Live Blogging The CNN Debate

The HPR reports on the CNN Republican primary debate in Las Vegas.
8:02 Hey all! Sarah here with Florence, Alex, and Jay for another GOP debate liveblog!
8:02 Ron Paul is the “champion of liberty.” Because all of the others are tyrants.

 8:11 Question about a sales tax directed to Bachmann, she opposes any new avenue for tax collection.
8:15 Rick Santorum– Value Added Tax is responsible for declining birth-rates in Europe. What??? 
8:17 Can someone please tell Rick Perry to stop calling Herman Cain “brother”?

8:17 Alex here. Very excited to be live blogging again tonight and providing some commentary!
8:18 Herman Cain is appealing to the American people to make their own calculations about 9-9-9. I don’t see that happening…
8:23 Michelle Bachmann- everyone benefits from this country, everyone needs to pay something, even if it’s only $1. I couldn’t agree more, if only it wasn’t Michelle saying that.  
8:25 It’s Florence with an improved Internet connection. Since we’re discussing Cain’s plan so often and since both Romney and Perry are addressing him by name, it seems that he’s definitely gained ground in the “viable candidate” game.
8:29 Wow, Santorum and Romney just had an intensely awkward moment erring on the side of a shouting match… I’m calling Romney the winner on that one if only because he ended with a promise to repeal.
8:30 Despite Rick Santorum getting in a shouting match with Mitt, he still got a round of applause. Rick got nothing when he attacked the plan again. Mitt is getting traction here. He may have just silenced criticism of Romneycare by invoking Gingrich and the Heritage Foundation. Well played.
 8:32 Romney promises to repeal Obamacare for the American people. He understands how to bring the cost of healthcare down for the American people, but his plan was for Massachusetts only. So a state plan showed him how to create a national plan, but that plan only applied to the state. Contradiction?
8:38 Point to consider: how enthusiastically would Huntsman would be joining in the fray on attacking Obamacare if he were here?

8:42 Once again, someone (Perry) tries to interrupt Romney’s time and he fights back by referring to Rick’s “hard time in the last couple of debates.” No love lost there.
8:42 Romney may be coming off as a bit of an ass just because there’ve been so many clashes about format and etiquette when people ask him questions… not sure how that’ll come across. Also, everyone is going after him tonight: tomorrow morning, is Romney facing his first significant barrier on the road to the nomination?

8:45 I think Romney just made a big error there.  The let me talk point only works so much and he pushes it a little far.  It’s a hard line to walk but Romney has got to be careful.
 8:43 Romney’s having fun with the back-and-forths with the two Ricks. He’s getting feisty, definite personality points. 
8:46 Oh god, do we even need to dignify the electric fence thing with a question? Immigrants are people, not stray dogs. (Also, can we please move away from the trend of calling them “illegals”? How about “undocumented immigrants,” or some other term that doesn’t suggest that these people’s very existence as a criminal offense.) 
8:48 Good to see Perry doing a better job articulating his immigration argument… wait, never mind, he tried to drag terrorism into this. Nod of approval retracted.

8:49 Perry’s smart to avoid saying that his core constituents “don’t have a heart” like last time. He’s running the argument as a security-savvy border governor, which should play a lot better with his conservative supporters. Is it too late for him to recover this argument? 
8:52 Romney’s coming back pretty strongly with the immigration argument, pushing the magnet argument (tuition breaks, jobs, etc.), which should play well with GOP voters. Also, the audience loves him.
 8:52 First pro-immigration statement of the night brought to you by Gov. Romney, I’m glad not everybody is as nativist as Bachmann. 
8:53 So far Anderson is just asking questions that rehash topics from old debates. I was honestly hopping for a little more from him.
 8:53 The argument about the candidates’ message to Latino voters is good… as is Gingrich’s pivot to make it a question about Vietnamese-Americans, Korean-Americans, and all other non-Hispanic-Americans.
8:56 I agree we need more energy investment, but Perry needs to have a few more ideas than just mining. He’s just swapping places with Cain here, front-runner to single-issue guy. 
8:57 Perry is pushing his energy-jobs plan is smart. Incidentally, the plan has the liberal blogosphere on fire.
8:58 Bachmann would like to deal with anchor babies legislatively without worrying about the Constitution and the 14th amendment. Hmmmm…
9:03 Rick Perry addresses nuclear or  “nu-ku-lar” power. Hope that pronunciation doesn’t remind people of Bush II and cause them to decide “Read our lips, no new TEXANS.”
9:04 Santorum has spent the night lobbing various rhetorical bombs at Romney and Perry… interesting. He can’t possibly win, but I kinda like this scrappier version of him.
9:08 Cain argues that the key is getting government out of the way. We seem to have tried that and run ourselves into a financial crisis in 2008. And he wants to try it again?
9:08 Bachmann is really floundering… she is to the anti-Obama lobby what Santorum is to the “family values” lobby?
9:10 Statements like that one from Cain are just not how you win elections.
9:10 So Herman Cain is grossly misinterpreting the Occupy Wall Street movement… they may not be hardcore Obama supporters, but it’s stretching the truth a bit to use them as an argument for economic conservatism. Ron Paul is definitely getting a better sense of that movement. 
9:10 Paul says that we should blame Washington, Wall Street, and, wait for it … THE FEDERAL RESERVE! Surprise! Because the Federal Reserve was involved in the bailout, this is apparently justification to abolish it.
9:12 It’s almost worthless to mention Paul bringing up ending the Fed at this point. Let’s just assume that that’s what he’s saying if his mouth is open. 
9:13 Romney is avoiding the Occupy Wall Street question, which is smart – it’s still a bit too hot an issue for him to touch. Still, I think the argument about the median income makes a little more sense in a discussion of income inequality than anything else. The billionaire’s don’t really seem to be hurting… 
9:13 Romney’s campaigning against the President while everyone else is campaigning against (snapping at ) Romney. He’s getting used to this presumptive front runner status.
9:17 Anderson Cooper says that the next set of questions are going to be on the right to bear arms and whether a candidate’s faith matters… be right back, going to spend the next fifteen minutes throwing up in the bathroom.

 9:18 All of the ads are from the energy lobby, is Perry buying the entire block?
9:19 The first faith and religion question goes to Santorum… guessing that this is going to diffuse the Mormonism issue very quickly. Also, the audience is very pro-Romney.
9:21 A sane religious argument from Rick Santorum. Who’da thunk? We shouldn’t be judging a religion’s route to salvation, but the moral teachings of the person’s belief system. So it doesn’t matter if we have a Muslim or Mormon or Buddhist President as long as they’re a morally sound person. Props Rick.  
9:21 Gingrich, as always, plays it very safe and very conservative on the faith and religion questions: Religion is very important – not that I’d ever comment on how you approach it – but it had better matter. Annnd John Rawls is turning over in his grave.  
9:23 Romney tosses out the Mormonism thing (“I’ve heard worse”) and moves on to his argument that religion should stop being a factor in how we choose political leaders. Far be it from this lefty Harvard Democrat to speak well of Mitt Romney, but… I do really appreciate his consistent stance on the importance of religion (as opposed to morality) to political decision-making.
9:27 I think when Michele Bachmann says that “Defense spending is on the table,” I think she means that it’s on the table like those foul-smelling greens are at Thanksgiving dinner… they may be on the table, but you’re not touching them.
9:27 Ron Paul questions our defense spending in Japan. Wonder if Huntsman could give him a lesson on geopolitical significance of the Pacific if he were here.
9:27 Gingrich had a quip about the supercommittee cutting off our leg versus shooting us in the head prepared, so he had to twist a question about the defense budget slightly to fit it in. At least he got back to the question at the end. 
9:28 How did we get back on the super committee?
9:29 Rhetorical props to Anderson Cooper for listing off all of the departments that Ron Paul wants to cut…
9:34 Call me a bleeding-heart liberal, but the anti-foreign aid argument makes me really sick. If we as a super-power can police the Middle East, I think we as a super-power can help people buy malaria nets. Sure, we need to make it more efficient, but that doesn’t mean that we need to cut it wholesale.
9:35 Less than 1% of the U.S. budget is spent on foreign aid and that money has a tremendous impact.  
 9:37 “Israel is our greatest ally”– Michelle Bachmann. Uh… In what sense? I like Israel and everything but really? Greatest?
9:43 I actually agree with Sarah above. We do need to evaluate where our aid dollars are going, but eliminating aid in general is both morally reprehensible and bad for national security.
9:44 Rick Perry says we should stop funding the UN – not exactly working wonders for international image.

9:45 Santorum’s argument about how the question is only relevant to people who are paying close attention to the race is a little unclear… he’s relying on the last minute and apathetic vote? Also, his answer about his history of beating Democrats was interesting, if probably unpersuasive: voters don’t look at who’s won the most elections, they look at who’s saying what they like to hear.
9:47 Rick Santorum may have won a swing state, but Romney won a Blue state, just saying.
9:48  Let’s also note Massachusetts was 47th in the nation for job creation while Romney was Governor.   
9:48 Romney and Perry are going back to the debate over Perry’s jobs record… I think the better argument for Romney is probably that the Texan jobs were 1. Not Perry’s to claim credit for (“I killed the dinosaurs and created fossil fuels!”), and 2. Low-income jobs that no one should want.  
9:51 Gingrich would like 7 three hour Lincoln-Douglas debates. As a former debater, that gives him points in my book.
 9:53 I like the Lincoln-Douglass debates idea from Gingrich, I hope we get at least one during the general election season.  
9:54 Final thoughts, team? 
9:57 Romney was the star tonight, but Paul seemed to get quite a lot of time as well. Despite the technical glitches, it’s been quite the experience!
 9:54 So this was definitely one of the more tense debates we’ve seen so far… maybe not as muddled as the jobs debate last week, but still pretty awkward. I think it’s interesting that Cain’s surge in the polls did not lead to a pile-on against him: are the other candidates finally getting serious about going after Mitt? Perry didn’t do poorly, not at all, but he has a long way to go if he’s going to become a strong alternative to Romney. I thought it was an ugly brawl, but ultimately indecisive… the early battles of World War I come to mind?
 10:01 Nobody said anything TOO new tonight, but everybody clarified their existing positions. People started to attack Romney personally, he was hilarious, but maybe a bit too harsh, when he shut Rick Perry and Rick Santorum down for breaching protocol. He was really consistent with that too, he was quick to shut up when it was Cain’s turn. I think that, given the GOP electorate, he’s going to get personality points for that. Cain and Gingrich did very well tonight as well, and I look forward to hearing more from them if they can afford to stay in this race. I didn’t actually notice Huntsman’s absence until the debate was over, how will his campaign end up spinning that? Tonight was a fun night, and we’re definitely going to be hearing quite a few snippets from this one for the next month until the next debate.