GREENVILLE - A handful of little-known Republican presidential candidates touted their conservative credentials and vied for a brief shot at the US political spotlight on Thursday during the first debate of the 2012 White House campaign.
With the Republican Party’s most high-profile contenders skipping the event, the five participants used the nationally televised forum to slam President Barack Obama’s leadership and attack what they called his misguided policies on the economy, healthcare and foreign affairs.
“The issues that have come up while he’s been president, he’s gotten them wrong strategically every single time,” former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty, the lone top-tier candidate at the debate, said of Mr Obama’s foreign policy.
Along with Mr Pawlenty, the debate in the influential early-voting state of South Carolina featured four longshot contenders – US representative Ron Paul, former senator Rick Santorum, former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson and former pizza executive Herman Cain.
All five decried what they said was a growing government intrusiveness in private markets and private lives. They predicted Obama would be beaten in the 2012 election because of the weak economy and the growing budget deficit.
“The economy will be the big issue. My theory is people vote from their bellies,” Mr Paul said, calling it Mr Obama’s biggest vulnerability. “We are in big trouble, prices are going up.” Continued economic improvement will be critical to Mr Obama’s re-election hopes but his Republican opponent will face a difficult task beating an incumbent president who hopes to raise a record $1 billion (€695 million) for his campaign.
The absence of more high-profile candidates like Mitt Romney was a testament to the slow-starting and unsettled Republican race for the right to face Mr Obama. Most of the party’s big names have delayed a decision on entry.
Four potential Republican candidates who are scoring well in early opinion polls – Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Donald Trump and Newt Gingrich – have made no formal move to run.
The debate was overshadowed by Mr Obama’s trip on Thursday to the site of the September 11th, 2001, attacks in New York.
That visit came four days after US special forces killed al Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden in a watershed achievement for Obama. But several of the Republicans said information that led to bin Laden resulted from “enhanced interrogation techniques” criticised by Mr Obama.
The debate was an opportunity for Mr Pawlenty to showcase his fiscal and socially conservative views for a national audience, but he did not attack Mr Obama as strongly as his longshot rivals did.
The debate was marred by controversy over restrictions imposed by Fox News and the South Carolina Republican Party barring the media from taking photographs of the debate. Fox News also did not allow news agencies to distribute video of the event internationally. – (Reuters)