Written Report on Day 2 of 2020 Republican National Convention: Lies

I didn't watch much of last night's First Night of the 2020 Republican National Convention.  I made up for that by watching just about all of the Second Night of the convention, tonight.  Here's what I saw and heard: lies.

• Lies from Senator Rand Paul, who praised Trump for bringing home our troops.  The truth: Trump has brought home no troops, as far anyone in the public knows or the press has reported.  I've been against overseas American military involvement since Vietnam.  Trump has done nothing to reduce that.
• Lies from Director of the U. S. National Economic Council Larry Kudlow, who said that Biden wants to raise everyone's taxes.  The truth: Biden only wants to raise taxes on people who earn more than $400,000.   That leaves me out.  What about you?
• Lies from former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, who said the Chinese Communist Party "covered up" the deadly COVID-19 virus.  The truth: No evidence for that.  Although the Chinese government may not have been as helpful as they could have been in alerting the world to COVID-19, Chinese scientists were the first to publicly let the world know about the deadly disease.
• Lies from Eric Trump (Donald Trump's son), who said Biden will raise taxes on over 80% of Americans.  See what I pointed out about Kudlow above, and do the arithmetic: those in America who earn more than $400,000 a year are a small fraction of the American people, not 80%.  Ok, I did the research and math: those earning more than $400,000 a year are in the top 1%.
• Lies from Melania Trump, First Lady, who said Donald Trump "loves" this country.  I don't believe that.  I think the truth is that Trump loves only himself.  But I'm willing to acknowledge that this is a difference of opinion, not an outright lie.  So perhaps, technically, Melania Trump didn't lie tonight. 

But even if Melania Trump didn't actually lie, she would be the only one of the speakers mentioned above.  That's a very poor percentage for truth in what we heard tonight.

Rand Paul's Withdrawal from the GOP Campaign: Regrets from a Democrat

I was sorry to see Rand Paul withdraw from the GOP primaries today.  I'll be voting for the Democratic nominee for President in November, but Rand Paul was far and away the best of the GOP candidates.

Among his eminently sensible positions are prison reform (we have the highest incarceration rate in the free world, and it's racially biased), drug reform (decriminalizing substances that millions of Americans use, without inflicting them on anyone else), and injecting a little caution into foreign policy (why not get a Declaration of War, as required by the Constitution, before in fact engaging in war).

Rand Paul is in many ways the anti-Trump:  in contrast to Trump's bombast and riffing on all issues, Paul presented a logically-thought-out and historically anchored position on many issues.   I thought it was healthy for our political process that the voters of Iowa rejected Trump and his tweets, but regretted that Rand Paul didn't do better.

I disagree with many of his positions, probably most of them.  I think there is a big role for government in our lives - in providing universal health care, which is about as clear a case as providing for the"general welfare" as provided in the Constitution as you can get.   And Rand Paul's faulting of Barack Obama and the Iranian nuclear agreement was unfortunate, and inconsistent with Paul's oft-stated desire to reduce US military escapades overseas.

But his voice added a unique element to the GOP Presidential race, and will be missed.

Fourth GOP Presidential Debate: Rand Paul Scores

Herewith my assessment of the just-concluded fourth GOP 2016 Presidential debate, as always with the proviso that I've only voted Republican once in my life - for John Lindsay, for Mayor of New York City, in 1969 (because he was against the Vietnam War) - but I do try to call these debates as objectively as possible.

I think Rand Paul made by far the most lucid and logically sound points tonight, on a variety of topics, and contra what some of the other Republicans were saying.  His single best moment was countering Marco Rubio's and just about every other Republican's assertion that we need huge military expenditures - Rand correctly explained that such expenditures are not only contrary to conservative fiscal policy, but unlikely to keep us safe, especially if they undermine our economy at home.   Rand also punctured Donald Trump's posturing about China and the trade bill, observing that trade with the Chinese was not part of the territory covered in the massive bill.   And he made better sense than anyone else about the U.S. carefully considering its military policy in the Middle East and towards Putin, rather than just rushing in.

I'd rate Jeb as second best tonight.   He spoke truth to Donald Trump and his inhumane and unworkable deportation policy.  John Kasich spoke well on this point, too.

The rest, I thought, were unremarkable.   Obviously, a lot of people currently support Donald Trump or Ben Carson, but it's hard - at least for a progressive like me - to see how either of them will go on to win the nomination.   Trump continues to have a good sense of humor - though little of it came through in the debate tonight.  And Carson is a complete enigma to me - or, at least, why anyone would support him.

The best point I saw about Carson tonight came from my Fordham public relations colleague Gina Vergel, who observed on Twitter -

Third GOP Presidential Debate: Participants and Bystanders

Back with a review of the third GOP Presidential debate tonight, as always with the proviso that I've only voted for a Republican once in my life - for John Lindsay for Mayor of New York City decades ago - and no doubt won't be voting for any of the Republicans up on the stage in Colorado this evening.

But, that said, who did the best and the worst?

I think Chris Christie had the single best moment, when he said he did not deny climate change - as do many Republicans - and would do what he could to improve our climate by supporting private alternate energy enterprise.  That's an enlightened anti-government position on this issue.

The best exchange was between Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio, who both came across well in Bush's attack on and Rubio's defense of his poor attendance record in the Senate.   In general, both Bush and Rubio had a good night, with Rubio somewhat better.

Cruz had a strong moment with the perennial Republican chestnut of attacking the media in general and the questions being asked of him and his colleagues in the debate.  But that was about Cruz's only moment.

Kasich started strong then all but disappeared.  Rand Paul gave some good answers but looked tired and bored.   Huckabee was unmemorable - except for his proud admission about wearing a Trump tie - and Fiorina was the dullest I recall seeing her in any of the debates so far.

Carson and Trump, the two front runners, were both ok, sometimes pretty good, but they often seemed more like bystanders than full-fledged participants in this economic debate.   Someone tweeted - I think it was Farhad Manjoo - that if "if you knew nothing about the polls and watched this you wouldn’t believe Trump and Carson were leading."  I've got to agree.

And so it goes.   Trump will have a chance to rekindle some of his fire on Saturday Night Live this weekend.   He'll need that, because he certainly didn't have all that much tonight.

PS: I thought Lindsey Graham was far and away the best in the junior GOP debate tonight, and was better than at least half the contenders in the main debate tonight.

Second GOP Presidential Debate: Trump Fails on Immunizations

I'll preface my analysis of the second GOP Presidential debate - three hours, just concluded on CNN - that I'm not a Republican, and this undoubtedly influences my views of who scored and who did not in a Republican debate.   Nonetheless -

It seemed to me that Trump did not do all that well tonight.  He was more conciliatory, true, and perhaps that helps him, but he once again spoke only in generalities.  And at times - for example - in the discussion of immunizations and autism - he seemed outrightly ignorant, insisting there was sort of a connection, even though Ben Carson, an MD, patiently and repeatedly explained that there was not, or none statistically and scientifically demonstrated.

As Trump does on most of these issues, he conflated at least two different issues - one, whether immune injections cause autism, and, two, whether the immunization shots can be spaced out, or not given all at once.   Drs. Carson and Paul may agree with the latter, but not the former - and Trump tried to sweep his ignorance under the rug by saying he, too, agreed with that, but somehow that still meant there was a connection between immunizations and autism.

The other candidates, with varying styles and intensity, all talked knowledgeably about a variety of issues.  Rand Paul was especially good on the dangers of unconstitutional wars, and Chris Christie on the opposite side of that argument, on the need for a strong and aggressive defense.   These two also spoke very well on opposite sides of the recreational drug legalization issue (I agree with Rand Paul).

Christie was also good in his denunciation of the personal skirmishing between Trump and Fiorina.  I thought Jeb and Fiorina were both strong and articulate in taking Trump on.    But of the two - Jeb and Fiorina - I thought Jeb had far more substance in his positions.

We'll see what the polls say in the next few days.  But I'd be surprised if there wasn't some slippage for Trump - a dangerous prediction, I know.

First 2016 GOP Presidential Debate: My Ranking of the Performances

Continuing my tradition of reviewing the Republican Presidential Debates (and Democratic Debates), which goes back to 2007,  here's my take on what happened on Fox News in Cleveland tonight.

First, as a preamble, I thought the 5pm appetizer debate, consisting of the seven contenders whose polling numbers didn't qualify them (by Fox's standards) for the main event, was one of the most boring political debates I've ever seen.   Sad to say, that debate made pretty clear why those seven candidates polled so poorly.

But on to the debate of 10, which took place from 9 to 11 tonight, I'll appraise this by ranking the performances from worst to best, on all the issues:

10. Ben Carson, neurosurgeon was amiable enough, but clearly out of his depth.  I'll be amazed if his polling numbers don't dip below one percent in the weeks ahead.

9.  Gov. Scott Walker, who was seen in reaction shots agreeing enthusiastically with whatever Carson was saying, didn't do very well himself.   I can't think if a single surprising or memorable point he made.

8. Sen.  Rand Paul came on strong with an attack on Trump at the beginning, and had a few good moments, but let Gov. Christie get the better of him in an exchange about hugs - Paul slammed Christie for hugging Obama, Christie responded that the hugs he most remembered were those of 9/11 victims.  This reprised, in effect, the exchange about national security between Ron Paul (Rand's father) and Giuliani in 2007, except tonight Christie did much better than Giuliani.

7. Gov. Huckabee had some strong moments - his best his joke at the end, in which he talked scathingly about someone leading in the polls with no valid ideas, whom we expected to be Trump, but turned out to be Hillary - but for the most part Huckabee looked and sounded tired.

6. Sen. Ted Cruz was clear and dynamic, but I can't think of an original or commanding idea expressed by him.

5. Christie had a surprisingly good debate, getting the best of Paul, as I said above, but also making powerful points about his success as Governor of New Jersey (and, fortunately for him, no one brought up Bridgegate).

4. Gov. Jeb Bush, as second in the polls after Trump, had more than anyone other than Trump to lose. He accounted well for himself  - spoke well, and came across as the compassionate conservative, especially on immigration, which is where he wants to be.

3. Sen. Marco Rubio came across as the man of the future - showing an understanding of the digital age - as well as compassionate and savvy on a variety of issues.   He was well-spoken, genial, and incisive.

2, Donald Trump held his own, including even in his answer to Megyn Kelly's question about the vicious and demeaning things he's said about women, and later defending his declared bankruptcies in response to a question from Chris Wallace.   For someone with zero experience debating and running in elections, Trump, whatever you may think of his views, stood strong up on that stage.

1. Gov. Kasich was the biggest surprise of the night.  He was powerful without being belligerent, and like Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio displayed what seemed like a real compassion for humanity.

So there you have it - an honest appraisal, without reference to my own political views, which are mostly in disagreement with everyone on the stage (I voted twice for Obama).