CNBC scored their highest rated TV show of all time last night via email:
In a hard-hitting debate that changed the course of the Republican primary, CNBC’s Republican Presidential Debate averaged 14.0 million total viewers, 3.9 million adults 25-54 and 3.4 million adults 18-49, making it CNBC’s most-watched telecast in network history. CNBC delivered its most-watched night in network history in all key demos.
So CNBC was the big winner, financially speaking, but they were roundly criticized by most conservatives and the RNC for putting on a terrible show. They did manage to ask real tough questions and instead of answering them, CNBC was made out to be as liberal as Bernie Sanders.
There were few in depth discussion about policies other than candidates saying "I will cut taxes for the rich more than you will," moments, but the big winner and loser of the night was Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, with Ted Cruz being a winner as well.
Outside of being lifeless, Jeb's worse move of the night was attacking his Florida colleague for not showing up to vote in the Senate and actually asked him to resign his position in Congress.
Breaking news stories before a debate are usually early fodder for the proceeding and If Marco Rubio was counting on a softball question from the moderators, that was the one. He had plenty of time to prepare for it and after the Sun Sentinel came out attacking him for his Senate record, the right wing press had already researched how he should answer.
QUINTANILLA: So when the Sun-Sentinel says Rubio should resign, not rip us off, when they say Floridians sent you to Washington to do a job, when they say you act like you hate your job, do you?
RUBIO: Let me say, I read that editorial today with a great amusement. It's actually evidence of the bias that exists in the American media today.
RUBIO: Later that year, in 2004, John Kerry ran for president missing close to 60 to 70 percent of his votes. I don't recall the Sun -- in fact, the Sun-Sentinel endorsed him. In 2008, Barack Obama missed 60 or 70 percent of his votes, and the same newspaper endorsed him again. So this is another example of the double standard that exists in this country between the mainstream media and the conservative movement.
Rubio forgot to tell the audience that the Sun Sentinel had endorsed him in 2010, so I guess they weren't liberally biased at the time.
But Marco got the added bonus of a lame Jeb trying to score points off of it and he just looked outright silly doing it and was easily dispatched by Rubio.
RUBIO: No Jeb, I don't remember -- well, let me tell you. I don't remember you ever complaining about John McCain's vote record. The only reason why you're doing it now is because we're running for the same position, and someone has convinced you that attacking me is going to help you.
Ben Carson spoke in tongues, which is how his supporters like him so while the rest of the world saw an ill prepared man, who promotes snake oil products, his followers will swoon.
Trump was more laid back than usual except when he attacked John Kasich for being a managing general partner at Lehman Brothers when the financial collapse happened. He also lied when he was asked about Mark Zuckerberg and said
QUICK: Mr. Trump, let's stay on this issue of immigration. You have been very critical of Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook who has wanted to increase the number of these H1Bs.
TRUMP: I was not at all critical of him. I was not at all. In fact, frankly, he's complaining about the fact that we're losing some of the most talented people.
Carly Fiorina for some odd reason spoke for the most time of all the candidates at the debate, (Debate Clock) and would have been forgettable except that she lied about how many pages there are in the tax code and how many women lost ther jobs.
Rand Paul talked for the least amount of time and did nothing to help himself. Discussing the Fed when the economy has improved was a big waste of time.
Chris Christie was forceful indeed on the fact that he would knock the sh*t out of Hillary if he gets the chance and then he played his usual debate strategy of attacking the moderator's questions by complaining that "we're wasting time talking about CEO resumes and fantasy football when babies are starving." By lying about Social Security I guess he helped himself, but I doubt it will elevate him much.
The big moments of the night came when candidates like Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio turned every question they didn't like into an attack on the main stream media and every GOP pundit on TV, Twitter, print and radio just loved them for it so they were the consensus winner.
RUBIO: Let me say, I read that editorial today with a great amusement. It's actually evidence of the bias that exists in the American media today.
RUBIO: Later that year, in 2004, John Kerry ran for president missing close to 60 to 70 percent of his votes. I don't recall the Sun -- in fact, the Sun-Sentinel endorsed him. In 2008, Barack Obama missed 60 or 70 percent of his votes, and the same newspaper endorsed him again. So this is another example of the double standard that exists in this country between the mainstream media and the conservative movement.
QUINTANILLA: Senator Cruz. Congressional Republicans, Democrats and the White House are about to strike a compromise that would raise the debt limit, prevent a government shutdown and calm financial markets that fear of -- another Washington-created crisis is on the way.
Does your opposition to it show that you're not the kind of problem-solver American voters want?
CRUZ: You know, let me say something at the outset. The questions that have been asked so far in this debate illustrate why the American people don't trust the media.
(APPLAUSE) This is not a cage match. And, you look at the questions -- "Donald Trump, are you a comic-book villain?" "Ben Carson, can you do math?" "John Kasich, will you insult two people over here?" "Marco Rubio, why don't you resign?" "Jeb Bush, why have your numbers fallen?"
How about talking about the substantive issues the people care about?
CRUZ: The contrast with the Democratic debate, where every fawning question from the media was, "Which of you is more handsome and why?"
RUBIO: OK. I know the Democrats have the ultimate SuperPac. It's called the mainstream media who every single day...
... and I'll tell you why. Last week, Hillary Clinton went before a committee. She admitted she had sent e-mails to her family saying, "Hey, this attack at Benghazi was caused by Al Qaida-like elements." She spent over a week telling the families of those victims and the American people that it was because of a video. And yet the mainstream media is going around saying it was the greatest week in Hillary Clinton's campaign.
HUCKABEE: You know, I know to a lot of people in the media, this is just a great big game, and we're the players. And, we come out here, and we do our thing. And, sometimes we're held up in contempt by people who write columns, but, I guarantee you to every person on this stage there's something deep inside of us that would cause us to give up our livelihoods and step out on this stage and fight for the people of America.
Get this, Ann Coulter is defending the CNBC moderators from criticism.
GOP's media bashing is getting boring.CNBC Qs not measurably different from CNN or FNC. They're just imitating Trump https://t.co/SRRD6Bqw17
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) October 29, 2015