ZitatThe Drudge Report summarized Thursday night’s GOP debate, which frontrunner Donald Trump skipped, with the headline: “The Seven Dwarfed!”
That assessment matches the consensus, left and right, from media observers: that Trump benefited from staging a fundraiser for wounded veterans, where he appeared relaxed, magnanimous, and in command, rather than placing himself in the crosshairs of the Fox News moderators and his Republican rivals.
The Washington Post‘s Dan Balz wrote that Sens. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), two of Trump’s main rivals, had “failed to seize the Trumpless moment,” opening new space for struggling GOP rivals. Even Jim Geraghty of National Review, which devoted its last issue to attacking Trump, conceded that Trump had likely benefited from avoiding the “flip-flopping immigration bloodbath” that the GOP debate became in his absence.
The Cruz camp appears to have made a strategic miscalculation. By sticking with the debate, and accusing Trump of cowardice, Cruz hoped to place himself at the head of the anti-Trump opposition. Instead, however, he exposed himself to a gang-tackle by the moderators and the other candidates. Had he joined Trump in protest at Fox News’ behavior, he would have signaled that he and Trump were the prohibitive final two candidates in the GOP primary.
ZitatDonald Trump brilliantly diminishes Ted Cruz by putting him on full display - Forget about trying to graph, measure or quantify how sharp Donald Trump’s political instincts are, he’s just off the charts. However, his decision to spotlight Ted Cruz’s greatest weakness, “the personality of Cruz“, the “in-authenticity”, is beyond brilliant.
Such a keen instinct is simply immeasurable. Not only did Donald Trump win the seventh GOP debate by not showing up; and not only did Trump avoid the best laid ambush plans of the Fox News team; and not only did Donald Trump raise well over $6 million for American veterans; but by removing himself from the debate stage – Trump’s absence forced Ted Cruz out of the shadows and into the brightest possible sunlight.
Candidate Trump previously stated: “Ted Cruz is just a nasty person” – and by all accounts the pontificating arrogance and personality of Ted Cruz was not only captured by the broadcast, but for the first time Iowans who tuned-in saw first hand WHY Ted Cruz is the loneliest man in Washington DC.
Even the most rabid Cruz supporters on social media are hunkered down amid an absolutely shameful display of how arbitrary and condescending their candidate displayed himself. Only those pundits with similar personal characteristics will say it was not visible.
The videos over there do speak loud and clear. I would say the initial results are in - and Trump skipping the debate was the right move. The rest of the 7 candidates should have done the same.
So.......rather than the mantra of "Trump....if he can't handle Fox and Megan how's he gonna handle Putin" B.S.........instead its "If you bow to media tactics exposing weakness how are you gonna handle Putin."
So.......rather than the mantra of "Trump....if he can't handle Fox and Megan how's he gonna handle Putin" B.S.........instead its "If you bow to media tactics exposing weakness how are you gonna handle Putin."
"Fox News Is Straight Up Clowning Donald Trump Now"
It's pretty hard to read the FOX release and not come to that conclusion.
"We learned from a secret back channel that the Ayatolla and Putin both intend to treat Donald Trump unfairly when they meet with him if he becomes president – a nefarious source tells us that Trump has his own secret plan to replace the Cabinet with his Twitter followers to see if he should even go to those meetings,' a Fox spokesperson said."
I'm sure Donald Trump did not appreciate that flip attitude and so he immediately withdrew from the debate. He took with him the lucrative ad revenues that Fox would have benefited from had he attended and they negotiated in a respectful manner with him. Without Trump the ad price during the debates plummeted.
However, the mischaracterization of Trump, as is he was afraid of Meghan Kelly sadly persist.
There is a lesson for all though in how DT wins arguments. He uses his considerable ability to influence the outcome of an argument. He is not afraid to give himself that advantage. The warning signal certainly went out to Fox News and well beyond, that any heathen who hits the send button on a flip remark like that will pay a severe consequence and almost certainly get canned. The cost of that flippant clown remark was way too high for Fox or any network, to risk playing that game. So they'll treat Trump with more respect in the future.
There really is such a thing as a clown question....
******* The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil ... but by those who watch them and do nothing. -- Albert Einstein