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CNN/YouTube Republican Debate Firsts

An empty stage set for empty shirts.

“Enough of the singing, enough of snowmen, let’s begin the debate.”
-Anderson Cooper

Live blogging of these Republican debate firsts was as entertaining as a Republican debate drinking game. Two hours of wasted time yielded the following snippets of silliness.

Check out ‘firsts’ from previous debates here. CNN coverage of this debate here.

Whoa! It’s about to start… here we go!

CNN/YouTube GOP Debate Firsts

First to wear a shiny purple: Moderator Anderson Cooper
First to sound like he just sucked on a helium balloon: Head of the Florida GOP (didn’t get his name)
First candidate on the stage: Rep. Duncan Hunter
First to give Florida Gov. Charlie Crist a hug: Sen. John McCain
First to wear the same tie a funeral director would wear: Rep. Tom Tancredo (black with subtle white stripes)
First to receive a question: Former mayor Rudy Giuliani
First to say Romney had a ’sanctuary mansion’ (where he employed illegal immigrants): Giuliani
First to be booed: Giuliani

Romney & Giuliani quickly proceeded to display their ignorance.

First to call America “our home”: Former Sen. Fred Thompson
First to say he was sad: McCain
First to say the government handling of Katrina & Iraq were failures: McCain
First to say “God’s children”:McCain
First to wear a cowboy hat and an American flag tie: Michael Whites (audience member who also had YouTube question)
First to say ‘out Tancredo, Tancredo’ (on illegal immigration): Rep. Tom Tancredo
First topic to give the GOP candidates orgasms on stage: The southern border fence
First to call another candidate a liberal: Former Gov. Mitt Romney to former Gov. Mike Huckabee
First to say our national soverignty is under threat: Rep. Ron Paul
First to say “bogus”: McCain
First to bring up President Ronald Reagan: McCain (somebody had to do it)
First to bring up Reagan after McCain: Giuliani (not to be outdone!)
First government program Fred Thompson would cut money for: Medicare/Medicaid
First to say Washington didn’t change him: Paul
First to say the Department of Homeland security is the biggest bureaucracy the U.S. has ever had: Paul
First cartoon to ask a question: Uncle Sam
First to call Paul’s stance on Iraq “isolationism”: McCain
First to bring up Hitler in a rebuke of Paul: McCain

First to say McCain doesn’t understand the difference between non-intervention and isolation: Paul

8:44 EST

First campaign-style video shown: Tancredo
First to say “Buy American”: Hunter
First to use his campaign video specifically as an attack ad: Thompson
First campaign video to make moderator Anderson Cooper say, “What’s up with that?”: Thompson
First Democrat to be shown on video: Sen. Hillary Clinton

Presidential candidate Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton

First to say he got his hunting license at the age of ten: Hunter
First to dress down a video questioner for his mishandling of a firearm: Hunter
First to get booed for stating that there should be “reasonable regulations” for owning a firearm: Giuliani
First to say “I own a couple of guns but I’m not going to tell you what they are or where they are”: Thompson
First to mention his son: Romney
First to say the best thing you can do for a kid is to have a mom and a dad: Romney
First to say “family values”: Romney (somebody had to say it)
First to say the last thing we need is federal abortion police: Paul
First to say he would not sign a federal ban on abortion: Giuliani
First to say the toughest decision he ever had to make was to allow the death penalty in his state: Huckabee
First to say Jesus was too smart to ever run for public office: Huckabee
First to say he would pray to Jesus for answers: Tancredo
First to say the Bible is the greatest book ever written: Giuliani
First to say he doesn’t believe that Jonah was actually in the whale: Giuliani
First to say his theology degree isn’t enough to help him comprehend all of the Bible: Huckabee

9:21

First candidate’s video to include King Kong: Giuliani

First to say we purposefully want to offend Islamic terrorists: Giuliani
First to say we’re winning the war in Iraq: McCain (typical)
First to say a date to withdraw from Iraq is a date to surrender: McCain
First to stutter: Romney (on a question of waterboarding)
First to say that waterboarding is torture: McCain
First clothing company logo to be displayed in a YouTube video question: Old Navy
First to say “victory”: Thompson
First to say the best thing we can do for the Iraqi people is to give them their country back: Paul
First to mention the Sicilian mafia: Giuliani
First to get an audience chuckle for self-deprecation: Thompson

9:48

First to say he won’t accept gays in the military during war time: Romney (Open question: When isn’t it war time?)
First to say he’d accept the support of Log Cabin Republicans: Huckabee
First president to be shown on a YouTube video: President John F. Kennedy
First to say that the decision to go to Mars isn’t one he’d like to make: Huckabee
First to suggest Sen. Hillary Clinton should be on the first rocket to the planet Mars: Huckabee

Planet Mars

First to say revoking welfare will help African-Americans: Giuliani
First to say “Stars and Bars”: Moderator Anderson Cooper
First to say he wouldn’t display the Confederate flag: Romney
First to say a line item veto is unconstitutional: Giuliani
First to (indirectly) suggest the New York Yankees won because he was mayor: Giuliani
First to say the word “hate” in the last sentence of the debate: Romney

End debate.

Now, as Anderson Cooper put it, the “smoke has cleared” from the debate, the important question still lingers: How did the Republicans’ answers leave us feeling?

As barren as the Red Planet itself.

Surface of Mars