You’ll have to excuse me, I barely got any sleep and had to wake up early as fuck on a Sunday morning to watch this goddamned debate. This probably won’t be my best written debate critique but I have a duty to fulfill and must see to it that I keep moving forward and continue to cover these shit shows. It’s just hard to get motivated when sitting through these awful things. Apart from Ron Paul and Jon Huntsman, the rest of these assholes are the same and frankly, I’m over it. But whatever, we’ve still got a little while left on this journey but hopefully after New Hampshire, a few more people will fall off and narrow this race down to just a few candidates.

So here we go, just twelve hours or so after the last debate and we’re off on another one. This debate was essentially a special episode of NBC’s Sunday morning news program ‘Meet The Press’. And just like that show, it was hosted by David Gregory, a man who looks like the love child of the Joker and a gremlin. Nothing was more annoying on a Sunday morning, when I should be sleeping off a hangover instead of watching this shit, than having to sit through the first fifteen minutes of this crap. Why? Well, the entire first portion of this debate was about Mitt Romney, as gremlin ass David Gregory wasted a quarter of an hour asking the candidates about the former Massachusetts governor. Jesus, where’s my damn bourbon!

Well, one good thing that I did notice was that Ron Paul was finally at a center podium! At least NBC isn’t afraid to show that Dr. Paul is a frontrunner. So I do have to give them credit for that. Shit, it must be tearing at Rick Santorum. He’s so pissed he gave his feathery baby mullet and extra bit of fluff this morning.

Anyway, Gingrich was the first to be asked about Romney’s record. Newt diverts the question and calls himself a Reagan conservative and says that he is more likely to succeed against Obama than Mitt, who Newt calls “timid”. Newt drops another Reagan reference and then another! He can’t just leave Reagan’s ghost alone, he has to continue to align himself with the 40th president because he knows that he is the hero to most Republicans. The truth is, Newt is NOT a Reagan conservative and at this point, if you can’t see why he isn’t, then you haven’t been paying attention.

Mitt Romney rebuttals by going on and on about his record and success at creating jobs in Massachusetts. He then talks about all the conservative leaders who have endorsed him. Santorum is pulled in and asked the same question as Newt. Then this all goes back and forth between Romney, Santorum and Gingrich for fifteen minutes. This entire section of the debate was pointless. Finally, David Gregory brings Ron Paul into this discussion and Paul says that this entire debate thus far has been “superficial”. Dr. Paul just slams Gregory and NBC for subjecting us to this, which causes Gregory to admit that Paul’s right and thus, the debate gets away from the time-wasting bullshit.

Jon Huntsman comes out and says that he was criticized at the previous night’s debate for putting his country first. Huntsman is of course referring to when Romney basically tried to make him look like a traitor for being Ambassador to China under Barack Obama. Romney says that working under Obama doesn’t truly represent a conservative stance. Huntsman cuts right in and says that the nation is divided because of statements like Mitt Romney’s. The room erupts into applause and cheers, in what was the greatest moment Jon Huntsman has had at any debate. In fact, the response was so good for Huntsman and so bad for Romney, after this exchange, that I would be shocked if there wasn’t a major number shift in the New Hampshire polls leading up to their elections.

Jon Huntsman is asked to name three areas where Americans would feel some pain over major spending cuts. Jon Huntsman immediately pimps the Paul Ryan Plan and says that the best thing about it is that there aren’t any sacred cows. He then goes on to say that defense spending shouldn’t be based off of a percentage of our GDP. He says that it would be determined realistically by looking at what we’re doing, what we need and eliminate all the waste.

Santorum is posed with the same question.He says that he won’t burden future generations with the Social Security problem. He also says that tax on labor makes us uncompetitive. He promises to take welfare and food stamps out of the federal government and return that power to the states. Santorum refers to all these entitlements as “dependency programs”.

Gingrich is asked about the negative comments he made last year in regards to the Paul Ryan Plan. Newt basically brushes it off, as he has already addressed the issue several times and now supports the plan. What he does say is that there needs to be a transition towards a Medicare program that makes sense.

Perry makes a joke and everyone laughs. I missed what he said as I accidentally spilled Chex Mix all over my couch and was frantically trying to clean up the mess; I’m paranoid of bugs. Rick Perry goes on to say that we need to create an environment that brings jobs and gives people their dignity back. He says that he did this in Texas and makes a case as to why he would be the best guy to do it for the whole country.

Rick Santorum comes back in and says that people often tell him that they want the same healthcare program that members of Congress have. Santorum agrees with those people and said that they should be allowed the same choices as Washington’s elite. Okay, so is he for socialized medicine then? Sounds like he wants to replace Obamacare or restructure Obamacare with something that reflects the same insurance plan members of Congress have.

Mitt Romney says that the right course for America is to not raise taxes. He adds that the reason why the government always wants to bring in more tax revenue is because they need to pay for their massive size. Mitt says that we need to shrink the size of government and claims that he has a plan that can reduce it’s size. He goes for the cheap pop from the New Hampshire crowd when he says that the first thing to do to stop over-spending is to kill Obamacare.

Jon Huntsman re-enters the debate and tells us that he put a tax reform proposal on the table that was endorsed by the Wall Street Journal. He says that we have to get rid of all the legislative loopholes and eliminate corporate welfare and subsidies. The crowd is being really receptive to Huntsman this debate.

Gingrich is asked about the personal attacks on him by Harry Reid. Apparently Reid said that if Newt became president, he would do everything in his power to make sure that he was just a one-term president. Gingrich cooly responds that the opposition always wants you to be a one-term president. He doesn’t cite this as an example but he’s right. Hell, nearly every single GOP candidate has said repeatedly that their mission is “..to make Obama a one-term president.” Hell, Michele Bachmann used to scream out this mantra again and again. Gingrich then goes on to cite Reagan again. He also gives Huntsman props for standing up to Romney earlier when he talked about putting partisan bullshit to the side and putting the country first. Newt says that people of goodwill can talk about the problems and work through them. He says that there is always time to fight and bicker later. He reminds us of how well he and Bill Clinton worked together in the 1990′s.

Romney jumps in to defend himself and says that he can work well with others. He talks about how the legislature in Massachusetts was 85 percent Democrat and regardless of that, they all worked well together. He talks about how the Democrats put their trust in him and allowed him to cut spending any way he saw fit. He claims that even though the state was full of Democrats, he cut taxes 19 times.

Ron Paul is asked about argument versus accomplishment or more precisely rhetoric over action. He is asked how he thinks he can get Congress to work with him when so few of his proposals have actually gone before Congress and only one has become a law. Ron Paul says that that shows how disgusting the politicians are and how sick Washington is because his policies work for the people as they are constitutional and promote individual rights, property rights and attack spending. He then says that he wants to first start by bringing our budget back down to the levels that it was at in 2006.

Rick Santorum is asked a question but, being the rotten bag of dicks that he is, ignores it and uses his time to attack Dr. Paul. He says that Paul has accomplished nothing and that he has proven that he is unsuccessful at working with anyone. Right, and everything Santorum has accomplished has been very strong liberal policies that somehow make him, and his supporters, believe that he is a conservative. Santorum goes on to say that Paul’s foreign policy will leave America vulnerable. Yep and Santorum’s foreign policy will murder innocent people and destroy their economy through sanctions and the cost of rebuilding the mess we leave them with. Not to mention the fact that it’ll just manufacture more hatred towards the United States. He concludes by saying that the things Republicans like about Paul, he can’t accomplish, and the thing they don’t like, he can accomplish and those things will put us in harms way. Santorum runs out of time and then tells the moderators that they have to give him more time to answer the question he ignored. This guy is such a fucking prick.

Defending himself, Ron Paul says that we can’t get involved in all these pointless attempts at nation building. He also adds that we can’t afford to have all these bases everywhere. Ron Paul warns us about our horrific monetary policy. He then answers Santorum’s claims that he has no influence by telling everyone that he has changed the rhetoric in this country. He has educated people on the tyranny of the Federal Reserve and made dissatisfaction with that agency go mainstream. He says that most Americans now favor an audit of the Fed and they want more transparency.

They go back to Santorum to answer the question that he ignored and he just babbles a bunch of crap. Huntsman then jumps in and brings up “trust deficits” again. He also brings up his strong desire for congressional term limits.

Rick Perry is asked about leadership and the crowd laughs. He is then asked about how he would buck his party and make decisions that might not be popular with the GOP establishment. Perry says the biggest problem with the country is Congress’ out of control spending. Referring to a few unnamed people on stage, he says that those who voted to raise the debt limit are a part of the problem. Perry, like Huntsman, calls for term limits for Congress but he also calls for them to be cut down to part-time so that they would all have to get real jobs like the rest of us. So, does Perry have a regular job?

Jon Huntsman gets on energy and says that we have to stop favoring oil over other resources. He tells us that we need more diversity and that we need to treat oil in the same way we treated broadcasting. He says that we have to break up the oil monopolies or else we will never truly have energy independence.

Ron Paul is asked about his stance on oil and energy subsidies. He responds by telling the moderators that subsidies are bad economic and moral policy as it takes government force to transfer money from one group to another, which can cause great harm in the long run. Ron Paul says that when the dollar is manipulated it drives prices up elsewhere, especially in regards to energy.

Mitt Romney starts talking a bunch of shit. He says that we have massive overhead because there are too many government problems. No shit dickweed, did you just figure that out? He is then asked about his pro-gay comments from some random magazine that was published in 1994. In that interview, Mitt said that he would stand up for gay rights. Mitt responds by saying that he doesn’t discriminate and that he had a gay person in his cabinet while he was governor. He says that he has always promoted a stance that wasn’t discriminatory in the hiring process or anywhere else. The moderator asks Mitt, “When was the last time you stood up for gay rights.” Mitt quickly snaps back, “Right now!”

The topic of defending gays is then brought up to Santorum. This bigoted fuck says that all people should be treated with respect and dignity but he is against gays trying to write or change laws. Yep asshole, sounds like respect and dignity to me. He is then asked how he would treat a son that came out to him as gay. He says that he would love him the same. Yeah, except he probably wouldn’t let his hypothetical gay son vote during major family decisions.

They go to Rick Perry and he just rambles about wrangling steer and wrestling illegal aliens before handing them free tuition checks. Mitt also has a ramble session but says unions suck and we need federal “right to work” legislation. He goes on to say that unions have too much political power and points to the unions for government employees as being one of the worst examples of political corruption. Santorum jumps back in to get his two cents on unions into the debate. He admits that he didn’t vote for Pennsylvania to be a “right to work” state but he supports it nationally. Uh.. does he not know how this works?

Newt Gingrich blames Barack Obama’s policy for killing jobs and raising gas prices. This lead in is just another opportunity for him to rant about how he is the second coming of Ronald Reagan again! Newt, who has always been a good debater is now carrying himself like Michele Bachmann, who was synonymous for continually repeating catchphrases over and over. I don’t see how this continued talk of how he is Reagan-esque is going to help him. His strategy has always worked well in debates and he doesn’t need to hold onto this cheap talking point.

Mitt Romney blames Obama for the slow economics recovery but doesn’t blame him for the recession itself. He adds that business owners feel like they are under attack from the Obama administration due to his shitty policies. He then goes on a tangent about clean air or something. He finishes up by calling for a real effort at tapping into our natural gas resources. Scientists have recently come out and said there is a lot less natural gas than these politicians claim. This is something I should probably look more into. Continuing the energy talk, Newt explains how radical and incompetent the EPA is. He gives a bunch of examples of how they suck and concludes by saying that he plans to replace the EPA with a different environmental agency.

Rick Perry is asked about John McCain’s comments where he recently praised Obama by saying that on foreign policy he reflected our Founding Fathers. Mr. Texas didn’t agree with McCain’s comments and he pointed out that Obama is a socialist and is therefore incompatible with the Founding Fathers. Really? Because on foreign policy, Obama and Perry don’t really differ all that much. Perry then rants about how Obama needs to respect the 10th Amendment.

Due to the fact that he has had very liberal policies, Santorum is asked if he has advanced socialism. He doesn’t really answer the question and goes on to describe all the things he’s done to reform the health care industry. The moderator gets flustered because Santorum is beating around the bush. Ricky Boy explains that he and the moderator aren’t communicating well. He says that his record proves that he is anti-socialist. You sure about that homeboy?

One of the idiot moderators asks Ron Paul what people are entitled to get from the government, as if people should expect the government to give them hand outs galore. Paul smacks this dickhead down and says that entitlements are not a right. He goes on to say that he hates the term “gay rights” because that puts people into a group. He says we’re not groups we’re all individuals and then says that it is individual rights that we have to protect. He says that we must think in terms of individuals and not groups and then warns that we can’t expect one group to be forced to have to give to another group.

Being that they are in New Hampshire, Jon Huntsman is asked what “Live Free or Die” means to him. He says that it is a motto that people from New Hampshire take very seriously. He says that they also take leadership very seriously and leadership is about unifying people, not vilifying groups and attacking them. Huntsman then goes on another rant about the “trust deficit”.

Rick Santorum is asked why he thinks that we need to worry about Iran when we survived the Cold War, as Russia had thousand upon thousands of nuclear missiles pointed at us. They also cite the fact that North Korea, who hates us, is also armed with nukes but Santorum doesn’t think we should invade them. Rick says that Iran is an Islamic theocracy and they are willing to die to kill us, so that is the major difference. Santorum needs to learn about Iran and its people.

Gingrich is asked about the fact that he has been vocally opposed to all the attack ads coming out against him but now he is releasing attack ads too. The moderators challenge Newt’s consistency. He says that he is consistent because his attack ads are “fact based” unlike all the ads from other candidates. Oh, what a crock of shit! This honey badger really has thin skin and a mouth full of bullshit to hide it! Gingrich then gets fired up and tells Romney to come out and say that his attack ads are “untrue”. Mitt says that he didn’t make the ads and by law he can’t direct them, they are made by all of his PACs. Mitt says that if the ads have anything that is wrong, that material should be taken out. However Romney immediately starts going through every single point in the ads and says that each one is true. Newt can’t dispute it, he just looks like a whiney fool and tucks his tail between his legs. Romney literally owned Newt! That just leaves one to wonder, what the hell has happened to our beloved honey badger? He’s gone from super-debater to being a guy that just babbles, repeats catchphrases and cowers at the sight of a fancy haircut!

To close out the debate, Rick Santorum goes on to talk about the book he wrote. Fuck you asshole, I’ve written two and am nearly done with my third! Plus mine don’t suck. And that’s pretty much it, other than Ron Paul talking about how he will always preach the gospel of liberty. This debate was pretty poor overall and most of these people still look like the weak douches they are. Paul did pretty good but not as good as last night. Huntsman did really well! In fact, the people of New Hampshire were cheering him many times throughout the debate. I wouldn’t be surprised if Jon Huntsman surges in the polls after this showing.

Grading Scale:
Grade A-: Jon Huntsman
Grade B: Ron Paul
Grade C: Mitt Romney
Grade D: Newt Gingrich
Grade D: Rick Perry
Grade F: Rick Santorum