The Turkish Ambassador to the United States, Namik Tan, has issued a statement in response to Rick Perry’s suggestion at last night’s debate that Turkey’s government is run by “Islamic terrorists”.

Full statement after the jump … Read More

Mitt Romney says he won’t raise anyone’s taxes no matter what. But I’m starting to get the sense he might be raising his own taxes pretty quickly. Everybody noted in last night’s debate that Romney seemed to cross the threshold on the tax return release question. He didn’t promise he would but he said he “probably” would in April. To me, the key tell there was that he still didn’t commit.

But on the campaign trail this morning, he gave us, I think, a bit more sense of what’s up.

Here’s what Romney said this morning … Read More

A new crop of Ron Paul newsletters just surfaced.

It’s common knowledge that Republicans aren’t excited about their presidential candidates. But there’s now some evidence that lack of excitement may be sapping enthusiasm for the general election too.

And we’re back to round two of the payroll tax battle.

TPM’s Michael Lester truncated tonight’s (boisterous) GOP debate into 100 seconds for your viewing pleasure.

While you’re in video-watching mode, check out the crowd going absolutely wild as Newt laid into Juan Williams. Newt was throwing out red meat like Nero to the lions. It was quite something to behold.

I think Rick Perry just said that Turkey is now being run by “Islamic terrorists”.

Newt’s really on fire tonight. Really not sure that it’s going to matter much. But he’s back into that mode of serving up perfect red meat for the Republican primary electorate.

9:37 PM: I’m curious to see how Romney does when actually challenged on the US auto industry.

9:43 PM: “Time will tell.” “Probably what I’ll do.” Those were Romney’s key lines on taxes. You’ll see a lot of follow ups trying to get him to nail that down to a real commitment.

9:51 PM: Ron Paul: MLK is with me on the drug war and the wars abroad. So even with the newsletters that’s still 2 out of three and that ain’t bad.

9:54 PM: Newt is raucous and shameless as usual. But this is the kind of performance that helped him rocket to the top of the polls.

Running updates on every turn of tonight’s debate at TPMLiveWire.