Republican Presidential Debate: Live Coverage

A few minutes ago Carly Fiorina mentioned “zero based budgeting.” What’s so interesting about that is that it was an idea last trumpeted by Democratic President Jimmy Carter. Indeed, the only time a poll mentioned “zero based budgeting” in the Roper Center Archive was in 2007. Back then, it was called a “Democratic proposal.”

Trump touted his role in limiting the debate to two hours. Moderator John Harwood: “Just for the record, the debate was always going to be two hours.” Whoever’s right, the debate has gone past two hours.

I think Christie’s been reasonably good tonight, and it’s not out of the question that he could gain a point or two in the polls. But that, too, might come at Jeb Bush’s expense, since they have similar policy positioning but Christie is a little more [sorry] high-energy than Jeb.