The 9th Republican presidential debate, hosted by CBS took place last night in Greenville, SC. And what a doozy it was.
Like many debates, it started out cordial, plus there was mention of the recent passing of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia by all the candidates along with condolences.
Then the knives came out and it was one attack after another, mostly between Jeb Bush and Donald Trump and/or between Trump and Cruz.
Trump blamed 911 on Jeb's brother, George W. and of course Jeb defended him. The Donald also berated Bush for spending millions on his campaign with no positive results. That Jeb is a loser while he, the Trumpster spent little and was winning. This went on for quite awhile.
Bush also attacked The Donald about his stance on foreign affairs in regards to Syria, ISIS and how Trump thought Russia could take the lead in fighting terrorism, etc. Bush thought The Donald's take on this was naïve.
Mr. Trump also said how he thought George W. should be impeached over his role in the Iraq War. That he misled the country about weapons of mass destruction. The back and forth went on and on.
Cruz jumped on The Donald saying how he would appoint liberal judges to the Supreme Court for all his talk of conservatism. The Trumpster in retaliation attacked Cruz, called him a liar and mentioned his dirty tricks in regards to Ben Carson. Cruz shot back with the following:
“I will say it is fairly remarkable to see Donald defending Ben after he called him pathological and compared him to a child molester, both of which were offensive and wrong.”
Trump said he was only quoting Carson's book.
The Donald was also asked about his use of profanity. He defended it basically saying he's been misquoted. That he plans on refraining from such language in the future.
Adding to the brawl, Rubio and Cruz rehashed the whole immigration issue. Nothing new was said and it didn't get ugly like the dust ups with The Donald and others.
As for Kasich and Carson. Both performances were milquetoast. Though I liked Kasich's thoughts late in the debate about how all this fighting between the GOP candidates only sets things up for Hillary and a possible win on her part.
The winner?
Rubio. He did not repeat mistakes from the last debate. Kept his cool. Was incredibly sharp with stats and knowledge on foreign affairs and remained cool, calm and collected. While the others were brawling, Rubio, for the most part, stayed out of it. And when he did jump in, he eloquently stood up for George W in regards to 911 and thanked God he was in office at the time and not Al Gore. Loud applause followed.
The loser?
Definitely Trump. He came off as nasty, argumentative and childish with his personal attacks, lashing out and calling Bush and Cruz liars. I did not feel he had a true grasp of foreign policy and like always, he continued to make grand statements about how he would fix this, that and the other thing but never offered solid solutions or details on how he would do so.
Overall, it was an interesting debate and definitely not boring, thanks to The Donald's combative style, blunt speech and bombastic ways. But I also credit Bush, Cruz and Rubio for providing interesting takes on various topics, holding their own and fighting back.
Who should drop out next?
No doubt, Ben Carson. Once he started whining and crying about dirty tricks, etc. his poll numbers have plummeted and show no signs of improving.
Only time will tell about the rest.
