The Republican Scrum Begins

by Ross Douthat

August 7, 2015

What this first set of GOP debates showed, including the "second-tier" one, was how utterly bankrupt the GOP is in terms of fielding anyone with even an inkling of understanding for what the problems are which this country faces - they are NOT Planned Parenthood or ObamaCare.

The only person that seemed to have in inkling of an idea what's going on was Kasick. The others were trying to outdo each other in spouting the usual GOP nonesense about (1) strong military to defeat ISIS - there is no evidence, after 15 years and >5000 soldiers dead in Afghanistan and Iraq, that we know how to bring peace and democracy to anyone; (2) how quickly they will undo ObamaCare - Cruz, of course, will do it on "day one"; unlike God, he will do everything in one day; (3) how it is of the utmost national importance to defund Planned Parenthood (4) how high they will build the fence along the Rio Grand - unless they are willing to add a "death strip" like on the old Iron Curtain, no amount of fence, or even "the Wall" which Donald is promising, will keep people out.

The one area where I agree with Mr. Douthat is that SOME of the FOX questions were pointed - even though MOST of them were invitations on a silver platter to spout the normal GOP/FOX nonsense.