I thought Santorum did a poor job. He wasn't clear or concise. He rambled when he answered the questions and half the time my daughter and I couldn't even figure out what his actual answer was. I think focusing his closing remarks on the social issues was a strategic mistake. Everyone already knows he won't back down on that. We want to know what else he stands for. I was very impressed by Perry's performance. If I was an uninformed voter this might have won me over. Bachmann did a good job too. My daughter thought someone had her doing yoga or something because she was so calm and collected, lol! She thought that her performance tonight was a big contrast from what we've seen from her previously. I missed part of Gingrich as I didn't get dinner done quite on time so I don't feel I can judge his performance fairly. Romney (as usual) was smooth as silk and full of bologna. Paul was rambling as usual. Apparently giving him equal time doesn't help.

What little I could catch, I have to admit that Romney sounded decent.

What was it that the AG's were saying or asking that bothered you?

It just seemed a little unrealistic and abstract. The gist of the whole thing was, why do you think the feds should be doing this, why do you think the feds should be doing that, what is the constitutional basis for the feds doing this, etc. And those are good questions, but my personal view is that the answers involve a lot of nuance, and it does a disservice to the Constitution to oversimplify it.

And part of the problem I think is that the candidates aren't really up to providing that nuance.

Shouldn't they be up to it though?? The Constitution is the supreme law of the land. If they can't articulate how that works in the nitty gritty of the job they're interviewing for then perhaps they shouldn't be applying.

In Santorum's defense he gave a really good explanation for why the human life amendment was so important in regards to states rights and abortion. Since the states have to ratify amendments it would essentially give the states the right to determine abortion law. Interesting perspective. I've actually never heard anyone put it quite like that.

GOPers keep it friendly at Huck forum

By: Emily Schultheis
December 3, 2011 11:26 PM EST

The presidential race began Saturday with Herman Cain’s dramatic, theatrical exit from the contest, but it ended with a substantive and subdued discussion of constitutional issues at Mike Huckabee’s presidential forum.

Each allotted an equal, set amount of time, six 2012 hopefuls – Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul – fielded questions on issues of state sovereignty and federal power from a friendly panel of Republican moderators.

Huckabee hosted the forum on an extended version of his Fox News show, and invited three Republican state attorneys general – Ken Cuccinelli of Virginia, Pam Bondi of Florida and Scott Pruitt of Oklahoma – to question the candidates.

“We heard more about the Constitution more than every other debate combined,” Bondi concluded at the end of the two-hour event.

It was an opportunity for the candidates to pay homage to Huckabee – who has so far stayed neutral in the 2012 GOP primary. He’ll hold a similar forum in Iowa, focused on abortion, on Dec. 14.

At the start of the forum, Huckabee noted that Jon Huntsman declined “repeated invitations” to participate, and said Cain had also declined before suspending his campaign earlier Saturday.

Gingrich was pressed on some of his more moderate stances – namely, his support for a health care mandate and his appearance in a commercial with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, where the two talked about climate change.

“Sitting on the couch with Nancy Pelosi is the dumbest single thing I’ve done in the last few years — but if you notice, I’ve never favored cap and trade, and in fact I actively testified against it,” Gingrich said. “I was at the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee the same day Al Gore was there to testify for it, I testified against it and through American Solutions we fought it in the Senate and played a major role in defeating it.”

Perry, who has turned in a string of embarrassing debate performances, didn’t make any major gaffes, but did stumble slightly when Cuccinelli challenged him on the assertion that an executive order would effectively repeal health care reform.

“The executive order obviously gives you that authority [to repeal the law],” he told Cuccinelli. “But also, as I said earlier, having men and women in those agencies who are going to share your philosophy – I think that’s an important message.”

Cuccinelli shot back: “I just want to be real clear to make sure I understand this: You are taking the position that you can stop the implementation of a law passed by Congress, signed by the president, with an executive order?”

Perry walked his comments back, saying an executive order could stop “parts” of the health care law.

And Romney defended his role in shaping the Massachusetts health care law, saying the final bill was “different” than the one he’d originally proposed but that he was pleased with the imperfect end result.

“Do I like the bill overall? Yes. Am I proud of what we did for our state? Yes,” he said. “But what the president has done is way beyond what we envisioned.”


The forum was specifically designed to prevent infighting between the candidates in attendance – each was interviewed separately, and even during the candidates’ one-minute final statements, they did not appear on the set together. Also missing were the raucous crowds and the journalist-moderators drawing the candidates out of their comfort zones. The questioners — all Republican elected officials — often voiced agreement with the candidates on their answers to policy questions.

When Bachmann said she’d abolish the Environmental Protection Agency, Cuccinelli said, “You’re talking to a crowd here that is all suing the EPA in one way or another.”

“I think we heard thoughtful, substantive conversation without infighting,” Bondi said at the end of the forum.

But it didn’t take long for the collegiality to dissolve.

While Huckabee said all the candidates did “an outstanding job,” Cuccinelli — himself a tea party hero who recently signaled he would run for governor of Virginia in 2013 — didn’t feel the same way. In a post-forum interview on Fox News, he blasted Gingrich’s moderate stances and also said he wasn’t persuaded by Romney.

“My benchmark was: I want to leave with comfort that each of these six candidates is going to be a limited-government, conservative president,” he said. “And despite pressing Newt Gingrich several times, I didn’t get that. I did not get that. We could have another compassionate conservative on our hands.”

Of Romney’s stances on health care, he said: “I don’t see a lot of difference there between him and the president.”

And the candidates themselves, denied the opportunity to challenge one another face to face, quickly got to work doing so once the forum wrapped.

In response to Gingrich’s claim that he testified against cap-and-trade, both the Perry and Paul campaigns emailed around a 2007 interview in which Gingrich said a 2000 carbon cap pledge George W. Bush made was “something I would strongly support.”


© 2011 POLITICO LLC

http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm? ... 49B3745AB1

Here's a clip with Santorum's part of the forum


He's stumbling over his words a bit, but my impression was that it was just because he had so much that he was trying to say as opposed to it being confused. I think he actually did pretty well.

I also have read where several people stated that Santorum's closing was aimed at Iowa and that was why he chose to go with the social issues again. It makes sense - Iowa will probably make or break him. If he can't do well there, people will see him as a unelectable so it's pretty do or die at this point.

Maybe. On the other hand, the president will have legal counsel telling him what's legal/in keeping with precedent and what isn't.

To a certain degree, I think it's problematic for politicians to be talking constitutional law. Someone running for president is running on a certain set of policies and a certain vision for the country. If you start inquiring into his view of the constitution, it puts him in a place where he has an interest in arguing the constitution is consistent with his policies and vision and that it's inconsistent with the other guy's policies and vision.

We saw this stuff against Bush from the left, we see it now against Obama. What gets lost is the constitution itself, and the fact that we usually disagree on policy grounds while the constitutional points are usually pretty arguable (IMO).

I'd much rather settle these issues (the proper understanding of federalism, for example) with elections than expect the Constitution, and therefore the court, to settle them.

Please don't confuse constitutional law with the Constitution. Constitutional law is about setting precedence which in fact is a form of judicial activism, i.e. legislation from the bench.

Understanding the Constitution and how it dictates to the three branches of government is imperative for the leader of this great nation. And it should be mandatory study for every voter. The judicial branch was to be, on purpose, the least powerful branch and is without 'will or power' to carry out its 'judgments', especially if the executive branch and/or We the People ignore its judgments (ref. Obama's refusal to prosecute violations of DOMA, which by the way is legislation).

I was happy to see Mike Huckabee getting kudos out there in the political world for his forum.

I thought it was very informative and well done.

My only disappointment was that Huckabee did not ask a question to each candidate himself. I am puzzled why he did not do that. He did ask one of Rick Perry-sort of a follow up.

I also enjoyed the AG's and Mike Huckabee on Justice following the forum talking about the candidates strengths and weaknesses in the forum.

Sigh...I still do not have a candidate to vote for.

Yeah, Paul surprised me that way, too.

Several people were complaining that Bachmann chose to criticize the property rights SCOTUS decision instead of Roe v. Wade.