Post-debate thoughts

Today was debate day! Donald Trump, because he is a whiny baby, refused to attend because Megyn Kelly might ask him hard questions (Seriously, why are Megyn Kelly and Chris Mathews the only competent moderators? They are scum.) So he took his ball and went... to Iowa where he held his own rally, with blackjack, and hookers, well okay without blackjack and I assume there were hookers, but they were there unofficially. 

I don't think he pulled it off, the event was uninspired and the presence of Huckabee and Santorum aren't exactly the kind of big draws that pump people up, Trump made his usual speech, modified a bit to be more on point with veteran's affairs and fewer mentions of how great he is, lots of bragging about how he raised six million dollars for various organizations, if, unlike last time these ones are legit, at least some good will come of it.

I don't know what viewership of the debate was yet, to my knowledge those numbers aren't available as I write this, but Trump was the most searched name throughout the whole ordeal, the problem is I suspect Trump is the most searched name regardless of whether or not there is a debate, so I don't think we can draw tons of conclusions from that. I assume Trump's event drew a lot of local coverage in Iowa, but my news feed is pretty light on talk about it.

As to the debate itself? Boring, without Trump the knives came out for Cruz, but none of the candidates had anything sharp enough to be really useful, tons of bickering about how conservative a true conservative should be, the usual talking points, and blah blah blah, man we have seen it all before, JEB! looked sharp from what I can discover, and Rand Paul actually had some attention paid to him since Trump wasn't there sucking the life from the room.

Will the local coverage be enough to put Trump over the top on Monday? We'll see, but my guess is no, it just wasn't enough of a spectacle, he made a big scene about dropping from the debate, then set up a (for him) low key and nuanced rally rather than a circus, and the people paid for the circus. My guess is we'll see Rubio, Kasich, or JEB! as the surprise victors of the Iowa caucus, with trump coming in a close second virtually tied with two or three others.

Disappointing, a strong victory by anyone in the caucus might force more people to drop out, if it remains a clusterfuck as I predict, most of the lower tier candidates will stick around and keep drawing out the death rattle of the Republican party.

Why is that disappointing again?