Lux Lucet

A few brief thoughts about the Republican debate tonight:

• Bain Capital is boring. It’s the sort of “controversy” that makes me want to tune out the first time I hear it.
  
• The discussion about Social Security is a good example of what’s wrong with the political debate in this country. The candidates spent a lot of time going back and forth about what type of government plan is best. In other words, they were all about rearranging the deck chairs why the Titanic sinks. How about this guys: get the government out of the retirement business altogether.
  
• Mitt Romney showed his jackboot tendencies by supporting the National Defense Authorization Act. It is frightening to think that we now have a law that gives the federal government the power to arrest and hold indefinitely an individual on suspicion that he is a terrorist. Romney promises that he will use the law with restraint. This is unconvincing. No president, no government should have such power, and it is an outrage that a presidential candidate can advocate the use – albeit responsible use – of unconstitutional police state powers and still receive broad based public support.
  
• I’m not interested in Mitt Romney’s tax returns.
  
• Don’t you just hate it when politicians boast about how many jobs they have created?
  
• Ron Paul dominated the Twitter results. Given that he tends to do better in these types of polls than in the actual primaries, it’s hard to say whether this means anything regarding his chance of doing well in SC.
  
• I thought Ron Paul seemed indecisive at times. His response to the defense spending issue seemed a bit convoluted, he came off weak on bin Laden, and his conclusion that the high arrest and incarceration rate among blacks is evidence of discrimination in the judicial system struck me as a bit too pat. He offered no evidence that this is the case.
  
• Paul was very good on the income tax question, however. “Zero” was his answer to the question of how the maximum tax rate should be. Those other guys seemed to be pulling their figures out of thin air. They sounded sort of like, “umm, uhh, 25%, yeah, 25% sounds good to me, let’s go with 25%.”
  
• Santorum sounded silly attacking Paul on gun rights. The Second Amendment has no better friend than Ron Paul.
  
• Santorum’s response to Ron Paul’s negative campaigning was classic lawyer stuff. Santorum didn’t deny any of Paul’s charges, he simply got all huffy that Paul had cited left wing sources for his information.
  
• I’ve heard the guy in many debates now, but I couldn’t really tell you what Santorum stands for.
  
• Rick Perry seems to have gotten past the deer-in-the-headlights look he had earlier in the campaign and managed to do a respectable job tonight. He was right to say that the government should get out of the housing market. The problem with him is that while he can make good comments in isolation, he lacks any coherent philosophy of liberty. Then again, the makes him no worse off than the rest of the field, Ron Paul excepted.
  
• Why is Perry defending the Roman Catholic Church-State? Why do people applaud his defense? Rome takes tax dollars from the US government. The rule is, he who pays the piper calls the tune. Rome has fed at the public trough for years, and now that its fascist politics have backfired on it, are Christians to rise to its defense? Why not decry the giving of taxpayer money to Catholic Charities? That’s what I resent.
  
• Gingrich showed his rhetorical chops tonight. I’d never support the guy in an election, but I have to admit that when given the right question, Gingrich he can a home run.
  
• Did anyone miss Jon Huntsman? I noticed that in leaving the field, he threw his support behind fellow Mormon Mitt Romney. No big surprise there.