Childish egomaniacs in a figurative food fight

In the most juvenile display thus far in the presidential primary season, the remaining GOP candidates for the nomination sparred for recognition in a cluster of taunts, guffaws, accusations, and venomous strikes upon the character of the fellow competitors for the crown.

Lost in the melee was substantial dialogue about the fierce issues that will be facing our next president. Instead we had Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz attack the tiresome windbag real estate businessman Donald Trump. CNN moderator Wolf Blitzer did little to control this middle school lunch period free-for-all. Thus, he permitted Rubio and Cruz to rain on the Donald with a constant drizzle of dribble about the inconsequential. Trump responded in kind with the maturity of a 13-year-old that had just been called a bad name.

Two diehard, invisible candidates – idiosyncratic surgeon Ben Carson and Ohio Gov. John Kasich – struggled to even be acknowledged in this forum gone wild. The constant bickering demeaned the position that they aspire to hold, reduced the dignity of the political party they belong to, and further evoked questions on whether any of them should be anywhere near the Oval Office.

Besides the base nature of their childlike admonishments of their fellow candidates, the assertions of indictment against their competitors were either somewhat accurate or overly embellished, although they were sometimes revelatory, especially in regard to Mr. Trump’s truthfulness or lack thereof. Moreover, the participants damned themselves by their lack of dignity and their juvenile manner of expression.

From the very start of the GOP debate at the University of Houston in Texas last Thursday, one could easily discern that both Cruz and Rubio had colluded to form a strategy of mutual attack on the frontrunner Trump. Previously, for the most part, Trump’s competitors had not fired muck at Trump for fear of personal reprisals from Trump himself and a sense of caution concerning blowback in their poll numbers. For some unexplained reason, the bedeviling Trump flourishes when attacked or questioned, no matter how outlandish his retorts have been.

Former Republican Florida Gov. Jeb Bush attempted to tarnish Trump. By doing so, he did not augment his poll numbers but contrarily sent his campaign into a death spiral that he did not recover from.

Hence, Rubio and Cruz (his closest competitors) were wary about going on the offensive. However, since the Super Tuesday and SEC primaries are not far away, the time to stare into the muzzle of the howitzer that is Donald Trump’s seldom-closing mouth is here. Whether these new tactics will backfire and result in Trump’s GOP canonization is a question still unanswerable at this juncture.

Of the many accusations Rubio asserted was the obvious question about Trump’s true political ideology. Up until 2004, Trump had been a Democrat all his life and had contributed to a great many donkey party candidates. More specifically, as was pointed out by the Rubio/Cruz tag-team at different times in the debate, Trump has contributed to former President Bill Clinton, former New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, former Massachusettes senator and current Secretary of State John Kerry, New York Sen. Charles Schumer, and Nevada Sen. Harry Reid.

Also, he had been up until two years ago a strong, wholehearted supporter of Planned Parenthood. Last summer, Trump modified his position to say the organization is responsible for “some things properly done and good and that are good for women,” whatever that truly means. Then in September 2015, he hardened his stance and said, “I would be totally opposed to funding.”

So Cruz’s contention that Trump “supports taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood” may or not be true depending where Trump actually stands on the issue.

The harping senators continued to challenge Trump’s assumption that he owes nothing to anyone because his campaign is self-funded. In actuality, Trump has spent $13 million thus far of his own money but has also collected $6.5 million in contributions through his website. When asked about this discrepancy, Trump called them “little contributions sent in by people who love us, which we take, which, frankly it is more expensive to send them back.” Really?

Rubio attacked Trump’s unrealistic assertions about the immigration problem. Trump, when comparing our northern and southern borders, stated that our border with Canada was five times the size as our border with Mexico. He has made this erroneous statement before. Truly, the Canadian border is less than three times greater in size than our southern border. Of course, it should be said that Canadians are not making perilous midnight runs to illegally enter the United States. There is no network trafficking illegal immigrants from Montreal.

Furthermore, Trump’s idea of a 2,000-mile wall that would be forcibly paid for by Mexico was also challenged as unfeasible.

Along the same line, Rubio questioned Trump’s liberal use of the term self-deportation. In regard to Trump’s criticism of former candidate Mitt Romney’s use of the term, Trump said in 2012, Romney “had a crazy policy of self-deportation which was maniacal.” On the contrary, in 2015, he said, “I said it was crazy because it would not work.” When further pressed to explain the term by Rubio, Trump stated that self-deportation means illegal immigrants start to leave, and others witness this and start to follow in droves. Huh?

Rubio also raised Trump’s ire as we have not seen before when he challenged Trump on a 1980s lawsuit in which Trump was the defendant. In the demolition phase of a Trump project regarding the old Bonwit Teller building, to save construction dollars Trump hired 200 illegal Polish workers at $4 an hour for 12-hour shifts in dangerous conditions. He ended up settling the class-action suit under non-disclosure terms. For the loud self-proclaimed champion against illegal immigrants and the employers who employ them, Rubio struck a nerve and uncovered a glaring example of Trump’s hypocritical assertions.

When Cruz took issue with Trump’s change in position regarding Lybia, the Donald became caustic. In the debate, Trump said he “never advocated” for the Untied States to topple Lybia’s Muammer Gaddafi. Although, in 2011, Trump stated: “We should go in, we should stop this guy, which would be very easy and very quick.”

Cruz would not relent. He brought forward Trump’s kind and complimentary comments about likely Democrat nominee Hillary Clinton, who was at the time secretary of state. Trump called her a “terrific woman” and “she really works hard and I think she does a good job.” That statement was made in 2012. Currently, Trump condemns Clinton and her lack of foreign policy prowess. Furthermore, the Clintons were well involved socially with the Trumps, and Trump was a strong advocate of Clinton when she was a New York senator.

Besides these factual discrepancies that were brought to light about the frontrunner, the forum devolved into a middle-school figurative food fight.

Then the debate further devolved into the three main contenders calling each other names, questioning each other’s personal hygiene, Rubio calling Trump a con-man, Trump calling him sweaty and a “choker.” Trump then attacked Cruz as a liar and a fool and asserted that nobody liked him and no other senator endorsed him. Simply, the words hurled around were akin to those one might hear from petulant middle-school children, not three men who want to lead a nation.

Poor and strange Carson begged someone to start a fight with him so he could get some attention, while Kasich, the only grownup on the stage, was the focus of the camera for only five minutes. He actually gave a concise and intelligent answer about governing. Then it was back to the figurative food fight.

This shameful display was an insult to every Republican, and for that matter every American. Our country is in real trouble both domestically and internationally. We need serious people with real dedication and real administrative skill sets to attempt to address the nation’s concerns. What we do not need are childish egomaniacs who are more concerned with prevailing in a name-calling match than running the country!