Republican debate reactions, captured in GIFs

It’s a big night for the 16 remaining GOP presidential candidates at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California.

Moderator: Jake Tapper, with Dana Bash and Hugh Hewitt as panelists. Given a choice, I would rather attend a wedding at the Nixon Library than observe a Republican debate at Reagan’s ostentatious venue. So how Reaganesque exactly are these Republicans? Whereas there were signs galore to find the Reagan Library, we had to search to find Nixon’s. Likely absent will be parts of Reagan’s record that clash with conservative ideology.

To be successful, a presidential candidate must play the long game. But he got it exactly right when he set his top priority.

“The more you knew Ronald Reagan, the less you want to speak for him“. Or a liberal peacenik who could moonlight as a Democrat? I lost track of how many times the former president was mentioned, which was more than I could count.

Republican presidential candidates, from left, former Pennsylvania…

This debate might be seen as do-or-die for the former governor to reassure skittish supporters – since July, he has dropped from first place to fifth in New Hampshire – except that he raised $130 million through June for his campaign and super PAC.

Americans, at the beginning of Reagan’s presidency, were in deep psychological depression.

“The other candidates now take weeks to figure out how to respond”. He spoke of giving voters “a cause to believe in… raising a banner of no pale pastels, but bold colours”. Reagan’s rule, Jindal said, doesn’t apply to Trump. He did that which is now unforgivable in the GOP, a transgression beyond redemption: he compromised.

Bush flashed a clear knowledge of the issues, and his lack of smoothness as a speaker.

“I think women all over this country heard very clearly what Mr Trump said“, Fiorina said simply, winning the first ovation of the night from the live audience.

Standing in front of Reagan’s Air Force One, the candidates paid homage to The Gipper. Rand Paul and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina. “It was a big deal because he was the grassroots, running against the establishment”. Billionaire reality TV star Donald Trump again showed his superficial stripes at his too-frequent turns, but he was never more ridiculous than when asserting – all evidence to the contrary – that there’s some link between vaccines and autism. Lindsey Graham.

Also-Rans:Huckabee, Cruz, Christie, and Paul moved little – all had probabilities of less than 5 percent before the debate and stayed roughly where they were. The greatest barrier to stronger growth and more jobs is our tax code, all 72,000 pages of it. What we need is a clean, simple, honest system with lower rates that will stimulate growth for businesses, workers and families.

Spencer acknowledged that the candidates who talked about Reagan at the debate did so as tribute to the former president and that was appropriate.

Since Reagan was working with a Democratic-controlled Congress, his principles were sometimes compromised by his pragmatic belief that getting something was better than getting nothing. Watch a fully formed fetus on the table, its heart beating, its legs kicking, while someone says we have to keep it alive to harvest its brain.

RR: That was about the comparisons between Donald Trump and my father. (October 21 1984).

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Costa Mesa, also was a Reagan speechwriter. Appropriating Reagan for her own campaign, however, would be an audacious heist.

“Unlike the [Democratic National Committee], the RNC has staff and volunteers listening to the concerns of Filipinos and encouraging them to get involved with the Republican Leadership Initiative in an effort to take back the White House in 2016”, he added. He may well have enjoyed the spectacle given that he compared politics to show business.