Thursday's GOP Debate Changed Nothing

It's not often that eight candidates can get into a room, answer questions about everything from economics to Iran, and walk away without changing a damn thing. Yet, that's exactly what the Republican Party candidates did Thursday night. Of course, that's not how the media is spinning it. As predicted, the media declared it a victory for Mitt Romney, Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann. Also as predicted, they declared it a huge loss for Newt Gingrich, Herman Cain, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul. Really? Ron Paul? The mainstream media could at least TRY and hide their bias and pro-corporate, anti-Paul agenda. In reality, the debate last night didn't help any of the candidates. The questions were spotty and, as Gingrich suggested, "gotcha" questions dominated the debate. Coverage of the debate hasn't really helped matters, as the media simply lazily reported the spin of the day from the front-running campaigns. Here is what I took away from the debate: 1. Rick Perry is going to be the front-runner before the Iowa caucuses next February — possibly as soon as Halloween. Perry is already polling in the mid-teens, and he won't formally announce he's running until Saturday. 2. Perry's entrance into the race will almost certainly pull votes from three places: One, he will take some "front-runner/electabilty" votes from Romney. Romney receives a large amount of his support from Republicans who are lukewarm to Romney's ideology, but see him as the best chance to defeat Obama. When Perry emerges with that badge, he will steal some of Romney's thunder. Two, as Perry gains "electability" credibility, he will take social conservative votes away from Bachmann — the candidate loved by the Tea Party and social conservatives, but who is also supremely unlikely to win a general election. Three, Perry will start to thin the field, with voters from the Santorum and Pawlenty camps coming his way, as well as whatever Gingrich voters remain. 3. Those three groups of voters will probably be enough to vault Perry into second or third overall in Iowa's polling, depending on how the Straw Poll shakes out. 4. The wild card in all this is Texas Representative Ron Paul. The mainstream media continues to ignore and downplay his candidacy. Yet Paul's supporters are more dedicated to Paul's candidacy than any other candidate's supporters are to his/her campaign. He won't be beat for lack of fervor or effort, if my overflowing email box is any indication. As I said earlier this week, much of Ron Paul's efforts will come down to his ability to gain mainstream credibility. He needs to do more than win internet polls and message board postings, although that grassroots enthusiasm is obviously helpful. He can help himself immensely with a good, perhaps first-place, finish in Saturday's Iowa Straw Poll. 5. Gingrich, Santorum, and Cain are done. They have no reason to even be on the stage at this point. Pawlenty has earned the right to stay on with his uptick in Iowa polling. A good performance Saturday by Pawlenty could separate him from the other single-digit folks and put him a notch below the front-runners. 6. I expect to see Romney do nothing but decline from here. Perry gives Republicans another electable (in theory — I say Perry doesn't have a chance in hell) option to run instead of Romney. Romney also made a major gaffe Thursday, referring to corporations as people, and while he may still be electable in the eyes of Republican primary voters, he is (in my view) unelectable nationwide. As it is, he may have doomed the entire 2012 slate of Republican voters with that stupid, unforced error, as it will be THE soundbyte for the Democrats to utilize in every election next November. If nothing else, Saturday should be an interesting day for politics. The Straw Poll will start to shake out the pretenders from the contenders, and Rick Perry will almost certainly jump in the race, boots first, some time on Saturday. Expect the Sunday talking heads to be focused on those two events. You can reach the author by email john@benzinga.com or on twitter @johndthorpe.