The debate last night for the GOP (Grand Old Party) was interesting. Of course, if you follow this kind of thing, you have heard about how Ted Cruz railed against the pathetic moderators for being so biased against Republican candidates.

 

But I have a question: Republicans know what to expect from any television channel ending in NBC. Why don’t they get someone friendly to the Republicans to moderate their debate? Granted, Fox News can be no better at times, but I’ve heard the idea floated to have Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and other similar conservative anchors host the debates.

 

This all misses the main point, however. And that is emotional intelligence. All of the candidates were asked, as the first question, to name their first weakness. Their answers are why people don’t trust politicians or people in general who are running for political office. They all answered with variations of “Well, I don’t know if you would call this is a weakness…” and then answered an entirely different question. Shady, to say the least. Not emotionally intelligent. An emotionally intelligent person would admit honestly to a weakness and motivate people with how they overcame it. For example, an excellent example would be, “I used to see issues in terms of black and white. Now I see shades of grey, and my stands on issues are therefore tremendously more informed than they used to be. I don’t look forward to making mistakes, but if you have the right attitude to them, and admit them, they can actually be life-changing in a positive way.”

 

Marco Rubio was emotionally intelligent when he said that in spite of Jeb Bush’s criticism of him, he still had tremendous admiration for him. That’s how an emotionally intelligent person talks, like Rubio did there, and if you noticed, the audience erupted in applause, because people in general respond to emotional intelligence, especially in politicians, particularly because it is so incredibly rare.

 

Donald Trump, while I am on the subject, is not emotionally intelligent. I love his policies, and agree with most of what he says, but he does not have a healthy attitude toward other people. If the polls show him behind, the polls are wrong. If Ben Carson is ahead, there must be a mistake. Trump cannot handle second place. It’s good to be aggressive, and heaven knows I admire Trump tremendously for a lot of reasons, but it concerns me that he has this attitude of always needing to be right. Also, he says that if someone hits him, he hits them back harder. This is not what is taught in the Bible. A Christian especially should be emotionally intelligent because it fits in with the scripture, “A soft answer turneth away wrath.” If people spent less time bashing the Bible, and ridiculing God, they would see that there are life-changing truths in the Bible. But it’s easier to ignore God, pretend He doesn’t exist, and then coincidentally have the supposed, but false, freedom to do whatever you wanted to do in the first place.

 

Carly Fiorina said good things, but I find that hse goes into lectur-y mode way too often, especially within the debate format. Rand Paul did well, but his way of thinking (small government) is unfortunately not resonating for the American public, many of whom want more government, even Republicans.

 

John Kasich and Mike Huckabee performed well, but nothing stood out to me in particular. I did like Huckabee’s quip about being alive to tell about his fighting of the Clinton machine all these years. Kashich seems to have done a great job with Ohio, but nothing he said stood out to me regarding emotional intelligence, either negative or positive.

 

In other news, Paul Ryan is the new Speaker in the house. On Facebook, I saw a picture where John Boehner was kissing Nancy Pelosi on the cheek. Republicans want military spending, and Democrats want domestic spending. Unfortunately, it’s still all spending, as Rand Paul astutely points out. I wish he would get more traction. Ryan’s election will mean no change in Washington, but it might mean change in the politicians’ pockets, as usual.

 

All countries need an emotionally intelligent leader. It’s a pity emotionally intelligent people are so hard to find.