Revenge Of The Republicans

From the crowded press room, CBS News Correspondent Eric Engberg has seen his share of political debates. In this Reality Check, he reviews Thursday night's performances by the GOP Six.

A gaffe gives all the newsies a damaging and possibly memorable lead to their analytical storiesÂ… which is all front-runner cares about because virtually nobody will actually watch the entire debate.

CBS News Correspondent Eric Engberg

In a sense, the non-front-runners form an unspoken cabal to try to deflate the big guy, knowing that none of them will go anywhere unless he augurs in. All this is done without anyone admitting everyone is playing a role.

John McCain, through body language more than anything, put to rest the "Temper Issue," which some of his enemies have tried to ignite against him, and staked out a position as the candidate who stands for killing the influence of big money in politics.

Questioned by the moderators about the whispering campaign suggesting he has a bad temper, the Arizona senator just kept smiling. For a decorated war hero, he can make himself look as non-threatening as Linus with a blanket, and that's what he did. Then, at just the right strategic moment, as he was cataloging a long list of pork barrel spending abuses, he looked right into the lens and said, "It makes me angry."

This was political judo of the first rank. Whoever thought McCain could be damaged by rumors of a low boiling point supposedly brought on by his years as a POW gets the bonehead of the political year awardÂ… which no doubt will move through many more hands before the election.

The whole anger business led to the only true political theater of the evening. Frontrunner Bush, knowing that McCain is his closest opponent and has been rising in the N.H. polls, injected into the proceedings his assessment of McCain, without benefit of being asked.
"He's a good man. I don't know what compelled me to say that about, Senator, 'cept he's a good friend."

How about this for a theory about why he's compelled to say that: It was a way to tell McCain and his supporters, "I'm not the one who's been spreading the vicious rumorsÂ… it's somebody else. And you, Senator, you might be just the guy to be my running mate. So let's not be mean to each other as this thing drags along. Let's not talk about how my military career was spent in Texas with the National Guard."

In short, it was a way to cement the notion that the game is Bush-McCain, and that the final ticket could read that way, too. Sound plausible? Here at Reality Check, as you know, we try to avoid skepticism about our politicians and their motives.

Now for more skepticism: the "stature gap" in this debate was painfully obvious, and I'm not just talking about the diminutive Gary Bauer. There was Bush, McCain, and the also rans. You almost had to admire the Big Men On Campus for not picking on the kids in the Latin Club.

Steve Forbes was the only combatant to try to bloody front-runner Bush by accusing him of the hideous crime of "considering raising the Social Security eligibility age. Tough luck for Forbes that Bush had the perfect "gotcha" in his portable bag of opposition research, a long quote from Forbes himself "considering" the hideous crime of raising the Social Security age. Oops. Forbes protested that his comment was 20 years old. Sorry, there's no statute of limitation of Social Security mini-gaffes.

For much of the evening, Forbes looked like he had just bitten the sourest of all lemons, puckered and pained. He got in articulate licks on the flat tax, IRS reform, and saving Social Security. But using his final at bat tproclaim that he alone is not a "professional politician was just plain silly. The man has done nothing but run for President since 1995. And the roster of hired gun consultants (all very professional politicians) on his payroll must be as long as his income tax returns.

Senator Orrin Hatch's personal grooming was impeccable as always. Beyond that, why was he there?

Sometimes he lapsed into that foreign tongue known as "Senatese." But he was consistently pleasant. He absolutely gets the award for the debate's Most Uncreative Pander with his stunning proclamation, "I'm against taxes." Wow. There's a zinger.

The newsroom crowd watching the debate insisted that Gary Bauer was the spitting-image of Chucky, star of Child's Play I, II, III, and IV. I personally can't condone such comparisons, but...

Bauer worked his opposition to abortion into nearly every answer. So at least he made the point of his candidacy perfectly clear and that's useful. His forays into other policy zones were dangerous, as when he said the reason Social Security is in fiscal trouble is because politicians have been stealing the trust funds for their pet pork barrel projects. Point made, but doesn't the aging population have something to do with it?

Alan Keyes turned in his usual zany performance. If there were no small children in the room to be frightened, he might even have provided some chuckles. But it was hard to find the humor when he referred to Governor Bush as "Massa Bush." The others ignored him. It may have been more courageous to call him on it.

A few other magic moments:

by Eric Engberg