What a carnival. Sure, I agree with most of the posters at The Corner that Mitt is doing very, very well and that Rudy hurt himself badly with the "sanctuary mansion" shot as did Huckabee on the tuition for the children of illegal immigration, but machine-gunning immigration questions was an absurd way to spend the first 35 minutes of the debate, and it was wrong to throw a "conspiracy theorist" question at Ron Paul after making him cool his heels for 35 minutes. He's got a huge significant base of support, and using theater to marginalize him and then brand him as the tinfoil hatter was simply wrong.
As was having a cartoon direct a question at John McCain. Senator McCain is making a dignified exit from national politics, and though I disagree greatly with his policies, he is a great American and deserves a great deal more respect as do all of these candidates. CNN couldn't help themselves, but we knew that would happen.
Lou Dobbs is making a fortune banging the anti-illegal immigration drum and talking up the threat of the North American Union. It is clear who had a great influence on this debate's design, and it wasn't a serious political journalist.
UPDATE: K-Lo's take:
So Far [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
this is Romney's best debate performance yet. He reminds us he has experience and outside of Washington, he's tackled difficult issues, and does not let his temper get the best of him with a New York bully (something that will come in handy).
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