9:01 PM: And here we go. Any real way Romney can muff this at this point? I doubt. What’s different now is that I really wonder whether Gingrich, Perry, Santorum even have the oooomph left in them to make a real fight of it tonight.
9:04 PM: Mitt’s giving Newt that, “Dude, I’ve so smoked you look.” … Actually not a bad answer from Gingrich … The subtext is pretty clear here: Newt, what the F were you thinking?
9:07 PM: Pretty clear at this point that Fox has fallen into line on this one. Baier didn’t press Romney on the tax issue, which surprises me.
9:14 PM: Romney is amazingly cocky in this debate. Thing is though, why not? At this point there’s just no one up there who can really challenge him and in the national numbers the big move to Romney has started.
9:17 PM: I’m not sure I’ve seen something like this before. The whole subtext of the debate basically is challenging everybody to shut up and stop attacking Romney.
9:21 PM: Man, if only Santorum weren’t a hopeless candidate, this sort of good debating might actually make him a contender.
