Republican Presidential Debate: Live Coverage

Medicare turned 50 this year, and the program has been pretty darn popular throughout its life — it’s hard to see what candidates win by speaking out against it. Even Ben Carson, who for several years has talked about cutting Medicaid and Medicare, recently changed his tune. The most recent iteration of his plan doesn’t lose those programs, but would give people health savings accounts of $2,000 a year per person. Carson says this will be so much better than Medicaid and Medicare that people will voluntarily leave those programs. As The New York Times explained yesterday, the proposal is incredibly confusing and could easily cost more than existing programs.

Fiorina is getting plenty of speaking time this debate. Seems like she’s OK to me.

I think she’s been fine. But the rest of the field has been sharper as a group. (And her first win was in the JV debate, which is like beating up on the Columbia Lions.) Perhaps also there’s the feeling in the room (and more to the point, among the media) that debates are Fiorina’s only real trick, and she doesn’t have the campaign apparatus to sustain any momentum she gets out of them.