The GOP Presidential Primary Debates are starting soon. Here are the first couple:

Quote :

"May 5, 2011 - Greenville, South Carolina. Fox News, South Carolina GOP June 7, 2011 - Manchester, New Hampshire CNN, WMUR-TV, New Hampshire Union Leader"

There was another scheduled for May 2nd that got canceled. The declared candidates to date include Gary Johnson, Fred Karger, Andy Martin, Jimmy McMillan, and Ole Savior (according to wiki). By comparison to the year before the the last elections McCain, Romney, and Obama had declared by Feb of that year, and Huckabee & Hillary even earlier in Jan.

First debate is only a week away. Will you be watching?

4/28/2011 10:55:55 AM

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"Gary Johnson, Fred Karger, Andy Martin, Jimmy McMillan, and Ole Savior"

who?

THERENTISTOODAMNHIGH has my vote

[Edited on April 28, 2011 at 11:06 AM. Reason : AFASDF]

4/28/2011 11:05:29 AM

Ole Savior

4/28/2011 11:32:59 AM

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/05/cnn-poll-still-no-front-runner-in-the-battle-for-the-gop-nomination/

Quote :

"The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey's Thursday release comes hours before the first Republican presidential debate of the 2012 election cycle. The debate is being held in South Carolina, which holds the first southern primary on the road to the White House. The poll also indicates President Barack Obama is ahead of all probable and possible GOP candidates tested in hypothetical general election matchups, but the person who comes closest to Obama may surprise you. According to the survey, conducted just before the news of the death of Osama bin Laden, 16 percent of Republicans and independents who lean Republican say they would be likely to support Mike Huckabee for the Republican presidential nomination. The former Arkansas governor ran for the White House in 2008, and while to date he hasn't taken many steps towards launching another campaign, he has definitely not ruled out another bid for his party's nomination. Fourteen percent say they'd back Donald Trump. The billionaire businessman, real estate mogul and reality TV star says he will announce by June if he's going to run for the White House. One point back is Mitt Romney, at 13 percent. The former Massachusetts governor and 2008 GOP White House candidate has been adding to his campaign team in recent months and last month launched a presidential exploratory committee. The poll indicates that 11 percent support Sarah Palin. The former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee has not made any serious moves towards launching a campaign, but says she isn't closing any doors. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, who has run for the White House twice before, both stand at ten percent in the poll. Both men have taken steps towards formally launching campaigns. Everyone else questioned in the survey registered at five percent or less."

The debate includes Cain, Johnston, Paul, Pawlenty, and Santorum.

The polls front runners are Huckabee, Trump, Romney, Palin, Gingrich, and Paul.

So the only declared candidate debating is Johnson, and the only front runner in the poll who is debating is Ron Paul.

[Edited on May 5, 2011 at 1:26 PM. Reason : .]

5/5/2011 1:18:05 PM

The "frontrunners" are bullshit and will not have adequate support.

5/5/2011 2:34:59 PM

Just read that it starts at 9 pm, so I might be able to watch it.

It is being hosted by Fox News. I guess the reason so many "front runners" aren't taking part in the Fox News debate is because they'd have to quit their jobs with Fox News first.

5/5/2011 5:51:05 PM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPwgV6c1vEo&feature=related

5/6/2011 1:14:06 AM

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703859304576305793979114236.html

Quote :

"Fox News Terminates Gingrich and Santorum Contracts Fox News Channel terminated its contracts with former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania this week as the two Republicans weigh presidential bids, a spokeswoman for the network confirmed Thursday."

5/6/2011 1:48:01 AM

The next debate is on tonight. No Huntsman or Johnson in this debate, but there is another debate in a little under a month so maybe then. Seeing Gingrich respond to his campaign staff quitting, and Romney to RomneyCare attacks from the right should be interesting. Ron Paul is always fun to listen too.

But the real thing to watch tonight is Michele Bachmann for President 2012!!!

6/13/2011 6:10:13 PM

I can't wait.

6/13/2011 6:17:50 PM

I didn't know bring-back-DADT Pawlenty was in a union and from a union family.

And she's in.



It was funny that Pawlenty after being asked like 5 times in a row wouldn't say ObamNeyCare to Romney's face.

[Edited on June 13, 2011 at 8:39 PM. Reason : .]

6/13/2011 8:37:36 PM

Bachmann =

6/13/2011 8:47:33 PM

what the hell are up with these questions? i'm waiting for boxers or briefs? please let them ask bachmann that!!!

6/13/2011 8:57:41 PM

They sure put a lot of trust in the "private sector". The "private sector: led us to economic disaster in the first place, especially the likes of Goldman Sachs. We should trust them more .

6/13/2011 9:03:58 PM

Pawlenty... Separation between church in state is to protect faithful from gov, not to protect the government from us.

6/13/2011 9:06:27 PM

They're on to whether or not Muslims are less committed to the constitution than other religions.

6/13/2011 9:10:39 PM

Gingrich is the first to reference Nazis so far (doing so in comparison to Muslims and loyalty to America)

6/13/2011 9:12:29 PM

mitt romney just alienated all the vancouver voters



oh wait

6/13/2011 9:18:35 PM

Cain says marriage is a states issue, Paul says get gov out of marriage, Pawlenty & Romney says we need to amend the US constitution.

6/13/2011 9:21:53 PM

^ agree with both Cain and Paul

6/13/2011 9:23:35 PM

Not many immigration or abortion fans on that stage.

6/13/2011 9:32:23 PM

Bachmann was such a fast flip-flop on gay marriage. She was first to answer, said "states rights"...then saw others answer with a constitutional amendment, and then butted in to say she agreed with that.



[Edited on June 13, 2011 at 9:39 PM. Reason : -]

6/13/2011 9:39:35 PM

Question: Will you close down unnecessary bases from past wars?

Santorum: What we have is a failure in leadership. Obama has embraced our enemies. But I would keep the bases too.

6/13/2011 9:51:10 PM

Pawlenty just said Palin would make a better Pres or VP than Biden.

6/13/2011 9:56:21 PM

who's the token black dude?

6/13/2011 9:57:12 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_cain

Quote :

"He is best known as the former chairman and CEO of Godfather's Pizza. He is a former deputy chairman (1992–94) and chairman (1995–96) of the civilian board of directors to the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City."

I think he opened tonight by saying he's never held a political office.

[Edited on June 13, 2011 at 10:01 PM. Reason : .]

6/13/2011 10:00:45 PM

Another good line was Bachmann saying we need to get rid of the EPA saying it needs to be renamed Job Killing Organization of America

6/13/2011 10:04:30 PM

Quote :

"Pawlenty... Separation between church in state is to protect faithful from gov, not to protect the government from us. "

I like to think that it protects me from them

6/13/2011 11:19:52 PM

hmm I never seem to agree with cnn's election analysis, I thought cain did the best in establishing himself, bachman didn't say that much thank god, romney also reminds me of a republican john kerry so not good; I didn't think he did himself much tonight but cnn's polling said otherwise, only thing I really enjoyed was paul talking about foreign policy and economy

also gingrich came off as the most knowledge/I know what I'm doing type guy, I say it ends up close between him and romney



[Edited on June 14, 2011 at 12:12 AM. Reason : ^i agree]

6/14/2011 12:03:33 AM

Cain is pro American law in America courts and does not support our country adopting sharia law in the courtroom.

Who can disagree with that?

6/14/2011 12:07:34 AM

Quote :

"It was funny that Pawlenty after being asked like 5 times in a row wouldn't say ObamNeyCare to Romney's face."

Pawlenty's a pussy. No way will he get the nomination.

6/14/2011 11:43:44 AM

Herman Cain is an idiot...or worse. "There's no reason to audit the Federal Reserve" - from the guy that worked for the Federal Reserve. Can't trust him, and he has no substantive answers to anything.

Also, does anyone remember going to Godfather's Pizza? I'm a strong proponent of "there's no such thing as bad pizza," but Godfather's is a notch below CiCi's.

[Edited on June 14, 2011 at 11:51 AM. Reason : ]

6/14/2011 11:48:49 AM

I didn't see much difference between any of them except for Ron Paul. Everyone else is just another Bush in terms of policies.

6/14/2011 4:54:36 PM

Quote :

"Everyone else is just another Bush in terms of policies."

you mean like Obama then

6/14/2011 6:02:45 PM

All these jokers are running for 2016 anyways, Obama wins and they get their name out there for 2016 when it will be wide open.

6/14/2011 6:06:44 PM

I watched last night's debate and it was totally "meh".

The GOP needs to hurry up and self-destruct so that we can move on.

6/15/2011 9:59:33 AM

I don't get why the GOP is sticking with the "whoever is next in line gets the nomination" routine when the Tea Party was supposed to have changed things.

I also don't understand why all of the cable news networks are so quick to determine who is and isn't "electable," even when an allegedly unelectable candidate has more support from individuals than any other candidate.

CNN got caught red-handed trying to skew poll results. Check out the following video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPY_6mjL3xY. In it, they show a online post-debate poll from National Journal with Romney at 51%, Bachmann at 21%, and Paul at 0%. Of course, the poll only had 54 voters at the time, and CNN declined to reveal the results of their own online poll, which showed Ron Paul with 75% of the vote.

Fox doesn't want Paul because he deviates from the mainstream imperialist rhetoric. CNN doesn't want to give him any credit because he's the only one that has a chance against Obama.

6/15/2011 10:56:21 AM

First, you have to realize that the Tea Party didn't change shit. Then it will all make sense to you.

6/15/2011 11:15:49 AM

We'll see in 2012, won't we?

6/15/2011 11:23:48 AM

umm, so what do you think changed so significantly?

[Edited on June 15, 2011 at 11:27 AM. Reason : please tell me whats going to happen in 2012]

6/15/2011 11:27:05 AM

In 2008, the prevailing wisdom was that we were in a temporary recession, and that the dip wouldn't last more than a few months or a year. Fast forward to 2010, no recovery in sight, in fact things got worse. Libertarian leaning candidates (like Rand Paul) that wouldn't have had a chance in 2008 get elected due to the amorphous "Tea Party"which largely focuses on the awful financial condition of the country.

2011 has been a shitty year for the economy, and it's rapidly getting more shitty. 2012 will be worse. People are waking up and realizing that the boom isn't coming back, we're just getting poorer. The candidates that can explain how we got here, and how we can get back out, will continue gaining traction. Even if the media tries to shut them out, the people are coming over to the common sense positions of guys like Ron Paul and Gary Johnson. We need major changes and principled leadership, not 500 dollar haircuts and "pragmatism."

[Edited on June 15, 2011 at 11:58 AM. Reason : ]

6/15/2011 11:50:04 AM

You're right, we do need their common sense.

My favorite part of the debate was when Ron Paul told us that we could expect "5%, 10%, 15% growth! We can have any growth we want!!!"

the voice of reason right there.

[Edited on June 15, 2011 at 12:11 PM. Reason : ibgrammarnazis]

6/15/2011 12:06:31 PM

If we had an actual free market and got government out of the way of business? We could have enormous (but sustainable) rates of growth. As long as government continues to be a massive burden on the entrepreneur, we won't see that. Our GDP should be negative right now all things considered, though the BLS spinsters are doing their best to keep it around 3%...and failing horribly.

6/15/2011 12:11:31 PM

so you think we could sustain 15% growth if we just dissolved government?

6/15/2011 12:14:52 PM

I reject the usefulness of most econometrics; measures like GDP simply don't take into account all of the components of a productive economy. Ron Paul's point was that we could be seeing much, much higher growth that we currently see if we would just remove some of the artificial barriers to entry and changed the laws in such a way that running a business in this country became less costly.

[Edited on June 15, 2011 at 12:27 PM. Reason : ]

6/15/2011 12:24:11 PM

Quote :

"I reject the usefulness of most econometrics"

thats convenient

Quote :

"Ron Paul's point was that we could be seeing much, much higher growth that we currently see if we would just remove some of the artificial barriers to entry and changed the laws in such a way that running a business in this country became less costly. "

I'd agree with this, to a degree. The other question that needs to be asked is what are the costs to normal people to acheive those types of growth? The only countries, to my knowledge, that have been able to achieve growth in the >15% range were building that growth on the backs of people that live in poverty we can barely imagine in the US.


but this is all off topic, the Tea Party will surely lead us to infinite prosperity.

6/15/2011 12:51:11 PM

Quote :

"The only countries, to my knowledge, that have been able to achieve growth in the >15% range were building that growth on the backs of people that live in poverty we can barely imagine in the US. "

That actually BRINGS those people and the country OUT of that poverty. Just like the US did.

6/15/2011 1:10:14 PM

That would mean the US would have to return to that kind of poverty before we could climb back out with that type of growth. That was kinda the point I was trying to make. A race to the bottom is not my preferred method of economic growth.

6/15/2011 1:19:35 PM

Quote :

"I reject the usefulness of most econometrics; measures like GDP simply don't take into account all of the components of a productive economy. "

Well this is a convenient way to protect yourself from actually consulting reality when evaluating your beliefs.

Quote :

"Ron Paul's point was that we could be seeing much, much higher growth that we currently see if we would just remove some of the artificial barriers to entry and changed the laws in such a way that running a business in this country became less costly."

Those laws protect consumers, the environment, and in many cases preserve competition. Some bad ones can go, but this vague "They are just a burden in general" sentiment is just ignorant. There are much more productive ways to spur growth: building new roads or broadband networks, for instance, lower costs for everybody from the CEO all the way down to the mailroom clerks. That infrastructure also increases the mobility for job seekers and thus the labor pool for employers. Public transit adds even more mobility AND reduces congestion, savings millions of man-hours, gas, and frustration. There's a whole host of investments that can be made that will make the entire market more efficient and accessible, investments that simply will not happen when everyone's operating based on short-range, short-term self interest.

[Edited on June 15, 2011 at 1:32 PM. Reason : .]

6/15/2011 1:30:53 PM

Quote :

"That would mean the US would have to return to that kind of poverty before we could climb back out with that type of growth. That was kinda the point I was trying to make. A race to the bottom is not my preferred method of economic growth."

Well, I'm not sure what to tell you. Who do you think manufactures 99% of the durable goods available to you? Middle class Chinese people? No, people that are dirt poor in comparison to us.

Quote :

"Well this is a convenient way to protect yourself from actually consulting reality when evaluating your beliefs."

I'm sure it seems that way. If we build a jet, hire a pilot to fly it, load the jet up with missiles, and destroy some buildings in Iraq, that all counts towards GDP. How much "value" did all of that create, though? Why is that being counted in a figure that is supposed to gauge productivity?

Quote :

"Those laws protect consumers, the environment, and in many cases preserve competition."

I agree somewhat on the environment, but laws are just as likely (and really, more likely) to benefit large corporations, not the little guy. Legislation very commonly destroys competition, because regulation creates such a high barrier to entry that start-ups have no way of ever catching up to the established businesses.

If government is going to be doing anything, infrastructure should be one of those things, but our infrastructure blows, so something must have gone wrong. We have some of the worst broadbrand infrastructure of the developed world. Maybe we shouldn't have given so much free money to the military industrial complex and investment bankers, eh?

[Edited on June 15, 2011 at 1:49 PM. Reason : ]

6/15/2011 1:37:29 PM