Sunday, September 20, 2015

Get your ticket punched at the so-called debate; then duck out of going further on record? In the lion's den? Is that a profile in courage? Or was it good judgment especially since the viewing numbers were orders of magnitude below the prime-time second "debate" show, thus yielding less bang-for-the-buck ticket punching opportunity?

A few online items to me are relevant to showing the host of GOP candidates do have individual differences. Some duck. All get their ticket punched.

FIRST: Ticket punching: Time has published online a full transcript of the so-called debate. What each said is on record in text, online, so that later retreat or waffling will be what it is.

SECOND: CNN posts its second "debate" follow-up poll results online here, reporting (with links from original omitted) as follows:

Poll: Fiorina rockets to No. 2 behind Trump in GOP field
By Eric Bradner, CNN - Updated 9:20 AM ET, Sun September 20, 2015


Washington (CNN)Carly Fiorina has rocketed into second place in the Republican presidential field on the heels another strong debate and Donald Trump has lost some support, a new national CNN/ORC poll shows.

The survey, conducted the three days after 23 million people tuned in to Wednesday night's GOP debate on CNN, shows that Trump is still the party's front-runner with 24% support. That, though, is an 8 percentage point decrease from earlier in the month when a similar poll had him at 32%.

Fiorina ranks second with 15% support -- up from 3% in early September. She's just ahead of Ben Carson's 14%, though Carson's support has also declined from 19% in the previous poll.

Driving Trump's drop and Fiorina's rise: A debate in which 31% of Republicans who watched said Trump was the loser, and 52% identified Fiorina as the winner.

During the CNN debate, Fiorina clashed with Trump over his personal attacks and their business records and scored points for her condemnation of Planned Parenthood.

The top three contenders underscore a key theme in the 2016 race: In a jam-packed GOP presidential field, the leading candidates are the only ones who have never held political office. [...] Florida Sen. Marco Rubio -- who 14% of Republicans identified as Wednesday's winner, putting him second behind Fiorina -- is now in fourth place with 11% support, up from 3% in a previous poll.

In fifth place is former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, at 9%. He's followed by Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee at 6% each, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul at 4%, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie at 3%, Ohio Gov. John Kasich at 2% and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum at 1%. [...] Five other candidates received less than one-half of 1 percentage point support: former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, former New York Gov. George Pataki and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.

Walker's collapse is especially stark.

[...] The CNN/ORC poll was conducted September 17-19 and surveyed 1,006 adult Americans, including 924 registered voters -- 444 of whom are Republicans and independents who lean toward the GOP. The margin of error with the Republican results is plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.

[highlighting added] All the names were there, in that item, which in its headlining and coverage highlighted Fiorina who climbed higher by a questionable stance upon dead fetuses. CNN's item omitted mention of that part of Fiorina's rise, while Brietbart highlighted that aspect of the Fiorina candidacy, in rising to Fiorina's defense. While so vocally staking a stance against abortion in front of millions on TV, nothing was found on the web about her having any particular stance on contraception in general, RU486, or the Hobby Lobby decision, while she has borne no children during two marriages and the course of her pursuing a professional career and the raising of two step-daughters. Wikipedia also reports her present net worth in the mid-eight-figures while linking to her father's biography and career showing she did not bootstrap herself into good fortune, but was born there.

As to ticket punching at the televised-to-millions "debate" and ducking a televised to fewer narrow-issue Iowa fundie event being separate; for some; there is this online here:

LIVE COVERAGE: GOP Presidential Candidates to Speak at Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition - Posted 5:10 pm, September 19, 2015, by Aaron Hepker, Updated at 05:29pm, September 19, 2015

DES MOINES, Iowa – Eight GOP presidential hopefuls are in Des Moines Saturday to speak at the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition’s 15th annual fall family dinner.


The candidates are speaking to an audience of more than 1,000 attendees at the Paul Knapp Center on the Iowa State Fairgrounds.

Former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum, businessman Donald Trump, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, former New York Governor George Pataki, Lousiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham and Ted Cruz are the events confirmed speakers.

By a process of comparing the televised to millions list vs. the showed up in the fundie hustings list, those ducking can be identified by a process of subtraction.

As to who said what to the Iowa fundies; perhaps I missed items, but YouTube search yielded the following presentations (not being entirely congruent with the above noted published speaker listing):

Huckabee.

Jindal.

Trump.

Cruz.

Mr. Bush appeared, via a surrogate who showed up and repeatedly ducked his head to read a five-minute low-energy prepared text.

If readers know of additional video from that event, comments suggesting YouTube links are welcome.

.............................................
Somewhat separate in scope from the preceding part of the post: Minnesota CD6 GOP-leaning editorial blogging about the so-called debate, Gary Gross, here and here. Opinions can differ; e. g., the term "ticket punching" is absent in Gary's posting, as is the term "fundie." Different people see different things. That is what makes America great [again].