Post your comments! Opinions! What did you think of the debate? Some of us thought it was a snooze. You?

Boca Raton,FL-

‘Youv’e got 5 exceptional sons, I know you are very proud of,” Huckabee said.”  You said you want them to inherit a great country. I have a solution that I think will work. If the country will elect me president,they will inherit a great country, and your boys will still get your money too. I think that will be a great answer. I want to offer a solution for that, for inheritance.(laughter)”

During the section of tonight’s debate where the candidates got to ask each other questions, Rudy attempted to distinguish himself with his support for the National Catastrophe Fund by asking Romney (who has been equivocal) and McCain (who opposes it) if they support the fund. Romney and McCain both directly avoided saying no and Giuliani probably hopes Floridians can read between the lines, but it still didn’t really hit home since Rudy didn’t have a chance to follow up. Neither did the moderators.

1. Romney said he supported the fund but organized at a regional level. (Still equivocal but he definitely took some buzz out the question by initially saying “yes.”)

2. McCain avoided a no answer by saying he would work with the states to develop a similar insurance bailout and priced the Cat Fund at $200 billion “with no way to pay for it” making him sound fiscally conservative.

While addressing a crowd of 200 people in Bennettsville, South Carolina, John Edwards criticized Hillary Clinton for choosing to leave the state in the days before the January 26th primary.

Clinton left South Carolina after participating in Monday night’s Democratic presidential debate in Myrtle Beach to campaign in states scheduled to hold contests on February 5th.

“Right after the debate, she flew out and she’s been gone and she won’t be back until I don’t’ know—later in the week or until primary day,” Edwards said. “And the question is, if she’s not going to spend time here the week before the South Carolina primary, what do you think the chances are she’s coming back after the primary? And what are the chances she’s coming back when she’s president of the United States?”

In his criticism of Clinton’s absence, Edwards sought to depict her as a politician not genuinely committed to the needs of those living in rural South Carolina. He also characterized the rural South as “forgotten America,” emphasizing his Southern upbringing to persuade voters that he identifies with and understands their economic hardships.

“We need a president of the United States who actually understands your life. It’s one thing to fly into South Carolina from some place else, give a speech, go to a debate and then fly back out,” he said. “It is a very different thing to have lived here, to have grown up in this part of the country and to understand in a personal way what’s happening in your lives. I do.”

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On the heels of Monday night’s Democratic presidential debate, John Edwards launched a new television ad on Tuesday to run in South Carolina, challenging his Democratic opponents on accepting lobbyist money—an issue that has become the touchstone of the former North Carolina senator’s grassroots campaign.

The 30-second ad, titled “What Happened,” begins with side-by-side images of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on the screen. The announcer says: “One gets more money than anyone from drug companies. The other one takes more money than anyone from Washington lobbyists. What’s happened to the Democratic Party?”

As the pictures changes to images of Edwards speaking before large crowds and mingling with supporters, the narrator continues: “The only one who’s never taken a dime from PACs or Washington lobbyists, who knows we’ve been ignored too long, who knows that rebuilding the middle class is more important than politics—our John Edwards. The only one.”

Edwards has centered his campaign on the principle of “taking back America.” He reasons that one cannot reduce the power of lobbyists who control Washington if he or she is accepting their money. While campaigning in Iowa in December, Edwards announced he would ban all corporate lobbyists and individuals who have lobbied for foreign governments from working in his administration, if elected.

In an attempt to make a comeback in a state he won during the 2004 primary election, Edwards will embark on a two-day “Back Roads, Back Home Barnstorm” of South Carolina on Wednesday, targeting small towns and rural communities in the hopes that his populist message will resonate among rural voters. During Monday night’s debate, Edwards argued that he is the only Democratic candidate who can “go everywhere and compete head-to-head” with the Republican nominee, including in places like the rural South—a demographic, he said, the Democrats cannot afford to lose in the general election.

“We can’t concede places like South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, Missouri,” Edwards said.

“We always do well in Chicago, or New York, or Los Angeles, Seattle. We do well in the big urban areas. The question is: Are we competitive in the rural areas, in the tougher places for Democrats to compete?”

On the eve of Martin Luther King Day—just moments before the start of the Democratic presidential debate in South Carolina—John Edwards’ campaign released a letter sent by King’s son, Martin Luther King III, to the former North Carolina senator, praising him for his commitment to end poverty and injustice and calling for all candidates to emulate his initiative.

“I want to challenge all candidates to follow your lead, and speak up loudly and forcefully on the issue of economic justice in America,” King wrote. “My dad was a fighter…Keep fighting. My father would be proud.”

Edwards and King held a private meeting at the King Center in Atlanta on Saturday, and though details of that encounter were not disclosed to the press, the two men discussed Dr. King’s legacy and their “shared commitment to fighting poverty,” according to Mark Kornblau, a spokesman for Edwards’ campaign.

In his letter, King addressed the aims of Edwards’ campaign mission: “I appreciate that on the major issues of health care, the environment, and the economy, you have framed the issues for what they are - a struggle for justice. And, you have almost single-handedly made poverty an issue in this election.”

The letter could not have come at a more opportune time for Edwards, who was asked at the end of Monday night’s debate, “If Dr. Martin Luther King were alive today…why do you think he would or why should he endorse you?”

Without hesitation, Edwards said he has focused his cause on the “two biggest issues that Dr. King stood for, which are the issues of equality and ending poverty in America.”

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Addressing a crowd of several hundred supporters at a rally in Las Vegas on Friday, John Edwards denounced an ad running in Nevada by a national labor union supporting Barack Obama.

The pro-Obama radio ad, airing on two Spanish stations and sponsored by a group called UNITE HERE (the parent union of Culinary Workers’ 266 that has endorsed Obama), calls Hillary Clinton “shameless” and says “she does not respect our people.”

Edwards condemned the ad—describing it as “malicious”—and criticized Obama for not calling on the group to stop running it.

“He should speak up,” Edwards told the crowd. “If he really means what he says—and this is not just talk—he should speak up and denounce this kind of divisive politics.”

Though Obama has not publicly addressed the ad as of yet, his campaign spokesman, Bill Burton, told reporters “it’s not our ad,” and that “if the Clinton campaign has questions, they should contact the union that sponsored” it.

Edwards took exception to the ad, he says, in part because Obama had previously criticized him for a television ad that ran on his behalf in Iowa by a 527 group—an ad the Senator said was “positive” and did not seek to slander his opponents. While he publicly spoke out against it at the time, Edwards said he did not have the legal authority to directly communicate with the individuals running it.

During Friday’s Las Vegas rally, Edwards seized the opportunity to address Nevada union members directly: “Regardless of who your political leadership chose to support or endorse,” he said, “nobody will fight for you and the right to organize and the right to collectively bargain like I will.”

“Let me say this very clearly,” he added at the end of his speech, “vis-à-vis Senator Obama, I will not divide America. I will unite America when I’m President of the United States.”

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In Tuesday night’s Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas, the three candidates—Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and Barack Obama—clashed over the issue of nuclear power and what to do about Yucca Mountain, a national repository for nuclear waste that is opposed by many Nevada voters.

The dispute began when Clinton said that Edwards voted in support of the nuclear waste facility, while she had “consistently and persistently been against” it. She also claimed that one of Obama’s supporters—the Exelon Corporation—was involved in funding the project.

In response to Clinton’s remarks, Edwards implied that he had changed his decision based on new scientific information and forged documentation that had emerged regarding the waste dump. He added that, unlike Senator Obama and Senator Clinton, he is completely opposed to the building of more nuclear power plants—a point he so often makes when addressing voters on the campaign trail. Edwards said that Obama is “open to the possibility of additional power plants” and that Clinton has said she is “agnostic” on the subject.

Obama defended himself, saying that he has long been a critic of Yucca Mountain, yet added that the country should “create a menu of energy options” in handling the storage of nuclear waste and “see where the science and the technology and the entrepreneurship of the American people take us.”

The debate over nuclear power will undoubtedly influence Nevada voters, particularly those who are undecided, in the state’s caucuses on Saturday. Polls indicate that an overwhelming number of Nevadans, both Republicans and Democrats, strongly oppose federal plans to dump the nation’s nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain—and believe it to be a key issue in deciding which presidential candidate to caucus for.

The last debate before the NV Caucuses was something of a letdown for those looking for fiery back-and-forth. There were no real winners and no real losers, as the candidates stuck to the high road after a week spent battling over racial issues. With the race here very close, and no one really sure what the impact of this caucus will be on the overall race, everyone seemed to be playing it safe.

But there were a few good moments for Sen Clinton, who resumed the confident, cool, collected debate persona she maintained when she was the clear frontrunner last summer.

She took full advantage of Senator Obama’s admission that he’s not much for managing bureaucracy, arguing that the next president will have to be an effective chief operating officer to keep the country safe.
And she scored points against Obama and Edwards on the issue of depositing nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, one of the key issues in the state (read the campaign’s research memo attacking her two rivals on the issue after the jump).

But it says something about just how interesting this debate was when what the campaign called her “Video Moment of the Debate” was a short riff on George Bush’s energy policy. Check it out below.

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Though you wouldn’t know it based on some of the messages you are hearing tonight. McCain and Romney aimed their early economic message with Michigan-specific references–where they are battling for a Jan. 15 victory.

Meanwhile, Giuliani is pushing messages (Israel, Castro) for the Florida crowd—his must-win state.

Thompson and Huckabee are actually more focussed on the Palmetto State—where they are set for a fight next week.

And Ron Paul…well, is being Ron Paul.