That GOP debate was a debacle

Ironically for a network accused of right-wing bias, Fox may have done the Republican Party a monumental disservice. In the midst of one of the Obama administration’s greatest achievements—the killing of Osama bin Laden—the network made the Republican presidential primary look like a low-budget Star Trek convention, where only the guy who played Dr. McCoy and a bunch of extras bothered to show up. And the network’s overuse of a loud, annoying Price Is Right bell to cut candidates off in mid-sentence only added to the aura that this affair was a tawdry game show waiting for someone to mercifully hit a gong…

Narrowly losing to Fox News for worst idea of the night was the attendance of actual legitimate contender—until tonight, at least—Tim Pawlenty. If I’d been there to watch the governor walk onto the stage, I would have screamed at him, Admiral Ackbar-style: “It’s a trap!” Undoubtedly his advisers thought the Minnesota governor would look like a president standing next to all these . . . I’m running out of synonyms for also-rans. He didn’t. His advisers also must have told Pawlenty to move his hands frequently, as if to give off a sense that he is actually animated. What does it say about our would-be presidential nominee when he couldn’t really outshine Gary Johnson (Who?)?