Gratuitous Llama G.O.P. Debate Non- Review

I didn't watch it. Primary debates bore me. If you want analysis, go read Peggy Noonan, who makes an excellent point about this "Next Reagan" meme that's sprung up.

Instead, I watched Dennis Miller's All In. Strangely, I found it rayther flat, too. Miller is a very smart guy and a very funny one, but you have to work hard to keep up with him and it seemed as if his Las Vegas audience couldn't quite do it. This, in turn, seemed to throw Miller off a bit, as he often looked slightly flustered and forced. Too bad.

Yips! from Gary:
Eh, I'll through in my two cents.

I only saw a little of the debate but based on the general bloggy consensus this morning, I make the following observations:

- The format was horrible. Lightning round answers of stupid, stupid questions. They were either "gotcha" types from Chris "Big Mouth" Matthews or badly worded and mostly irrelevant ones from the Politico readers.

- The biggest winner was Romney. This was for many Americans their first impression of him, and it was good. This is what he needs to do to make people take a closer look at him

- The biggest loser was Giuliani only because he is the "front-runner" at this point and the expectations were high. He seemed a less prepared and confident than you would expect

- McCain was good in some ways, not so good in others. He remains for me a viable option but he still has a long way to go to prove to me that he's the best choice

- If there were fewer candidates up there than the remaining ones would have had more time for answers. Some of these guys should really just go away as they have less than zero chances and were doing little more than using up oxygen last night (I'm talking to you Ron Paul)

- Some of the "second-tier" candidates should probably hang around though to keep this from being a "let's all gang up on Rudy" fest

- Fred Thompson benefited from not being a candidate yet. Other than Romney, no one in particular made that much of an impression and the desire for an additional option may help fuel his candidacy. I figure that if he's going to run he needs to formally declare no later than the Fourth of July otherwise the money and staffing will just not be there for him

- If Thompson does decide to run, Giuliani will be impacted the most, followed by McCain. Depending on how he does and how the others react to him you would have a four man top tier right now and one of them will be gone by the end of the year. The base support is a fixed pie and I would think that one (or even two) of them will be effectively squeezed out before the first primary

I also agree with the lovely Ms. Noonan on the whole "Reagan Successor" thing. Can we start asking which one of the clowns on the Dem side will be the next Jimmah Carter?