Before the prime time debate on Thursday night (Aug. 6, 2015) of the 10 contenders for the Republican Party’s 2016 presidential nomination, there was an earlier debate that afternoon of 7 contenders who didn’t make the primetime cut because they had polled at less than 10%.
Among them was Carly Fiorina, 60, businesswoman and former CEO of the high-tech company, Hewlett-Packard — the first woman to lead a top-20 U.S. company. The other 6 were Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, Bobby Jindal, Lindsey Graham, George Pataki, and Jim Gilmore.
The buzz on social media as well as “talking heads” media analysts is that Fiorina clearly won that debate.
Here are the highlights of Fiorina in the debate:
1. Fiorina took on Hillary, describing the latter with 4 words, “Not trustworthy. No Accomplishments,” and calling her a liar, which Hillary is:
“Hillary Clinton lies about Benghazi, she lies about e-mails. She is still defending Planned Parenthood. And she is still her party’s frontrunner. We need a nominee who is going to throw every punch, not pull punches, and someone who cannot stumble before he even gets into the ring.”
2. On foreign policy, Fiorina slammed Obama’s Iran deal, saying he “broke every rule of negotiation.” Fiorina said she would make two calls in her first day in the Oval Office:
“The first one to my good friend Bibi Netanyahu to reassure him we will stand with Israel. The second phone call to the president of Iran. He might not take my phone call, but he will get the message. And the message is this: Until you open every nuclear and every military facility to full, open, anytime, anywhere for real inspections, we are going to make it as difficult as possible for you to move money around the global financial system.”
3. On Donald Trump, who reportedly had received a phone call from Bill Clinton shortly before Trump announced his run for the White House [just think for a moment what this means. See “Trump threatens third-party run. Stalking horse for Hillary?”], Fiorina said:
“I didn’t get a phone call from Bill Clinton before I jumped in the race. Did any of you get a phone call from Bill Clinton? I didn’t. Maybe it’s because I hadn’t given money to the foundation or donated to his wife’s senate campaign.”
Here’s a video of the entire debate:
Carly Fiorina is considered to be a Moderate Conservative (On The Issues):
Click here for explanation of political philosophy.
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Fiorina’s political positions (On The Issues):
- Pro-life: opposes legal abortion except in cases of rape, incest, and maternal endangerment; opposes federal funding of abortion and Planned Parenthood.
- Government: favors tax cuts, lesser government, fewer regulations, zero-based budgeting, limit federal salaries, abolish earmarks; post federal budget on Internet for public comment.
- Economy: opposes every new tax and tax increase; favors tax cuts and cuts on waste and spending; favors small business, against crony capitalism; favors changing rules on outsourcing.
- Environment: favors weakening the EPA; is skeptical about man-made “climate change” (Wikipedia).
- Gun rights: opposes assault-weapon ban; rated AQ by the NRA, indicating a pro-gun rights voting record.
- Health care: repeal Obamacare; opposes any federal government healthcare takeover; favors more competition in medical insurance (instead of Obama’s crony capitalism), malpractice reform.
- Illegal immigration: opposes amnesty and government funding of “sanctuary cities”; supports a path to citizenship for children of illegals, if they graduate from college or serve in the armed forces.
- Foreign affairs: impose crippling sanctions on Iran; 2-state solution, but with Jerusalem as undivided capital of Israel; no time-table for troop withdrawal from Afghanistan; keep Gitmo.
- Homosexuals: opposes same-sex marriage, favors civil union; opposes banning homosexuals from military.
~Éowyn
