CNN Republican Debate: Your reactions…
Post your reactions to tonight’s CNN Republican debate here…
January 30, 2008
21 Comments »
TrackBack: http://insidecable.blogsome.com/2008/01/30/cnn-republican-debate-your-reactions/trackback/
RSS feed for comments on this post.
I watched for a minute or so after “The O’Reilly Factor” on CNN HD, but then I gave up. I can’t stand debates anyway.
Comment by Mike Chimeri — January 30, 2008 @ 9:30 pm
The most boring debate? ever seen… Boring! Was a debate?…
Comment by Rodrigo — January 30, 2008 @ 9:38 pm
The moderation was TERRIBLE! Thanks Paris Cooper…
Comment by Rodrigo — January 30, 2008 @ 9:40 pm
The commenters to Mary Katharine Ham’s postings on Townhall are tearing McCain a new one…and then some. They really hate him. Speaking of things I can’t stand, the anti-non-conservative stuff on Townhall, conservative blogs in general, and BillOReilly.com message boards drives me insane. It’s part of the reason I don’t go to those boards anymore.
Comment by Mike Chimeri — January 30, 2008 @ 9:48 pm
what a short debate lol, on my satalight channel it says the debate goes till 10pmc i was gonna tune into watch it but they were down to analyzing the debate?
was it only an hour or what?
Comment by don — January 30, 2008 @ 10:01 pm
Anderson was horrible. And they really shut out Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee. There was even one instance where Ron Paul said “I want to get in on the issue of liberals and conservatives.” AC said, “Ok, well, ok I promise to get to you in two minutes, err, um two questions.” Ron Paul wasn’t heard from for 15 minutes. (neither was the Huck) Ron Paul never got to answer the question. SHAME on CNN for shutting out two candidates.
Comment by Aaron — January 30, 2008 @ 10:04 pm
The debate ended early, probably because of Rudy dropping out, they had not enough to talk about. Or maybe not. Isn’t the Dem debate two hours tommorow? Either way, I find the beginning s cheesy (the walking out crap), and the final questions are always stupid. Why even invite Ron Paul. Everyone else is talking about pressing issues, and he just goes on about the gold standard, blah, blah, blah. He is just a distration.
Comment by jmkaib — January 30, 2008 @ 10:06 pm
Watched BOR and Hannity instead. One thing I learned tonight is that Douglas Kennedy from the Big Story on FNC is the son of RFK. BOR was talking to his sister and he brought him up.
Comment by Lurker — January 30, 2008 @ 10:25 pm
I watched - basically a waste of time with McCain and Romney spending an eternity debating what Romney meant by “timeline.”
Having Ron Paul there seemed pointless given how poorly he did in Florida, but he had a great point when he called out the moderators for letting that go for as long as it did when they could debate real issues, not “he said, he said” nonsense. He basically underscored how the networks have consistantly baited the candidates to get into arguments to boost the ratings.
I know that Romney and McCain are the two real viable candidates left, but still…
Comment by FishOil — January 30, 2008 @ 11:01 pm
The audience was clearly for Romney and McCain got boo-ed at least once. Weird.
Comment by Arthur — January 30, 2008 @ 11:17 pm
Actually, I found tonights “debate” quite informative, often entertaining. I’ve been with CNN on this from the beginning and have found that the more exposure candidates receive the better we understand that what they’re saying doesn’t always match up to their body language.
I don’t necessarily have a horse in this race so it’s much easier to be objective. The top two candidates aren’t always the best choice, but money does talk, and a war record is sometimes all you need.
Personally, Ron Paul clearly defined the problems and basically how to solve them while Huckabee has indeed had more years as governor than most, and he has a moral obligation to be honest and tell it like it is. Neither Paul or Huckabee are as clueless as others seem to think. Beats Guiliani and the others from the word go.
Maggie
Comment by Maggie C — January 31, 2008 @ 12:33 am
The “debate” itself had extremely little to recommend it, with the usual CNN style of “If it’s Republican, all we really care about is stamping them as bigoted religious zealots so we can brag about it afterwards”.
Tonight, they toned that down a tad to let McCain & Romney show off their “ain’t gonna back down now” attitudes and bicker themselves into ignominious soundbites.
And a good political debate moderator doesn’t let that happen for long…but, as most of us know about CNN, having a newsworthy debate on the issues was never the goal here.
Comment by Nick D. — January 31, 2008 @ 1:56 am
I really liked the setup of the stage.
Comment by Erik — January 31, 2008 @ 5:54 am
That was supposed to be a presidential debate? One commenter compared Anderson Cooper’s moderating skills akin to those of Paris Hilton and that pretty much said it all. I am completely disappointed with CNN and Anderson Cooper showing their complete bias towards McCain and Romney. They’re no better than FOX and Bill O’Reilly.
Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee weren’t allowed to speak and were barely acknowledged as participants.
Ron Paul was the only one trying to talk about the real issues, as usual. He even commented at how ridiculous it was for Anderson Cooper to allow Romney and McCain to banter back and forth calling each other liars. I was watching that whole debacle with my jaw dropped at the ridiculousness of it all.
Another commenter stated that Ron Paul’s mentioning of the gold standard is nothing more than a distraction. That person clearly illustrated that monetary policy is obviously above his or her reading level. Why do you think gold is selling for close to a thousand dollars an ounce? Because people have lost faith in the dollar and as a result it is losing value around the world.
CNN’s bias is disturbing.
Comment by Patrick — January 31, 2008 @ 7:19 am
And if I hear the “what would Reagan do” question or the stupid debate over who’s the more conservative conservative, I’m going to scream! Let’s talk about current issues and not political theories!!
Comment by Bill — January 31, 2008 @ 7:25 am
Debate?
Really? When?
Comment by media guy — January 31, 2008 @ 8:18 am
I don’t think it was boring. McCain was so juvenile in the faces he made and in his demeanor toward Romney, and I’m glad Ron Paul brought up the fact that they were playing “he said, he said”. What a waste of time. And it was good that Huckabee pointed out that he and Paul were being ignored. That’s what they did to Hunter and Tancredo when they were in the race.
But the Reagan comparison - yes, it is idiotic to keep bringing that up.
Comment by Missy — January 31, 2008 @ 10:15 am
i think it was a good debate and basically huckabee and paul are going nowhere so why waste time? Its true issues matter and they didnt talk about them but i dont think cnn is bias in fact they always allowed governor Romney to respond. Fox news is bias
Comment by dragonxv — January 31, 2008 @ 11:58 am
BillOReilly.com message boards drives me insane. It’s part of the reason I don’t go to those boards anymore.
Mike: And the main reason I quit my membership before it was to expire. Many of the people on those boards are rude and/or cliquish, a bad combination for good discussions.
We have a much better situation here on ICN.
Comment by Ira — January 31, 2008 @ 12:14 pm
Not allowing all four equal time is a complete manipulation of the debate and clearly shows that CNN clearly has an agenda to push McCain and Romney. No wonder they’re seen as a front runners, they get all the media time. That is akin to peddling propaganda. Like the Republican Party, CNN has lost its way. doesn’t care about simple journalistic principles and integrity.
Give Ron Paul the same amount of time as McCain or Romney and he would quickly emerge as the front runner. Even though Ron Paul barely had the chance to speak last night I’ve seen online polls today where people felt he won the debate! The media is scared of change and they’re scared of Ron Paul. Just look how far he has come and look at how much money he raises from the people, not corporations, even though the mainstream media largely ignores him. Shame on Anderson Cooper and shame on CNN.
Comment by Patrick — January 31, 2008 @ 2:17 pm
Patrick, that’s true, but all the debates have been the same way. Even on the democrat side, I believe it was Joe Biden who has some sort of a graphic that showed he got about two minutes of time, while Hillary and Obama got lots more.
As a Duncan Hunter supporter, I was infuriated by this as well, especially after reading how there was no true “conservative” in the Republican race. He was there, but just obtained very little visibility.
Comment by Missy — January 31, 2008 @ 3:13 pm