Welcome to Cato Daily Podcast, I'm your host Anastasia Yuglova. Today is Wednesday, May 16, the day after the second Republican presidential debate in Columbia, South Carolina.

That debate is the subject of my interview today with Cato's

Executive Vice President David Bowes. To begin with, did anyone emerge as the

winner for you last night? I think it depends partly on what they were

running for. If they're running for the Republican nomination then I think

Giuliani had a very good night and he made very good use of challenging Ron

Paul on foreign policy. I think McCain also had a good night, but

less so with Republican voters. McCain and Ron Paul were both sort of addressing the whole

country,

Independence, Democrats, Republicans, the people

who would win a presidency.

But if you're talking about just Republican primary voters,

Giuliani probably did best, and I think Huckabee in Tancredo may have done well, although neither one of them broke

through in a way that a minor candidate has to do.

Now that exchange there between Paul and Giuliani, did the

Ron Paul candidacy he officially implode when he stopped just short of

suggesting US foreign policy cause 9-11 or was that an intelligent point about

the reality of blowback?

Sometimes when you make a valid point, that's when your candidacy implodes.

Michael Kinsley defined a gaff as when a politician accidentally tells the truth.

So those are not mutually exclusive. However, of course Ron Paul made a

valid point. Things don't happen in a vacuum. Of course US foreign policy has an

...