Live blogging debate

September 5, 2007 – 9:16 pm

They open with a question about Fred Thompson.

Mike Huckabee makes a reference to "no show George".

John McCain mentions that the debate might be up past Thompson’s bed time. He also also says that people in New Hampshire want face time.

Rudy Giuliani: "He’s done a pretty good a job playing my part on Law and Order." This is a nomination that you have to earn though. "Three leading Democratic candidates who have not run a state, a city, or a business."

Illegal immigration.

Mitt Romney is asked why he didn’t do anything about sanctuary cities and the illegals on his front lawn. Romney says that governors are not responsible for mayors who are breaking the law. Then he pushes back on Rudy and NYC. Also tries to differentiate with Rudy on "amnesty."

They ask Rudy about a quote about NYC "wanting people like" illegal immigrants who work. Rudy points out that the other part of the executive order required that the police do things about law breaking illegal immigrants . "I didn’t have the luxury of rhetoric." Rudy pointed out that that year 758 people were deported that year.

Wallace asks if McCain if Romney is playing politics with immigration. "We failed because the American people have lost confidence in us. Iraq, … Katrina, etc." "Governor Romney, less than a year ago, had exactly the same position I do now."

Huckabee. They ask him about last year’s racism quote. "First of all, because I have listened to some of them." "I agree, we ought to have sealed borders."  Wow. He again steals Newt’s package tracking analogy.

Hunter. Commits to finishing the fence in 6 months.

After interviewing a cop — curiously from Massachusetts –, the proverbial man on the street, they wing back and ask Rudy and McCain why the bill wasn’t amnesty. Rudy dodges the question. McCain takes it full on.

They lot Romney in. He talks about sanctuary cities and businesses.

Family Values

They ask Sam Brownback about Larry Craig. He pushes back and says that it is important "that the party stand for family values." Brownback did his thing.

Hunter. "When Democrats have problems like this, they make them chairmen of a committee."

They ask Romney about his two-step approach to abortion. "Almost all of us would like to see an America that didn’t have abortion." He reverts to a Bush-style "the states aren’t ready." Wasn’t the question whether Romney thought abortion was murder? "For some people abortion is murder?" What about you Gov. Romney??

Huckabee. Talks about the Human Life Amendment. If he is in the top-tier, he and McCain alone support that. I still think that is extraordinary.

Guns

They ask Rudy about gun control. Rudy talks about reducing crime.

They cut to the diner and a woman says that there shouldn’t be an amendment on gay marriage. The debate audience seems clearly divided.

Brownback says we need an amendment. Then he gives the standard Stanley Kurtz line.

They ask McCain about his recent line about Giuliani.

He gives Rudy a very positive compliment, and then contrasts national security and managing a city and the security there. Then he talks about his position on Iraq and why he was right. McCain contrasts his record on national security. He talks about his military record. "I didn’t manage it. I lead it."

Rudy responds and re-iterates his admiration for McCain. Then he invokes his record as governing. He quotes George Will about his record as "running the most successful conservative government in the last 50 years."

They ask Romney about his Iraq position. "Even Hillary Clinton is willing to commit troops" longer than Romney. Romney doesn’t really say anything but the positive side. He reiterates his position, but doesn’t back away. Romney says "if the surge is working."

They ask McCain to follow up. McCain points out that "the surge is working," and "it’s working governor, it’s working." Ed Morrissey caught the contrast. And Andy McCarthy likes it too.

Then they ask Ron Paul…. Yawn. Fox pushes back and says "so we should take orders from al Qaeda."

Brownback continues his distance. He takes the position that the political solution isn’t happening. Then he re-iterates his federation/Biden strategy. Fortunately, Fox pushes back about the divisive problems: Turkey v. Kurds and Iran’s role. Brownback points out that we have these problems. After all hasn’t Turkey invaded?

They ask Huckabee. He says we have to continue to the surge under the "fix what you break". Huckabee did well on this.

Fox starts a fight between Paul and Huckabee. Huckabee is totally winning from this. This is amazing.

Duncan Hunter continues his audition for SecDef.

Now they ask Tancredo. They point out that he opposed the surge.

Fox cuts to the diner again. And the people in the diner hammer Romney. Romney apologizes and says that we need a global strategy. Romney clarifies his position and no one applauds.

Now they cut to wiretapping, etc.

Romney says that he would wiretap in the US only with a visa. "Our focus has to be preventing an attack."

Now they ask Tancredo about waterboarding.  Like Romney, he ducks the premise of the question and  talks about the responsibility to keep people safe.

Now they ask McCain about torture, et al. McCain invokes a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Vessey, on this subject to give his answer.

Now they ask Giuliani about Gitmo. "We can’t close Guantanamo because no one will take the people there." Huh? McCain’s position is to deal with them in the legal system. Giuliani has a great line on Iraq. "How do you win if the debate is about how to retreat?" Great and important point.

They ask Hunter if we hold people indefinitely. They say "absolutely."

Taxes

They ask about the tax pledge. McCain says that he stands on his record. Is that the right answer? He then starts talking about corruption and pork, where he is on better ground. Chris Wallace comes back with the logical problem about the votes.

They follow up with Brownback who gives a pedestrian answer.

Rudy gives a weird answer about multiple pledges.  "Only one pledge to the Constitution of the United States." Weird.

Now they beat up on Romney. They talk about Romney raising fees, etc. They give the particular fees. Nice! I am sympathetic to Romney’s position that the tax on interest, dividends, and capital gains should be zero. But isn’t he going to be vulnerable to attacks based on his wealth on this?

Now Fox asks Huckabee about the FairTax and the fact that the numbers don’t work. The closing line about winners and losers and "most of us end up being losers in the end" is great.

The guy at the diner asks about Rudy and family values. "Lead by example." OUCH!

How does he answer this? This is not a fair question. But I think that he screwed it up.

Iran hypothetical

Tancredo makes a very important point about there being a great deal of dissent inside Iran. This is the right answer. Their crazy president is getting boxed in with appointments by people opposed to him.

Duncan Hunter, again speaking to his strength, handles this well. There really isn’t another answer that will fit in.

Huckabee ducks the hypothetical and gives principles. This is the right answer.

Romney gave a nothing answer.

McCain just lays out principles. Not much different than Hunter, Huckabee, or Brownback, except that he doesn’t condemn the hypothetical. Like Brownback he reiterates how severe this threat is.

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States will get full delegates

August 28, 2007 – 9:43 pm

Somehow, I am not all that impressed by the fight over the national parties stripping delegates from state parties who will have primaries prior to Feb. 5th.

Last week, the story was Florida and the Democrats. This week, it appears to be the Republicans and Florida, South Carolina, and New Hampshire.

How long will it take for all the candidates to commit their delegates to voting for seating full delegations?

This is a problem in theory, but not in practice.

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Granite Grok’s corrective to Ames

August 13, 2007 – 2:09 pm

Granite Grok has an important corrective to the discussion about Ames:

I recognize that Mitt Romney gobbled up a lot of the hardcore GOP stalwarts early in the game. I have seen this for myself here in the Granite State. In an independently-orientating state like ours where more and more people are less willing to get all that attached to the party apparatus, I’m not convinced that having a lengthy list of the usual cast of characters as supporters wins the day. The events I’ve attended by Rudy Giuliani and John McCain appear to attract more ordinary folks as compared to Mitt’s, which featured many familiar Republican faces. Perhaps this will be what it takes to win the party primary here in NH. Are their numbers great enough? Or, will the less politically intuned voters outweigh their influence?

I think that they are absolutely right about open primary states like New Hampshire and South Carolina. These are states that independents will have an impact in. They are also states that Republicans who aren’t county central committee meeting junkies (I actually enjoy these meetings) will vote in these primaries.

I do think that Giuliani has an appeal to independents in theory, but the message might be hard. Electability is his message to Republicans. Independents won’t care about that. And NH independents seem to be militantly anti-war, which is akin to the argument he is pushing against to vocally.

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McCain: Earmarks are “gateway to corruption”

August 13, 2007 – 6:24 am

Here’s a piece of clarity for the morning. The guys at Granite Grok caught up with Senator John McCain in New Hampshire. They asked him a question about earmarks, and they recorded the answer. Transcribed:

Transparency and knowledge are the only antidote to the corruption that is bred by earmarks, the gateway to corruption.

I think that he’ll have trouble getting disagreement on that from the conservative blogosphere.

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Iowa in December?

August 8, 2007 – 1:14 pm

At least the weather will be better. But that’s what the WSJ is telling us:

South Carolina Republican Party Chairman Katon Dawson will join with New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner tomorrow morning to announce that both states are moving up their presidential primary dates earlier into January, according to a prominent South Carolina Republican who spoke with Dawson this week. That likely will force Iowa — always protective of its party caucuses as the first-in-the-nation nominating contests — to make good on its vow to move their date from next Jan. 14 into pre-Christmas December.

I’ve been saying this for a while. Details:

New Hampshire tentatively had planned to have its first-in-the-nation primaries on Jan. 22, eight days after Iowa’s caucuses. South Carolina Republicans had planned to hold primaries on Feb. 2. Dawson told his fellow Republican that South Carolina’s would be at least 10 days before Florida’s Jan. 29 primaries, but not on the same day as Nevada’s caucuses, which are Jan. 19, and 12 days after New Hampshire’s primary.

That suggests New Hampshire will be moving into the first week of January. Iowa would then be certain to move up from Jan. 14. To avoid getting caught in the holiday period, Iowans have said the caucuses would have to be in mid-December.

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2002 versus 2008

July 30, 2007 – 9:23 am

Patrick Hynes makes a great point this morning with some videos of Jeanne Shaheen from her 2002 debate against now-Senator John Sununu:

I think Shaheen will win the Democrat primary if she decides to run. Easily. But I see her numbers coming down quite a bit when the public is made aware of her past statements:

Basically, it turns out that Shaheen was pro-Iraq war, pro-Bush tax cuts, and pro-Bush-style national security. (videos after the jump) The fact is, in what was then a solid GOP state you probably had to be. So let’s just work out some of her options. None of them are particularly good.

First, she can stand by her positions. More likely, she will drop Iraq like a hot potato, but stand by her position on tax cuts.  After all, Sununu has dropped his support for Iraq because "he never had any idea Bush would screw it up this badly" or something similar. Shaheen just takes the same line. But what about things like tax cuts, wiretapping, etc. She sticks with her statements. Call this the "stand by her principles" option.

Her problem is that there’s a big division in the NH Democratic Party right now between the lefty activists and the Democratic centrists. NH GOP Chair Fergus Cullen talked about it back in June:

Call it the Carol Shea-Porter Gravitational Effect. For the past decade, conventional wisdom held that New Hampshire Democrats had to position themselves as moderate centrists to win elections. Former governor Jeanne Shaheen taught her party that lesson. Mark Fernald ignored it to his peril. John Lynch absorbed it and, for a time, prospered.

Then in last fall’s congressional primary, war protester and unabashed left-wing activist Shea-Porter trounced the Shaheen School’s candidate, a play-it-safe political vegetarian who avoided the rhetorical red meat the Democratic base starved for in an effort to preserve his electablity. Shea-Porter went on to edge an incumbent Republican in one of the nation’s biggest upsets of 2006.

In other words, Shaheen was the model of centrism, back in the day. The NH Democratic Party may have learned a different lesson since then (or it may have gotten lucky in a really good environment) There is room for a nasty primary in NH on that question. Steve Marchand, the mayor of Portsmouth, could be the representative of the Carol Shea Porter school of principled left-wingism.

So her second option is to flip-flop and cave to the left. Now flip-flopping may be the new normal, but it is going to be a major attack on both sides in 2008 in the primaries and the general.  Ultimately, the question that Marchand and Carol Shea Porter will be asking is "does Shaheen have a principle?"

This raises a deeper question. In 2002, Democrats ran to the right, trying to avoid the bulldozer of 9-11. Five years later, the party base has been flooded with anti-war activists. Are the centrists who ran in 2002 electable in primaries? If they flip-flop are they going to be exposed to charges of  being unprincipled? Do progressive activists care?  In other words, as revolutions in parties bring new activists, they often bring new candidates. And the anti-war activism of the 70s reshaped (and ultimately discredited) the working-class Democratic Party that once was. After all, only part of what killed the Democratic Party in the 80s and 90s was their credibility on national security. The rest was the rest of the liberal agenda that finally won in the intra-party fights in 1974.

Perhaps the real question is, could the 2008 Democratic primaries, as the air saturates with attacks of flip-flopping on the war and other issues, end up being a battle between the new generation, the post-post-9/11 Democrats like Marchand, Obama, Carol Shea Porter, etc. versus the old Generation, the post-9/11 Democrats like Clinton, Shaheen, etc. What’s the legacy of all this going to be?

Where does that leave Shaheen in New Hampshire?

Videos after the jump. Read More »

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NH slaps IA

June 13, 2007 – 8:46 am

You have to love this headline from the Concord Monitor:

Frontloaded primary takes stuffing out of Iowa’s straw poll

And the lede:

So far, the New Hampshire primary doesn’t seem to be suffering from the front-loading of the presidential nominating calendar. For some candidates, the New Hampshire events may be bigger than normal. But they’re still coming, and voters are still turning out to see them.

Is the same true in Iowa? News that Republican presidential candidates John McCain and Rudy Giuliani were skipping an Iowa straw poll - conceding the event to Mitt Romney - made headlines last week. And last month, the New York Times reported that Hillary Clinton’s campaign staff had considered whether Clinton should stop competing in Iowa (they ultimately rejected that plan).

In other words, according to the monitor, NH is important. Iowa isn’t. I am not sure I agree, but … this a news story. What boosterism!

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Live blogging the NH debate

June 5, 2007 – 7:06 pm

Introductions

Tancredo: MoC for 10 years

Tommy Thompson: Candidate not the actor. Governor for 14 and Secretary of HHS

Sam Brownback. Raised on farm in Kansas, have 5 kids, Senator

Mitt Romney: Family, neighbor and MA.

Giuliani: Likes the motto

McCain: Served coountry all his life.

Huckabee: Give people from Hope another chance

Hunter: I missed it

Gilmore: same

Paul: Champion of constition

Was it a mistake to invade Iraq?

Romney:  SUpported the president. Underprepared and underplanned. Didn’t do a great job afterwards. Stabilize the central government. Does that mean that he opposes Biden’s plan federalism? "Null set kind of question" is lame.

Giuliani: No. Says Dems are in denial.

Did Senators read NIE?

McCain: Did not read NIE. Did get briefings. Details. Details. Details.

Brownback: No. Held hearings and had briefings. Need a political plan. He supports federalism.

Should Senators read the NIE?

Gilmore: Yes. Middle East unstable place.

WMUR: What if the surge doesn’t succeed?

McCain: We don’t have the fifth brigade there yet. They will follow us back. We must succeed. They reasked the question. Says federalism doesn’t work.

Thompson: Make the government vote. (Does he have a new toupee?)

Hunter: I read the NIE report. Need reliable Iraqi forces. Withdraw through rotation of Iraqi troops.

Paul: "The sooner we come home the better." Paul got applause.

Huckabee: We underestimate al Qaeda.

Tancredo: Didn’t support the surge. "A Republic if you can keep it." He wants to withdraw. Also got applause.

Iran

Brownback: Supports the Prez on Iran.

Hunter: Dialog with everyone. Iran is moving deadly equipment. Reserve the right to pre-empt. Won’t take nukes to prevent Iran for nukes.

Giuliani: Unacceptable for Iran to have nuclear power. "The Democrats seem to be back in the 1990s." This war is not a bumper sticker. This is a real war.

Gilmore: Work with European allies.

Romney: People are testing the USA. We are not arrogant. We have resolve. "How do we help move the world of Islam to help the moderate Muslims." Need a broad vision.

Immigration

Tancredo: Consequences of the bill passing are "incredible" and "disastrous". Not just the number of jobs we may be losing or kids in our school. We are talking about "whether or not we will actually survive as a nation". "We are testing whether or not we will hold together as a nation,"

Giuliani: Problem with the plan is that it has no unifying purpose. Compromises leave you with the following conclusion: "Is it going to make this better?" Quite possible that it could make things worse. Tamper proof ID card. Database that allows you to figure out who they are and why thye are here. Throw out people who are not in the database.

Question to Romney about flip-flopping and pandering: Z visa is a real problem. It allows people who came here illegally to stay here for the rest of their lives. Every illegal alien gets to stay here. Not fair. Big applause.

McCain: Says Giuliani’s requests are in the bill. This bill satisfies national security challenges. "Our job to do the hard things." Also got applause.

Giuliani: "Say things that are not in the legislation"

Romney: Enforce the law as it exists. Make the Z-visa temporary.

Hunter: When they shut down a meat packing plant in Iowa, people showed up to take the jobs.

Brownback on pathway to citizenship: New path. Get in the back of the line. Exterior enforcement, interior enforcement, and resolve the interior situation.

Thompson: Secure the border. Says it is an "Amesty" bill. Is his hearing aid acting up?

Paul: No fence needed on Canada. "We subsidize illegal immigration."

English the official language. McCain says Native Americans too.

Fred Thompson

Gilmore: Fred Thompson conservative enough? We don’t know if Fred Thompson is conservative enough.

Thompson: Fred will help the party.

Giuliani on abortion: Lightening is striking! Government should not impose its views.

Romney: Says he fought as a conservative. "New Opportunity of the 21st Century."

Huckabee on Evolution: Wonders why someone who wants to be President is asked this. He says that he believes that God was active in the creation process. Says he doesn’t know about 6 days and 6,000 years. He knows that God created the earth.

Brownback: Fully convinced that there’s a God who was involved in the process. Debate faith and reason like St. Anselm did. I love Anselm.

McCain: School decisions should be left to local school boards.

Romney on the Mormon issue: Nothing new.

Paul on Church and State: "Congress shall write no law."

Global warming and energy

Giuliani: There is global warming and human operation contributes to it. Energy independence too. Need a project like the man on the moon.

Romney: Giuliani is right on an Apollo project. When companies make profit, that money should be reinvesting in capital equipment. It is not just the companies, it is the countries.

McCain: Everyone is annoyed by expensive oil. Companies should be invested. Including nuclear power.

Paul on subsidies: No subsidies.

Gays in the military

Paul: Current policy is decent policy.

Huckabee: Already covered by UCMC. You punish them if the behavior is a problem.

Giuliani about the gay linguists being fired: Not the time to deal with disruptive issues like this. "In a time of war you don’t much fundamental changes like this."

Romney: "Don’t ask don’t tell seems to be working."

McCain: Not enough military. It is their judgment.  The policy is working. No one thinks that gays and lesbians should serve in the military.

What would you use Bush for internationally

Thompson: George Bush has a great family.

Brownback: Bush’s dad is great. I’m sure the son would be too. More about Bush Sr.

Tancredo: Was told "never to darken the doorstep of the Whitehouse." Would tell George Bush that.

Huckabee: "The Republican Party as a whole deserved to get beat."  Katrina, Iraq, borders, etc.

Townhall forum

A woman from Medford who lost her son. Bringing troops home

Hunter: Rotate out as he said before.

Brownback: "Getting the situation to a point where we can turn it over to Iraqis." Federalism, again as he said.

McCain: First of all, he gets up. He said he is proud of the girl. "This war was very badly mismanaged." Some of the sacrifices were unnecessary because of the mismanagment. Applause line.

Cynthia from Merrimack. Her husband served in Iraq. What do we do to get the government of Iraq to work?

Paul: Just leave.

Giuliani: Likes the McCain walk around thing. Sacrifice and service are the reasons we are safe now. People can only embrace democracy when they have an orderly existence. Nitty-gritty of putting together an orderly society? And asks about whether success is going to get reported?

Kyra Crusco about whether conservatism can involve conservation

Gilmore: Reduces it to energy independence.

Tancredo: You have a conservative model to work from. TR put the stamp on that.

Doug Hall, town moderator for Chichester. Could buy refills for his drugs for $600 in Spain

Giuliani: Government and employer dominate.d. Health Savings Account. Democrats suggested socialized medicine.

Hunter: But insurance across state lines. This is the AHP that GOP congresses have been dealing with.

Joshua Williamsen, WMUR blogger. What would you do for healthcare?

Thompson: Turn it into a wellness system.

Romney: One of my friends asks if he is dying his hair darker. He talks about small business people being in trouble. He embraces it. Private mandates for private insurance.

Max Latona, St. Anselm Professor, most pressing moral issue

Huckabee: Pro-life is being the womb. We celebrate life. They celebrate death.

Giuliani: Our ideals come from God.

Paul: Acceptance that we promote pre-emptive war.

Brownback: Life baby! And he means a little more than abortion.

Neal Capano. Airline agent. Flip-flopping on immigration

Romney question about English as the national language: Don’t get an advantage to become permanent residents. Asia is our markets.

Tancredo: One language. U2 comes on in the background at my bar.

McCain: "Governor muchas gracias."

John Lewicke. Electrical Engineer. If we do more of the same, why do we expect anything different?

McCain: Spending. Spending. Spending. Which led to corruption. Earmarks.

Giuliani: "You get what you measure".

Romney: It goes from small bore to large bore. "Our projects and services can lead the world."

…..

Erin Gardner. What does it mean to be an American?

Tancredo: Cut from the past.

Huckabee: There are a nmber of people who we should welcome into this country.

Giuliani: Abraham Lincoln defined what an American is. "It is not whether you came over on the Mayflower or yesterday. It is how much you believe in freedom … freedom of religion … the right to vote …" This is good stuff.

McCain: "America is a land of opportunity. It is to share a common goal. It is to be created equal and be endowed by our creator wth unalienable rights." …. "A beacon of hope and liberty. And as Ronald Reagan said, a city on the hill."

Carolyn Gargasz. Rep. from Hollis about keeping moderate Republicans

Gilmore:  what did he say? I forgot?

Hunter: "Move away from the Kennedy wing of the Republican Party"

Romney: Model is Reagan. Economic, military, and family values.

Giuliani: You can reach out to moderates by nominating me

McCain: Protect the family. And the battle against radical Islamic extremism.

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Romney the lawyer: Murder “means different things to different people”

June 2, 2007 – 1:54 pm

Last week in Laconia, NH, Mitt Romney was asked a question about abortion. Doug Lambert of GranitGrok, was there to videotape the answer. It turns out that the person who asked the question is a Democratic operative, so I discounted this. But then Green Mountain Politics highlighted the quote (which he got wrong, sorry Chris…). Romney was asked "is abortion murder?". Romney responded:

I don’t want to use that term because it means different things to different people. … It is taking human life … Murder has — I used to go to law school — murder has malice of forethought and  all sorts of other things …

Now, I know that some people are going to get wound up about Romney’s answer about abortion, but there’s nothing really new here. I think that there are a bunch of interesting rhetorical things going on here. But let’s make two things clear:

Mitt Romney said that murder "means different things to different people" and used his implicit authority as a lawyer to explain his complicated position.

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Healthcare lobbies campaign in early primary states

May 28, 2007 – 8:44 pm

I thought this was interesting. It appears that two different healthcare lobby groups are using a strategy of grassroots and media campaigns in early primary states. I have copied the ad for the Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease. The Hill runs a story about AARP and a bunch of patients groups running media and grassroots campaigns in early primary states:

The senior citizens’ lobbying group AARP and a handful of patient-advocacy groups have joined together to stage events in key presidential primary states to sway the debate on healthcare, a key emerging campaign issue.

This morning, the chief executives of the AARP, the Alzheimer’s Association, the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Action Network, the American Diabetes Association and the American Heart Association will hold press conferences, rallies, training seminars and visits to campaign offices in early-primary states to promote healthcare coverage and access, particularly for people with chronic diseases. …

The AARP will hold its event in Concord, N.H., while the diabetes and cancer groups will hold a combined event in Des Moines, Iowa. The heart association will gather supporters in Columbia, S.C., and the Alzheimer’s group will meet in Reno, Nev. Each event is expected to draw somewhere between 100 and 200 people. …

Apparently, AARP had been doing this already:

The AARP has been positioning itself to play a major role in influencing the presidential candidates’ stances on healthcare and financial security for older Americans. The organization has been carrying out its “Divided We Fail” campaign in early-primary states and plans to expand the effort nationwide using its network of state offices as November 2008 approaches.

This is a good strategy for moving the debate. It will be interesting to see how the various candidates handle this.

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