The Highlight Of The Third Republican Debate

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​The Highlight Of The Third Republican Debate

     In truth, I found the other night's Republican Presidential debate a pretty depressing affair, the general theme being all the wars we are involved and, if one of the candidates is elected, all the war-making we can potentially expect to be involved in: war in Gaza, war in Ukraine, bombing of Syria, getting tough with Iran, getting rough with China, building up a monster fleet of naval destroyers to send into the Taiwan Straight for a war there...and, of course, Republicans being anti-tax warriors as well, no mention of how We the People are supposed to pay for all that heavy duty death and destruction. 
             Fortunately, though, things lightened up when the hostilities moved to the battleground of the stage and the fighting words began to fly among the candidates.               Seemed Nikki Haley was the target of the most memorable word-grenades,

...tossed at her by He of the Insufferably Endless Verbiage, Vivek "Motormouth" Ramaswamy.

     But, oh, could the quick-witted former U.N. Ambassador lob 'em right back, and to her own advantage.
​    When Ramaswamy called Haley "Dick Cheney in three-inch heels" - frankly, I wasn't sure what he even meant by that, as is the case with so much of the bafflegab  that rushes out of his mouth - she shot back that she wore five-inch heels, and not as a fashion statement but for ammunition. 
      I dearly loved that quip, but not nearly as much as the Haley-on-Ramaswamy smack down that followed when the subject turned to the banning of TikTok, a policy  the Republican candidates generally voiced favor for.
     When asked by the moderator how he'd ban TikTok since he used it, known TikToker Vivek Ramaswamy tried to whiff the question by again turning his sites on  Nikki Haley. He quite self-righteously proclaimed that Haley's daughter also used TikTok  and told Haley to take care of her own family first. 
     For Mama Bear Haley these were serious fighting words indeed, and she responded by going nuclear on Ramaswamy.
           Fire in her eyes, voice, and body language, Nikki Haley told Vivek Ramaswamy, in no uncertain terms, to "Leave my daughter out of your voice."

      Now, this language was to me reminiscent of Will Smith's infamous slapping of   Chris Rock at the Oscars, 

...after which Smith yelled at Rock to “Keep my wife’s name out your f***ing mouth,”

         Nikki Haley did, thankfully (though I'm not sure how) resist the urge to march  across the stage and give Vivek Ramaswamy a good Will Smith-style slap, though she did let him have it verbally,

...after which she looked out into the audience and, while Vivek kept yammering on,  shook her head as if to say, do you even believe this  #%*! ?

     These were for sure some prime bits, but the absolute highlight of the whole show was the now famous moment when Haley glanced back at Ramaswamy - barely glanced, that is, as if she couldn't be bothered to look at him - and said, "You're just scum."
       It wasn't just that she said it, but how she said it. And her expression.

      And for this former top American diplomat, whose job required the ability to read people like a book and to carefully deal with the most powerful leaders on the planet with the utmost craft, delicacy, and savoir-faire, to just cock her head back at the still yakkity-yakking Vivek  Ramaswamy and toss off, "You're just scum," dropping all finesse out the window and just calling the guy like she saw him...it was right down hilarious.
       And how much funnier was the whole TikTok sequence after the debate was over and we saw that the daughter that Nikki Haley was, in Vivek Ramaswamy's estimation, being too permissive with in her social media use, was not a tender, impressionable  tween, but a 25-year-old married woman.

        Thank goodness for the comic relief.