Of course, in the original version there were only seven dwarfs

Mercifully, the first Republican presidential debate has now ended. I never thought I’d yearn for the likes of presidential primaries to begin, but anything to winnow this field of ten, count 'em, ten middle-aged white guys in dark suits can’t happen quickly enough. (And, yeah, I’m a middle-aged white guy who owns a dark suit or two, myself.)

Arnold Schwarzenegger sat with Nancy Reagan in the audience. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’d like to see Arnold as president, but it’s a pity he couldn’t be up there with the other stiffs candidates.

Why they call these things debates is beyond me. Not only don’t the candidates square off against one another, they don’t even answer the questions, having learned to segue into canned comments no matter how far removed from the original topic.

As a couple of semi-personal asides, I’d never heard Ron Paul speak before and can’t say I found his public speaking skills very impressive. His understanding of the Constitution may not be up to snuff, either. I was away from the screen when it happened, but Reason's David Weigel blogged:

"Matthews asks everyone if they'd support an amendment to allow foreigners - i.e., Arnold - to run for president. Ron Paul says no, because 'I believe in original intent.' Matthews says - into the mic! - 'Oh, God.'"

I might have done the same as Matthews, frankly. Could Paul have possibly meant the Constitution should never be amended for any reason? If so, that's beyond dumb, and not only because the Founders obviously intended it to be amendable.

If not, then he should have made whatever his point was differently. However, and whatever the issue-by-issue libertarianism any of the other candidates might lay claim to, he stuck to his guns (whether he shot anything other than his foot is another matter) and stood out from the crowd insofar as he was given much air time in the first place.

Also, Weigel predicted among other things that Jim Gilmore would lose the debate and then at the end admitted that all of his “predictions fell flat, except, arguably for the Gilmore one.” Wrong. Gilmore won just by being there, as did the other media-starved candidates in this Republican free-for-all. Personally, I think Gilmore is really shooting for retiring John Warner’s Senate seat, though I'm sure he’d be quite happy if his presidential campaign really took off, too. Hey, that's how we got Carter and Clinton, after all.

Dumbest question of the night? (And asking the dumbest question is no small feat for Chris Matthews.) Whether it would be a good thing if Bill Clinton returned to the White House. Best thing about the event? It reminded American that no matter what else happens in 2008, come 2009 George W. Bush will no longer be president.