santorum B-

    Ari Fleischer gives it to Romney/Gingrich

  • Anonymous

    Santorum calls the audience as pro-Romney.

  • Anonymous

     Must admit I almost fell asleep during this one. What did Santorum do that was thick?

  • MickP0rk

    Deserves no rating. Piss poor from all of them and a pretty good reflection of what these debates have done to the GOP.
    Entertaining amusement though they are for the rest of the sane world.

  • Anonymous

    Nate Silver@fivethirtyeight
    Santorum dropped quite a bit on Intrade during the debate. Now just 6.8% chance of winning GOP nomination, started at 11%

    Chuck Todd@chucktodd
    BTW, not sure there’s any moment tonight that will change trajectory of race which RIGHT NOW has Romney coming back again

  • Anonymous

    David Gergen: Mitt Romney won against Santorum by a significant margin.

  • Neil

    Many examples posted over this thread – I think the 2 minutes he spent defending earmarks was possibly the worst use of time of any candidate in any of the debates so far. But he generally gave an impression of not being the equal of the other candidates intellectually.

  • old_labour

    Glad I did not bet on that!

  • old_labour

    I wonder if ordinary Americans are more concerned with the debates, or that there is allegedly a photo of Whitney Houston inside her coffin in this week’s National Enquirer and that she was buried wearing $500,000 worth of jewellery.

  • MickP0rk

    jonathan
    @jmlawyer

    GOP’s 20th Presidential Debate has just ended. I feel stupider for having watched it. #clowncar

    That just about sums it up.

  • MickP0rk

    @igorvolsky: “@daveweigel: BREAKING: Adele declared winner of GOP debate”

    heh.

  • MickP0rk

     “there is allegedly a photo of Whitney Houston inside her coffin in this week’s National Enquirer”

    There goes The Sun on Sunday’s exclusive. ;^)

  • Mike Smithson

    The winner, for me, was Newt Gingrich who came over as lucid, thoughtful and best able to cope with a general election campaign. 

    Santo had a poor night and Rombo came over as the mean-spirited bully that he is. 

  • MickP0rk

     “The winner, for me, was Newt Gingrich”

    It’s no sillier than declaring Romneybot or Santo or Paul winner.

    Of all the ones I’ve seen this one said the winner was Obama the most clearly.

    They really have all pushed themselves further and further to the extremes.

    It’s strange the GOP base should be so unhappy.
    Yes, the candidates are indeed all hopeless but the conservative base have rarely if ever been pandered to so blatantly and with such little regard to what is moderate or electable elsewhere or even sane.

  • Anonymous

    Presumably someone has already noted the activities of Eric Joyce. Just in case they haven’t 

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2105180/Labour-MP-arrested-bar-brawl-inside-House-Commons.html?ito=feeds-newsxml 

  • MickP0rk

     

    It is reported on the website Mr Joyce, 51, complained the bar, popular with MPs from both parties, was ‘full of Tories’

    Well you will insist on going to westminster Eric. There’s hardly any of them in scotland. ;^)

  • http://twitter.com/StarzandStrypz Starz and Strypz

    Good morning, British insomniacs, early risers and unemployable alcoholic loners (hope I haven’t left anybody out).

    Debate recap: Santorum fared badly due to Paul/Romney tagteam effort, his penchant for congressional babblespeak, and his inability to cut his losses in doomed arguments over his support for earmarks, omnibus spending bills and “Benedict Arlen” Specter.

    Newt was back on his game, but it’s probably too late to matter. Who knows what might have been, had he kept on his happy face instead of dredging the depths with his mutually-destructive Bain assault?

    Paul was Paul.

    And Romney, by being the only other man to be accounted for here, effectively won.  He’s been maimed by the successive blows he’s taken in South Carolina, Colorado, Missouri and Minnesota, but yet he still somehow clings to his aura of near-inevitability.  Tonight confirmed the status quo ante.  On to Michigan, Arizona, and Super Tuesday.

    Oh, one other loser: CNN.  Come on, yet more questioning about contraception?  The GOP brings itself down to CNN’s level by agreeing to appear in this alternate reality forum.

  • MickP0rk

     “unemployable alcoholic loner”

    Is this the surprise candidate the GOP will wheel out if it comes to a brokered convention? His chances must have rocketed after tonight. ;^)

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