The Republicans, Episode 6
Once again the Mystery Debate Theater team of Andrew Kingsford, Tim Willette and Steve Rhodes gathered at Beachwood HQ to watch candidates for president debate in order to bring you the news and comedy you’ll need to make a decision in November ’08.
This time it was the Republicans from Dearborn, Michigan, in a debate loosely organized around economic issues.
Tim brought the Red Bull (I finally see the symbolism) while Andrew brought those cute Heineken keg beer cans and ordered Chinese. Being of Australian birth, Andrew ordered in his faux American accent to avoid the otherwise inevitable cross-cultural translation issues. “I’ll be on the phone for three hours and then the wrong order will go to the wrong house,” Andrew explained defensively.
Andrew promptly fell asleep – I think while Fred Thompson was talking – so you’ll notice him disappear from the transcript early on. He also might have been mad because I called him a wanker, like his father before him, who was from the House of Wankers. And then he learned upon exiting Beachwood HQ that his bike had been stolen.
I wonder if that will make him a Republican.
The following transcript has been edited for clarity, space and sanity.
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BARTIROMO: Hi there. I’m Maria Bartiromo of CNBC.
MATTHEWS: And good evening from me. I’m Chris Matthews of MSNBC. Joining Maria and me in questioning the presidential hopefuls this evening will be John Harwood, chief Washington correspondent for CNBC, and Jerry Seib of The Wall Street Journal.
BARTIROMO: Governor Romney, here in Detroit, Michigan, alone, one in every 29 homes went into foreclosure in the first six months of the year. Whose job is it to fix this problem? The government or private enterprise?
ROMNEY: It’s everybody’s job. It’s inexcusable that Michigan is undergoing a one-state recession, that the rest of the country is growing and seeing low levels of unemployment, but Michigan is seeing ongoing, high levels of unemployment, almost twice the national rate.
Industry is shrinking here, jobs are going away. This is just unacceptable. And, therefore, everyone’s going to have to come together to solve the problem.
And that means, from the president’s standpoint, the president’s going to have to stand up and say – you know what? – to the auto industry: The door’s always open. We’re ongoing to work with you and make sure that you have a listening ear and someone who will participate with labor and with management . . . [BLAH BLAH BLAH].
TIM: It’s CD-Romney.
ROMNEY: We’re also going to have to do a better job keeping our taxes down. [Michigan Gov.] Jennifer Granholm has made a big mistake by raising taxes.I was, frankly, a little nervous to – about being here tonight. I figured she was going to put a tax on the debate before we got finished.
(LAUGHTER)
STEVE: Awww, his advisors wrote a funny.
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MATTHEWS: Mayor Giuliani, private equity firms are making billions of dollars. Is there any downside to this amazing bonanza in the hedge fund and the private equity firms?
GIULIANI: The free market is the asset that has allowed us to – the sky’s the limit. The reality is, that what we have to do is look at the fundamentals. A president can’t be a economic forecaster. A president’s not going to be any better an economic forecaster than you are a baseball forecaster – and I’m not a particularly baseball forecaster this afternoon.
STEVE: The president shouldn’t have any idea of where the economy is going?
TIM: This way we can just get rid of that whole Federal Reserve thing.
GIULIANI: And make sure you do something about legal reform so that our legal system doesn’t – it’s 2.2 percent of our GDP now, is spent on all these frivolous lawsuits. It’s double any other industrialized nation.
TIM: And 2.2 is twice 1.1, which is the second half of the 9/11 fraction, and that’s why I should be president.
MATTHEWS: Just to test your forecasting ability, Mr. Mayor, will Torre keep his job?
GIULIANI: Joe Torre is the best manager in the history of the Yankees, at least in the modern era. So — and he’s my friend.
MATTHEWS: OK. Congressman Paul . . .
TIM: How are the Rangers doing this year?
MATTHEWS: I think you have questions and concerns about the bonanza in the hedge fund industry. Do you?
PAUL: Yes. I think this is not a consequence of free markets. What’s happening is, there’s a transfer of wealth from the poor and the middle class to the wealthy.
This comes about because of the monetary system that we have. When you inflate a currency or destroy a currency, the middle class gets wiped out.
So the people who get to use the money first which is created by the Federal Reserve system benefit. So the money gravitates to the banks and to Wall Street.
STEVE: Is this going to end with the Queen running a cocaine cartel?
TIM: I hope so!
PAUL: That’s why you have more billionaires than ever before. Today, this country is in the middle of a recession for a lot of people. Michigan knows about it. Poor people know about it. The middle class knows about it. Wall Street doesn’t know about it. Washington, D.C., doesn’t know about it.
But it’s because of the monetary system and the excessive spending. As long as we live beyond our means we are destined to live beneath our means.
And we have lived beyond our means because we are financing a foreign policy that is so extravagant and beyond what we can control, as well as the spending here at home.
And we’re depending on the creation of money out of thin air, which is nothing more than debasement of the currency. It’s counterfeit. And it is a natural, predictable consequence that you’re going to have people benefit from it and other people suffer.
So, if you want a healthy economy, you have to study monetary theory and figure out why it is that we’re suffering. And everybody doesn’t suffer equally, or this wouldn’t be so bad.
It’s always the poor people – those who are on retired incomes – that suffer the most. But the politicians and those who get to use the money first, like the military industrial complex, they make a lot of money and they benefit from it.
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BARTIROMO: Senator McCain, what about that? How are you going to win the middle class back? Wall Street executives are making millions of dollars every year, paying tax rates of 15 percent, while the average guy out there is paying 30 percent in taxes. Is this system fair?
McCAIN: Everybody is paying taxes and wealth creates wealth. And the fact is that I would commend to your reading, Ron, Wealth of Nations, because that’s what this is all about.
ANDREW: A hundred-year-old book?
STEVE: He hasn’t read that book.
TIM: There’s a lot of things in that book that Sen. McCain wouldn’t agree with. Like markets are a terribly poor way of taking care of the less fortunate.
McCAIN: And unless we get spending under control and eliminate all this waste and pork-barrel spending, the latest is this public works, $21 billion worth of pork barrel projects in public works, which the president should veto.
TIM: All this waste . . . it’s like that commercial where they talk about how much money they’ll save if they just switch copying companies . . . the Government Printing Office is out of control!
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MATTHEWS: Governor Huckabee, tell us about your fair tax. You’re going to get rid of the IRS. You’re going to have a, basically, consumer tax. Won’t that discourage spending?
HUCKABEE: It ends the underground economy that right now makes it so that folks like us end up paying taxes, but drug dealers don’t; illegals don’t; prostitutes and pimps, they don’t. But we do.
TIM: Is he the first candidate to use the pimp word? And did he say ho’s? did he say pimps and hos?
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MATTHEWS: Congressman Hunter, do you agree with that: the idea of replacing the IRS – the income tax, a direct tax – with an indirect sales tax?
HUNTER: What I would do is pass the Hunter-Ryan bill which would put countervailing duties on the Chinese when they cheat.
TIM: Sounds like one of those Tom Clancy books.
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MATTHEWS: Senator Thompson, do you want to respond to that question or that comment by the congressman about Chinese trade?
THOMPSON: I was one of the strictest advocates of imposing restrictions on the Chinese for their behavior in terms of exporting dangerous materials to other countries and tying some of trade policies to what they did in that regard. They have still not done enough. They have devalued their currency which puts them in a favored position as far as our manufacturers are concerned.
TIM: Don’t forget the ancient Chinese secret.
ANDREW: Ginseng?
TIM: We still don’t know . . . Senator Thompson, please refrain from asking the audience to applaud.
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BARTIROMO: Senator Brownback, are you prepared to say, categorically, that under a Brownback administration, there will not be a tax increase?
BROWNBACK: Yes. Because, clearly, the last thing we need to do is raise taxes in this country. Currently, the country now, the average citizen works until the first part, the middle of May, just to pay their taxes.
STEVE: Our wealthiest citizens work till 11 a.m. on January 2nd to pay their taxes.
BROWNBACK: And we also – we have to get spending under control. Here you’ve got to change the system. So I think we need to take that BRAC military process for base-closing, apply it to the rest of government, so you have an annual process for culling federal spending, that requires a vote of Congress.
STEVE: Isn’t that called making a budget?
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BARTIROMO: Congressman Tancredo, same question: Are you prepared to say, categorically, that, under your administration, there will be no tax increase?
TANCREDO: Absolutely. I’ll take the oath. The fact is this, that when we talk about spending cuts, which everybody, I think, on this stage adheres to and certainly pays lip service to, we have to think about what exactly it is that pushes spending at the federal level. And, believe it or not, it isn’t even earmarks.
STEVE: It’s toemarks.
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MATTHEWS: Mayor Giuliani and Governor Romney, you’ve been having a tit-for-tat on tax cutting. What’s the difference between the two of you.
GIULIANI: I cut taxes 23 times when I was mayor of New York City. I believe in tax cuts. I believe in being a supply sider. I cut the income tax I think it was 24 percent.
STEVE: Which is close to 22 percent, and half of that is 11 . . .
GIULIANI: I cut taxes by over $9 billion.
STEVE & TIM: 9!
ROMNEY: It’s baloney. Mayor, you’ve got to check your facts. No taxes – I did not increase taxes in Massachusetts. I lowered taxes, number one. Number two, the Club for Growth looked at our respect to spending record. They said my spending grew 2.2 percent a year. Yours grew 2.8 percent a year.
STEVE: So he cut taxes and spent more?
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GIULIANI: The line item veto is unconstitutional. You don’t get to believe about it; the Supreme Court has ruled on it.
STEVE: The Supreme Court has ruled on abortion too.
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GIULIANI: I took President Clinton to court [on the line-item veto] and I beat him.
STEVE: And I’ll beat his wife too!
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HUNTER: You know, Senator Thompson, there is one place where the federal government has a role in manufacturing. And that’s ensuring that everybody’s playing by the rules.
Now, when Communist China devalues their currency by 40 percent, they undercut American products around the world. They undercut them so low that we can’t even pay for the cost of materials and meet their prices.
TIM: He should throw Thompson for a loop by saying something about the Soviet Union. See if he bites.
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SEIB: President Bush says trade is still good for America. Are you a Bush Republican on trade?
TIM: I’m for rough trade.
BARTIROMO: Foreign acquisitions in the United States are headed for a record in 2007, and yet some money is still turned away. A Dubai company could not acquire our ports. A Chinese company could not acquire Unocal. Has this country become protectionist or are there serious, real national security concerns?
GIULIANI: Well, I think we’re on a verge of going in one direction or another.
TIM: In fact, we might go two directions at once. Or maybe we’re going nowhere.
GIULIANI: I mean, for example, you want to get specific, the four trade deals with Peru, Colombia, Panama, South Korea that are in front of Congress right now, which the Democrats are trying to block, would be good deals for the United States.
In three of the four of them, we would actually get to export more than we’re importing. Why they would want to block this I can’t understand. We would actually get to export more, and we would increase our exports.
TIM: By exporting more, we would increase our exports dramatically. And the more we export, the more our exports go up.
GIULIANI: Our percentage of our economy that now depends on exports has gone up from 9 percent to . . .
STEVE & TIM: 11!
GIULIANI: 12 percent.
STEVE & TIM: Oh!
TIM: So close!
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BARTIROMO: So, yes or no: Should a Dubai company be able to own 20 percent of NASDAQ?
GIULIANI: Sure, if they pass safety and security clearances.
STEVE: As long as it’s not Bernie Kerik’s company.
THOMPSON: The answer is yes. Dubai would own 20 percent of NASDAQ. But NASDAQ under this deal, as I understand it, would gain more than 30 percent of the Dubai company.
It all depends on national security issues. Doesn’t seem to be one there.
But we should look at all these deals carefully because we have a vast infrastructure. A great portion of it is in private hands. There’s no way, frankly, we can protect it all. So we need to do everything that we can to make sure that we’re doing all that we can to protect . . . BLAH BLAH BLAH.
STEVE: Why can’t they just script him in the role of candidate? I don’t understand why his acting doesn’t translate.
TIM: Well, he’s more of a method guy.
*
TANCREDO: No. I’ll tell you, if Dubai wanted to buy Wal- Mart, I might think about it.
TIM: What if they wanted to buy Mexico?
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BROWNBACK: We went to Iraq – on the war in Iraq – what I voted for was the war on terrorism. And Afghanistan was where the Taliban was – where al-Qaeda was located.
TIM: And Iraq was somewhere around there, in the neighborhood.
BROWNBACK: And we saw, in Iraq, what we thought was the mixture of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction. And it was in 2003. This was in close proximity to 2001 when we had the 9/11 crisis. And I wasn’t about to trust that Saddam Hussein wasn’t going to mix terrorists with weapons of mass destruction.
Now, we haven’t found the weapons of mass destruction.
TIM: And it turns out the terrorists weren’t really there either.
*
BROWNBACK: This Friday, Joe Biden and I are getting together in Des Moines and we’re going to be talking about the political side, a three-state solution in Iraq. This is what ultimately is going to happen. You’re going to have a Kurdish north, a Sunni west, a Shia south, within one country, federalism with a weak federal government, the federal government headquartered in Baghdad.
TIM: So you from Des Moines out there, if you’re looking for a good time Friday night, come see me and Biden talking about federalism.
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MATTHEWS: Senator Thompson, Senator Brownback made the point that we haven’t been able to find the WMD. You made a statement a couple of days ago, I believe, that alluded to the fact you believed that there were such weapons in Iraq. Do you believe they were there right before we got in – they were moved out somewhere?
THOMPSON: I was just stating what was obvious and that is that Saddam had had them prior. They used them against his own people – against the Kurds. And of course, he had a nuclear reactors back – I believe it was in ’81 when the Israelis bombed that.
TIM: And that’s why we should in invade Germany. They’re working on those V-2 missiles. And who knows what Genghis Kahn is working on these days. He’s real trouble too
THOMPSON: So, there’s no question that he had had them in times passed, and in my own estimation, there’s no question that if left to his own devices, he and his son would still be running that place, attacking their neighbors and murdering their own people and developing a nuclear capability – especially in looking what Iran is doing as their next door neighbor and long-time adversary.
TIM: Senator Thompson, what really happened to the Red October?
STEVE: Andrei, are you telling me you lost another sub?
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MATTHEWS: Governor Romney, if you were president of the United States, would you need to go to Congress to get authorization to take military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities?
ROMNEY: You sit down with your attorneys and they tell you what you have to do, but obviously the president of the United States has to do what’s in the best interest of the United States to protect us against a potential threat. The president did that as he was planning on moving into Iraq and received the authorization of Congress . . .
MATTHEWS: Did he need it?
ROMNEY: You know, we’re going to let the lawyers sort out what he needed to do and what he didn’t need to do.
TIM: What lawyers, his defense attorneys?
*
MATTHEWS: Congressman Paul, do you believe the president needs authorization of Congress to attack strategic targets in Iran, nuclear facilities?
PAUL: Absolutely. This idea of going and talking to attorneys totally baffles me. Why don’t we just open up the Constitution and read it? You’re not allowed to go to war without a declaration of war.
Now, as far as fleeting enemies go, yes. If there’s an imminent attack on us. We’ve never had that happen in 220 years.
The thought that the Iranians could pose an imminent attack on the United States is preposterous. There’s no way. This is just war propaganda, continued war propaganda, preparing this nation to go to war and spread this war not only in Iraq, but into Iran, unconstitutionally. It is a road to disaster for us as a nation. It’s a road to our financial disaster if we don’t read the Constitution once in a while.
MATTHEWS: Governor Huckabee, same question. Do you need Congress to approve such an action?
HUCKABEE: A president has to whatever is necessary to protect the American people.
TIM: And if that means breaking the law, so be it.
MATTHEWS: Senator McCain?
McCAIN: We’re dealing, of course, with hypotheticals.
STEVE: Who is he, Hillary Clinton?
McCAIN: But I would, at minimum – I would, at minimum, consult with the leaders of Congress because there may come a time when you need the approval of Congress. And I believe that this is a possibility that is, maybe, closer to reality than we are discussing tonight.
STEVE: What is he hinting at? The invasion begins at midnight?
TIM: He paid for this microphone.
*
GIULIANI: It really depends on exigency of the circumstances and how legitimate it is, that it really is an exigent circumstance. It’s desirable, it’s safer to go to Congress, get approval from Congress.
If you’re really dealing with an exigent circumstance, then the president has to act in the best interests of the country.
And the point of – I think it was Congressman Paul made before – that we’ve never had an imminent attack, I don’t know where he was on September 11th.
PAUL: That was no country. That was 19 thugs. That had nothing to do with a country.
GIULIANI: And since September – well, I think it was kind of organized in Afghanistan and Pakistan. And if we had known about it, maybe – maybe hitting a target there, quickly, might have helped prevent it.
In any event, we’ve had 23 plots since September 11, where Islamic terrorists are planning to kill Americans, that we’ve had to stop.
So imminent attack is a possibility, and we should be ready for it.
*
BARTIROMO: Mayor Giuliani, under your leadership, how will this country become energy- and oil-independent and strike the right balance between environmental conservation and oil exploration?
GIULIANI: This is a matter of national security. You’ve got to support all the alternatives. There’s no magic bullet here. Biofuels, nuclear power – we haven’t licensed a nuclear power plant in 30 years. We haven’t had a new refinery in 30 years. We’re on hold.
Hydroelectric power, solar power, wind power, conservation – we have to support all of these things. We’ve got to support them in a positive way. And this is an area in which the federal government, the president has to treat this like putting a man on the moon. It is a matter of national security.
STEVE: Was the moon going to attack us?
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HARWOOD: Senator McCain, Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips, this past year, earned a combined $72 billion in profits. Is that too much? Should the oil industry pay higher taxes, or should it be required to use some of those profits to help solve our energy problems?
McCAIN: I would not require them to, but I think that public pressure and a lot of other things, including a national security requirement that we reduce and eliminate our dependence on foreign oil and we stop the contamination of our atmosphere which is – in climate change, which is real and is taking place.
And we have now a confluence of two national security requirements. One is to address the issue of climate change, and nuclear power is a very big part of that. And it’s also a requirement to not allow Chavez in Venezuela, Putin in Russia . . .
TIM: . . . that’s the USSR to you, Senator Thompson . . .
McCAIN: . . . and the president of Iran to dictate world events, bully their neighbors and use oil as a weapon which would probably further terrorism and endanger this nation’s national security.
THOMPSON: That brings in the whole question of the importance of stability in the world. The United States, since the end of World War II, has been a force for stability and democracy.
TIM: Except in those places where stability and democracy are at odds. Which is most places.
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MATTHEWS: This is one of those 30-second down the line, gentlemen, questions.
TIM: You’ll only need 30 seconds to evade it.
MATTHEWS: How do the Republican win back confidence on the economy, Governor Romney?
TIM: I’m gonna strap the economy to the roof of my car!
Mr. Romney: We need to have leadership that’ll tell us the truth and actually lead.
TIM: But you can’t do both.
ROMNEY: And vis-a-vis meeting with most likely Hillary Clinton, I can’t wait to talk about the fact that I spent my life in the economy.
TIM: I just wanted everyone to know I’m not from another planet. That CD-Romney thing is bullshit. I’ve been in the economy my whole life. Prick me and I bleed.
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GIULIANI: Hillary Clinton, the governor mentioned, wants to put a lid on us. She wants to put a lid on our growth. We want to give people freedom. I’ll give you an example. Hillary, the other day – remember the Hillary bond program? She’s going to give out – she’s going to give $5,000 to every child born in America, with her picture on it.
I challenged her on it. I challenged her. She has backed off that. She has a new one today. This one is, she’s going to give out $1,000 to everybody, to set up a 401(k).
The problem is, this one costs $5 billion more than the last one.
STEVE: And the pundits say she’s playing it safe!
*
(CONOCOPHILLIPS COMMERCIAL)
STEVE: Didn’t ConocoPhillips bring us the last 10 minutes? Product placement!
TIM: Is this TV station like Google ads? Maybe after Tancredo speaks we’ll see commercials for Cancun.
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BARTIROMO: Senator Thompson, give specific steps to maintain the long-term solvency of Social Security.
Mr. Thompson: Well, you’ve hit on a major problem that we’ve got to come to terms with. We’re looking at the short-term economic situation now, and I think it’s very good news.
But if you go out a little bit, you’ll see that we’re not going to have Social Security and Medicare as we know it into the future, our children and our grandchildren certainly are not. We are eating our seed corn.
We are spending their money. We’re pitting one generation against the next. We’re better than that. We’ve got to do some things better than that, even though the choices are difficult.
Number one, we’ve got to make sure we have a growing economy . . . BLAH BLAH BLAH.
STEVE: That look on Romney’s face is him thinking this guy isn’t going to be a problem at all.
TIM: Right now, I am the Red October.
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TANCREDO: The negotiators for the Bush administration – probably the worst vote I ever cast was the vote to give the president fast track. I mean, you know, talking about the tariffs, CAFTA, here was a bill over a thousand pages long to do what, to reduce tariffs between the six Central American countries and the United States?
That was about a paragraph, right? But it’s over a thousand pages.
TIM: Maybe they can have a paragraph-item veto.
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SEIB: Governor Romney, do you think the Republican Party should take the lead in ending the employer-based health care system we have now and replace it with something else?
ROMNEY: Well, I don’t believe in replacing what we have, but I believe in improving it. And the way we improve something is not by putting more government into it – of course, that’s what Hillary Clinton wants to do. “Hillary Care” is government gets in and tells people what to do from the federal government’s standpoint.
So my plan gets everybody in American insured, takes the burden of free-riders off of our auto companies and everybody else and says, “Let’s get everybody in the system.”
And to do that, we say: Look, we’re going to have states create their own plans – we did it in our state and it’s working. We’re not going to have the federal government tell them how to do it.
STEVE: Because our state governments are so much more capable of handling complex issues. Look at Springfield.
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GIULIANI: Unions have made a positive contribution. My grandmother was an early member of the United Ladies Garment Workers Union . . .
TIM: That’s why I like wearing ladies garments.
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BARTIROMO: Senator Thompson, Chrysler is facing a possible walk-out on Wednesday. Should the government step in and help Chrysler and the other auto makers?
THOMPSON: No.
BARTIROMO: Why?
THOMPSON: Well, I think the government has to have a good reason to step in.
TIM: What about breaking the union? Isn’t that a good reason? What kind of Republican are you?
THOMPSON: I think it has to be something that drastically affects our economy. It might a little bit later on. You’d have to cross that bridge when you came to it.
TIM: I don’t want to deal in hypotheticals. Like if I were president . . .
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BARTIROMO: Senator Thompson, what are the dangers of a weak dollar?
STEVE: They’re too flimsy to get into the vending machine.
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MATTHEWS: Mr. Mayor, Hillary Clinton says that one of our biggest economic threats right now is how much of our federal debt is owned by foreigners.
TIM: What if Hillary wins the Republican nomination too?
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ROMNEY: Is London going to replace New York? Of course not.
Should we fix Sarbanes-Oxley and take out Section 404 as it applies to smaller companies? Of course, we should.
Is this country the hope of the world? Absolutely.
And would I support the Republican nominee? Of course.
TIM: It’s CD-Romney! I don’t need any of you! Should I be president? Yes I should!
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ROMNEY: I’ve come to know these people now over these debates. Is this our sixth debate, I think – something like that? And this has a lot – this is a lot like Law & Order, Senator. It has a huge cast, the series seems to go on forever, and Fred Thompson shows up at the end.
STEVE: His advisors wrote a funny.
Mr. Thompson: And to think I thought I was going to be the best actor on the stage.
STEVE: His did too.
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BARTIROMO: Governor Romney, what is the greatest long-term threat to the U.S. economy?
ROMNEY: Our sense of optimism. America has to be optimistic and recognize that there’s nothing we can’t overcome. We have to recognize that what we have, as Americans, is the envy of the world. We have technology. We have innovation. We have great schools. We have great families. We have great homes.
TIM: We have great hair.
BARTIROMO: Thank you very much.
*
Beachwood Analysis
Hillary Clinton was the clear winner tonight with front-runners Giuliani and Romney jockeying for position as the best candidate to slay her. Among Republicans, Giuliani showed again why he is in the lead. He projects leadership, strength, reason, and a bit of a street fighter mixed with a hint of professor in those little glasses. He’s completely comfortable in his own skin. Of course, this is no judgment on his stands on the issues. But those are irrelevant at this point to Republicans. Giuliani hardly best embodies the party, but he seems to offer the best chance to go toe-to-toe with Hillary.
Romney is too slick and too smarmy; right out of the 1980s. You get the sense that Hillary would wipe the floor with the rest of these guys.
Fred Thompson is a dud, as predicted here at the Beachwood. His best hope is to slip through in Iowa if Giuliani and Romney tear each other apart and alienate voters, but it’s a slim reed to hang onto.
Huckabee is looking for the same opening, though he may have more staying power and make for an attractive vice president nominee. But Huckabee failed to capitalize tonight in his momentum going into the debate, coming up flat.
TIM: Did the Republicans just jump the shark? Maybe Fred Thompson is the Cousin Oliver of Republican candidates.
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P.S.
TIM: I’m gonna pour Red Bull in Andrew’s beer glass next time.
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Posted on October 10, 2007