[Written by Fred Wickham, reposted from Bullseye Rooster]
My debate plan.
I can share this because I know no Republican candidates, nor their staffs, will be reading my blog. I have made it unavailable to them. Here’s the plan — and the debate’s sponsors have taken me up on it. So be ready for fireworks this Tuesday night.
A questioner — from Bloomberg, Washington Post, or WBIN-TV — will say to the candidates, “I have two important documents with me. One of them will be your guide to governing this country. You may only choose one. No hedging will be allowed.” Then the questioner will produce the U.S. Constitution and the Bible.
Right down the row: Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Romney, Huntsman, Gingrich and whoever else is still in the running. Will they all leave the stage in a huff? We’ll find out. I’m hoping the questioner has the guts to stop any attempted spin. “Choose one or the other, Governor!”
The sponsors haven’t gotten back to me on this yet, but I’m sure they’re going to call me tomorrow and say it’s a go.
15 Comments
Brilliant. Please do this. The problem will be, people in the audience will no doubt cheer if Perry or Bachmann chooses the bible.
Cold day in hell they do this
I agree with Duckman. The bouncers wouldn’t let any one in with a copy of the Constitution.
Prediction: Gingrich will start babbling about gotcha questions and the rest of the candidates will put on their best serial killer smiles.
Here’s my question for them…
“How many of you believe that God Himself has chosen you for this position”?
If they answer YES, they expose themselves to us as the loons that they are.
If they answer NO (while truly believing that they have been called) then they are denying Gods calling.
Quite the dilemma.
(would have been even more interesting if SP were running)
A brilliant idea, but sadly, I think Republican voters would be happy with either choice. What gets me are the staunch conservatives that preach about their religion, and yet their political actions are in direct conflict with the central message (i.e. charity and love) of said religion.
Sasha, I quite agree with you. The great ideas of the “Progressive” movement in the nineteenth century are firmly based on the Sermon on the Mount — not that you could tell that from the bible-spouting right wing-nuts!
Unfortunately there are so many ways a smart* politician could get out of that one. Mostly by simply refusing the conditions and secondly by lying.
“This is a Gotcha Question (ca-ching – royalty to S Palin) and I refuse to answer it”
“The Constitution is the foundational Law of the Country, its writers were guided by the Bible, as I would be”
“Nothing in the Bible could contradict the divinely inspired Constitution”
“The Constitution is the practical application of the Bible”
* I know ‘smart’ would seem to rule out the GOP field, but I’m using it metaphorically
Hilarious!!!! ‘>D
What? Sharia law isn’t an option? 😉
Picking the Constitution would be a lie, the Republican Party has been trying to undermine it for years. “Citizens” Patriot Act, Abortion, etc.
Maybe there could have been three choices: the Constitution, the Old Testament and the New Testament.
Hey Jim, I think you left out the Book of Mormon. ‘>D
The actions of the Faux News parrots and extreme wing nuts demonstrates why the country is in trouble and why the partisan machines are the problem, not the solution. America is made up of many different ideologies and interest groups. There is rarely an overwhelming majority in favor of anything. This means to make progress there has to be rational debate, bipartisan negotiation, and compromise – because without them, there can be no action.
Instead of action, we see the wing nuts spout complete fiction, refuse to provide factual sources, refuse to be bipartisan, refuse to negotiate and refuse to compromise. They insult and attack anyone that is making a factual statement that disagrees with them. They ridicule the truth rather than respond to it, because responding to it would require facts that support them (that usually do not exist) and making their own real agenda known which they cannot afford to do without losing their influence). The demonize anyone they don’t like, even when that person AGREES with the point they are making.
What we need is more rational, fact based debate, more bipartisan negotiation and more compromise. Now all the American People need to do is figure out how to marginalize the extremists so they don’t have influence, because we can’t stop them from being extremists.
You can lead a man to knowledge, but you can’t make him think.
We’ve always had extremists. The problem now is that the press has given up their job of actually reporting, you know, news, and only care about how many eyeballs they can beg, borrow or steal (I’m ignoring media outlets that have a bought-and-paid-for agenda, because we’ve always had those as well). Reporting on raving loonies attracts eyeballs, so the American people have to change and stop paying attention to news as entertainment. Good luck! Or we need tighter regulations on what qualifies as “news”.