8:23 PM: It’s so funny how everyone up on that stage — and everybody watching — is waiting in pained silence, waiting for Perry to forget where he is. There was this moment when the camera focused on Mitt and he had this look of pity combined with latent joy and just ‘I can’t watch this.’ And yet, Perry did it. It’s like everyone wants to run up and give him a high-five. Or maybe that’s just me.
8:26 PM: Bachmann: “World wide nuclear war against Israel.” Not sure why it would need to be world wide. Seems like a pretty regional thing regardless.
8:27 PM: I think Newt just directly accused the Pakistani government of hiding bin Laden.
8:28 PM: I don’t agree with much that Rick Santorum believes in foreign policy, though his answer on Pakistan was pretty reasonable. Yet it’s clear that he’s one of the few guys up there who thought about any of these issues before he realized that he’d have to answer questions about them in a foreign policy debate.
7:59 PM: South Carolina politics is a richly interesting combination of fierce injunctions to biblical fundamentalism and coverage of which elected official is copulating with what other big wig or potentate in the back seat of what car. And then there’s which politician is gay. There’s also the episodic embrace of treason and efforts to break up the union. Together, it’s a lot.
8:05 PM: Feel like the pressures of multiple simultaneous sex scandals has gotten Herman Cain to expand his policy agenda beyond 999. Also, he seems to have ruled out military action.
8:07 PM: Meta-win. Mitt stands down Scott Pelley as a meta-signal that he can stand down Iran.
8:10 PM: Newt is insisting that Obama should be doing all the things he’s already doing against Iran — covert disruption, offing scientists, working in concert with Israel, etc.
8:12 PM: He did it! Perry gets through a completely coherent, non-stuttering answer. I can hear his consultants cheering up here in New York … Actually Eric Kleefeld points out that Perry only really crashes in the second half.
8:18 PM: Quite apart from his policy prescription, Jon Huntsman just sounds so much more rational and forward-looking, serious about thinking about the country’s real challenges in the coming decades than anyone else up there.
We’re gearing up for tonight’s GOP foreign policy debate, sponsored by CBSNews and National Journal. This will be a particular interesting encounter since foreign policy has played a surprisingly smal role in this year’s GOP primary fight. Unlike on domestic policy where they all have slightly different flavors of the same policies, on foreign policy they have some genuinely differing positions. And in some cases candidates have no foreign policy at all.
Join us in 10.