Republican debate

A tough night for me (see last post) so I'll be brief, but I know you are all dying to know my take on the debate.  One thing I did was ask Laurie what she thought, kind of a not-so-involved take on things.  She loved Herman Cain for his presentation and his specifics; Pretty much lumped Perry and Romney in a dead heat in second; gave Paul a slight nod over Bachman in the third tier; and put the rest in the "I didn't hear them enough to form an opinion " group.  Not especially bad news for Santorum and Gingerich, but devastating to someone who talked as much as Huntsman.  Now for my take, from the bottom up:

8 and 7- Michelle Bachman and Rick Santorum.  I might give Santorum the edge just because he had good points but just seemed to vanilla to make an impression.  Bachman, the analysts on MSNBC said, put herself into the lower tier with this performance, and I tend to agree.  When Laurie described how she felt about her, I said that she meant Bachman was very "cardboard" and Laurie agreed.

6- Ron Paul.  I put it this way:  He's like the guy who says, "Let me drive," and you kinda hesitate but let him, and he does okay for a while, and then all of the sudden he's up on the sidewalk or wrapped around a tree.  Intellectually much sharper than the other two, but none of them had a very good speaking style.

5- Newt Gingerich, and I struggle to put him here, because the few points he got to make were very well put.  He had the best line of the night when the guy from politico brought up the praise he heaped on Perry in a foreward to Perry's last book and asked if that meant that he was willing for Perry to "be his proxy on economic matters" in the debate.  He replied, "No, it means if the governor writes another book, I'll write him another foreward."

2, 3, and 4.  This is the hardest part for me, because while I have a clear idea that I thought more of Romney than Perry (probably because Romney looked more like a man in a debate, and Perry was busy being the lead character in "You're So Vain" with his constant looking into the camera), but I just can't decide where I want to put Huntsman.  At any one time I put him anywhere from ahead of Romney to behind Newt.  I will agree with MSNBC on one thing- Romney did better for himself than Perry did.  And I guess I'd say the same for Huntsman.

1- Herman Cain.  He was intelligent, well-spoken in the extreme, had simple to explain, specific plans.  I'm not saying he's my guy (or not), but it sure would be nice to see him as President so that the African American community could see what a good, honest, intelligent black man- one who would suggest they work rather than feed them a welfare check and a pat on the butt- might do for them.

I apologize to everyone that I've only read one of your blogs tonight.  Earlier my heart wasn't in it; now my eyes are bailing on me.  I promise I'll catch up tomorrow- if the Good Lord is willing and the planes still fly.