Everybody is gushing about how tough the moderators were on Thursday night, but my impression was that they were a lot tougher on Trump than on Bush, so I thought I’d try to quantify it. I used this transcript as my source.
Before I went through the transcript, my assumptions were that Fox would try to promote Bush and Walker, the so-called establishment candidates, and to trash Trump and Cruz, the rebels. Now that I’ve done it, I think I was right about Bush and Trump, but wrong about Walker and Cruz, unless they very seriously miscalculated Walker’s (lack of) foreign policy expertise. I also thought they would mostly ignore Carson and Kasich, since they aren’t widely known; be nice to Huckabee (since he had a show on Fox News for a long time) and Rubio (since he’s their “younger generation” guy), and be mean to Christie and Paul (since Paul is more a libertarian than Republican, and Christie is damaged goods after all his problems of the last couple years). I seem to have been right about Huckabee and Rubio, mostly right about Paul and Christie, and mostly wrong about the others.
Bottom line, it seems clear to me that the questions were designed to help Bush, and hurt Trump. Trump got nine very hostile questions (out of ten); nobody else got more than seven questions total. And every question Bush got was an open-ended opportunity to say pretty much whatever he wanted to say, particularly on subjects he’s flubbed before and thus was extremely likely to have practiced, while almost all the other candidates got questions that forced them to say yes or no on something very controversial, or to talk about subjects they probably would rather have avoided.
I got tired of doing this about a third of the way through, so I’ve scored the questions very generally. Hostile questions, like almost all of Trump’s, got a -10. I define a hostile question as one that is either very skeptical (an actual question for Trump: “With that record, why should we trust you to run the nation’s business?”), and/or one that is preceded by an attack on the guy (“You said this terrible thing last year…”). Super softball questions, like the incredible one that Rubio got at the end asking what he thought about God and veterans, got a +10, but as I saw how long this was getting, I stopped trying to be precise and ended up giving a +10 to just about any question that anyone should have expected he’d be asked, and so had a prepared spiel ready. Only a couple of questions got anything but a plus or minus 10. One question was so stupid that I couldn’t score it, and it had an equally stupid answer, as I noted in the summary below (just do a search on “stupid question”. And the Rubio question I mentioned above was so pillowy soft that I gave it a +20.
The biggest surprise to me, after reading the transcript (I did watch the debate on TV, but was multitasking with the PC at the time, so I missed a lot), was how abysmally clueless Scott Walker is on foreign policy. He seemed to have a prepared answer for one of the FP questions they asked him, but really floundered on the others, and they asked him a lot of them, leading me to think it may have been on purpose. He had a reputation for being weak on FP, and they may have been trying to help him by giving him all those chances to show off how much he had crammed, but it ended up making him look like an idiot. IMO. I already didn’t like him because of his attacks on labor, but that’s a difference of opinion. I now think that he is absolutely unqualified to be President, and that electing him would be a disaster.
And although I expected them to go easy on Rubio, I was a bit surprised how easy. IMO, he got the four softest softballs of the night. Rubio, Bush, and Huckabee were the only candidates who didn’t get a single negative question.
Anyway, rather than spend any more time making my evaluations more exact, I offer this summary of questions for debate, to see if others get the same impression I did about Fox News having their thumb on the scales for the candidates they especially like (Bush, Rubio, Huckabee) and dislike (Trump, Paul). The questions are in order for each candidate, if you want to check the transcript, but of course they skipped around among the candidates when asking the questions. Anything not in direct quotes is a paraphrase, and I was not completely objective when I paraphrased, so again, check the transcript. And where I tried to provide context before giving the question, where I say “after talking about X…,” I mean the moderator, not the candidate.
Trump:
- You won’t pledge to support the party’s nominee?? -10
- How can you win after saying all these terrible things about women?? -10
- (Immediately after Bush’s softball question on immigration) Show us your proof for what you said about Mexicans being rapists. -10
- Immediately after Trump, in answer to the previous question, does what everybody else in every debate ever held has done, and says what he wants to say, rather than giving a direct answer, the same Chris Wallace who responded to Jeb’s equally free-form answer by saying “Thank you, sir,” says: “I’ll give you 30 seconds to answer my question, which was, what evidence do you have, specific evidence that the Mexican government is sending criminals across the border? Thirty seconds.” -10
- Why have you flip-flopped on health care? -10
- “Mr. Trump, it’s not just your past support for single-payer health care. You’ve also supported a host of other liberal policies. Use – you’ve also donated to several Democratic candidates, Hillary Clinton included, Nancy Pelosi.” -10
- After talking about Trump’s multiple bankruptcies, “With that record, why should we trust you to run the nation’s business?” -10
- After Trump says he just took advantage of the law, Chris Wallace details Trump’s latest bankruptcy, where he says lenders lost over a billion dollars, and over 1000 people lost their jobs. “Is that the way that you’d run the country?” -10
- After accusing Trump of being pro-choice and anti-assault weapon: “When did you actually become a Republican?”
-10 - An Iranian general is meeting with Putin. How would you respond to that? +10 (first and only non-hostile question for him of the night)
Carson:
- (After quoting list of blunders he’s made) “don’t they raise legitimate questions about whether you are ready to be president?” -10
- “As president, would you bring back water boarding?” -10 (no good answer for this)
- Do you agree that we need tax reform? +10
- How would you oppose Hillary Clinton? +10
- Would you have used military force against Assad after he used chemical weapons in Syria? +10
- Race relations? 0 (Why was he the only one asked that?)
Rubio: - Why would you be a better president than Jeb Bush? +10
- Is Trump right when he says our leaders are stupid? +10
- Tell us how you would help small businessmen. +10
- Why do you favor a rape and incest exemption for abortions? +10
- Tell us about your views of God and veterans. +20 (What, no apple pie?)
Bush: - Do you understand the concern about dynastic politics? +10
- (After quoting Bush giving a pretty enlightened view on immigration) Tell us more about your policy on immigration? +10 Note: Bush’s time-exceeding answer was followed by Chris Wallace saying, “Thank you, sir,” the only time those words were spoken all night. So an extra +5 for that.
- Here, we’ll give you yet another crack at saying whether invading Iraq was a mistake. +10
- You support common core. Tell us more about your views on education. +10
- How would you cause record economic growth as President? +10
- Did you call Trump a clown and buffoon? +10 (gives him a chance to say no, but then trash Trump for being “divisive,” and then swerve into another recitation of how great Florida’s economy did under Bush)
Cruz: - (After saying he has a toxic relationship with his colleagues) “How can you win in 2016 when you’re such a divisive figure?” -10
- Are you against illegal aliens murdering American citizens? +10
- “How would you destroy ISIS in 90 days?” (I’m unable to score such a stupid question, especially after Cruz gave such a stupid answer: By speaking the words, “radical Islamic terrorism.” But he got a lot of applause.)
- “Why is Governor Bush wrong on Common Core?” +10
- “Have Russia and China committed cyber war, and if you were president, what would you do about it?” +10
Christie:
- (After listing several bad things about NJ’s economy) “So why should voters believe that your management of the country’s finances would be any different?” -10
- Tell us why Rand Paul is helping terrorists opposing NSA spying on American citizens. +10 for Christie, -10 for Paul
- Is Huckabee lying when he says he can save Social Security without cutting benefits? -5
- What do you think of Rand Paul wanting to cut aid to Israel? +10
Walker: - “Would you really let a mother die rather than have an abortion?” -10
- Since you’ve changed your position on immigration, “are there other past positions that we shouldn’t hold you to?” -10
- What Arab country not currently in our coalition would be our greatest partner? -10 (It’s actually a neutral question, but Walker flubbed the answer so badly (“America’s a great country!”) that IMO it must have been picked to show how weak he is on foreign policy).
- “Given your [terrible economic] record in Wisconsin, why should voters believe you?” -10
- What would you do instead of the Iran nuclear deal? 0 (good question, but his ridiculous answer again shows how clueless he is on foreign policy, and he’s getting foreign policy questions a half hour before the foreign policy part of the debate. They see to want to target his weak areas.
- Do you think police shooting black people is the civil rights issue of our time? +10 everybody should have been ready for this
- What would you do if Putin threatened the Baltic nations? +10 (Walker actually appeared to know what the Baltic nations were)
Huckabee: - Given your conservative views on social issues, “how do you persuade enough Independents and Democrats to get elected in 2016?” +10
- Is the government too big for even a Republican to shrink? +10
- Explain how your plan on Social Security would work. +10
- What do you think about Rand Paul’s views on Iran? +10 (MUCH more open-ended than the yes or no question they gave Paul)
- How would you handle women, gays, and transgenders in the military? +10
Paul: - (After saying he blamed the rise of ISIS on Republican hawks) “Why are you so quick to blame your own party?” -10
- Would you tear up the Iran deal? +5 (yes, it gives him a chance to expound, but it’s a yes or no question, and any attempt at nuance is bad for a Republican).
- “What will you do to ensure Christians are not prosecuted for speaking out against gay marriage?” +10 I guess, but FFS, what a straw man.
- Do you still support cutting aid to Israel? -10
Kasich: - “Why should Republican voters, who generally want to shrink government, believe that you won’t use your Saint Peter rationale to expand every government program?” -5
- Tell us what you hate about Trump’s position on immigration. +10
- After Kasich responds by talking about how great he’s been for Ohio’s economy, the same Chris Wallace who just blasted Trump for not answering directly, " Respectfully, can we talk about illegal immigration?" +10
- How will you take on Hillary Clinton? +10
- How would you explain your opposition to gay marriage if your child was gay? +10