the mclaughlin group is next. >> from washington, "the mclaughlin group," the american orig from washington, the mclaughlin group, the american original. for over three decades, the sharpest minds, best sources, hardest talk. >> issue one. debate two, return of the republicans. >> i dare hillary clinton, barack obama, to watch these tapes. watch a fully formed fetus on the table, its heart beating, its legs kicking while someone says we have to keep it alive to harvest its brain. this is about the character of our nation. >> they're back. the second republican presidential debate of the 2016

cycle took place wednesday at the ronald reagan presidential california. there were two debates, one at eastern. eastern. the earlier debate involved four candidates, lower in the polls. lindsay graham, bobby jindal, george pataki. and rick santorum. the prime time debate featured jeb bush, ben carson, chris christie, ted cruz, carly fiorina, mike huckabee, jon kasich, rand paul, marco rubio, donald trump, and scott walker and beyond their shared words of affection for ronald reagan, the candidates quickly sought battle. who won the prime time debate? >> i think you would have to say carly fiorina won it, john. she was prepared. she was programmed, she was articulate. she was crisp. she was tough, and after the

debate was over, a lot of people said she had won, and she has really won overwhelmingly, the post game debate, and all the tv shows and talking shows show people who think she won are going up, up and up, long after the debate is over. i will say this, carly fiorina is being projected, if you republican party. someone who will do for the establishment, take down trump, which the establishment is desperate to get done. i don't think anybody was badly some people did well. i think some people did very well, but there's no doubt about it, i think, that carly comes out number one. stood out. she really, i think, has introduced herself to the country. she's gone far beyond the republican base. she played fast and loose with the facts around planned parenthood, and i think she really is overreaching in the criticism she's making of an

organization that millions of women in this country have gotten services from, and to imply that they are harvesting and selling baby parts, doesn't bear out with the facts and i think that's offensive. having said all that, she is a tough debater. she called down donald trump and i think trump basically has been taken down a peg or two. he seems like there's a leveling. he's sort of one of the candidates, and i think jeb bush had his moments. i think he's still in the game, and i think chris christie actually came back, so i think the establishment is still alive and well against the insurgents and i would count fiorina with trump as one of the insurgents. >> when i say who won the prime time debate, if you define,

who got the most air time, trump won with almost 20 minutes, followed by bush with 16 minutes, and fiorina with 13 minutes. you care to add to this discussion. >> how do you conceive of the victory is the important point. jeb bush had some moments of humor with the secret service, challenging donald trump. i think carly fiorina issued a power line of women across america understood what you meant, and his face visible showed concern. two. the question will be we have many more debates to go. if you think about 1980, you know, george bush winning iowa in the first caucuses. it's a long way. things will happen. we'll have to see. >> yeah. >> if you define winner as an improvement in relative standing, fiorina, once again, won the most, followed by rubio. but both started from relatively low levels.

bush moved up relative to his lackluster performance in the august debate. >> i would agree with that. i think also that carly fiorina debate. however, i wonder, though, if she has not still damaged as far as winning the nomination. one good shot to trump got in was her record at hewlett- packard, and hard time for high- tech in general. i think she's got good excuses but it muddies the water. about that. they're going to be all over that, the republicans are, i'm sure donald trump is, and the democrats will because that's what killed her in that senate debate. let me say this, john, let me say this about george w bush. i did the same thing. >> jeb. >> jeb. look i thought jeb did a good job, and i like trump. and he was being punched from every side in this debate. hitting him there, and they

but overall, it showed the fact that there was a big guy, and all these people piling on, and own. >> he had hismoments. guys. >> we all love that. >> in terms of fiorina she's going to get scrutiny, she's been brilliant at turning a ledden business career into spun gold, that and a losing senate race. not much preparation to become president. she's going to be examined and hewlett-packard also didn't follow the sanctions the gangster ran. they sold lots of computer equipment to iran, and she's this big supporter of tougher sanctions. so she has a lot of inconsistencies she's going to have to address. issue two. keeping us safe. >> and your brother's administration gave us barack obama because it was such a

have been elect. >> as it relates to my brother, there's one thing i know for sure, he september us safe. >> rand paul raises a trump nuclear specter. >> i'm very worried about having him in charge of the nuclear weapons is i think his response, his visceral response to attack people on their ugly. my goodness, that happened in junior high, are we not way above that. would we not be worried to have nuclear arsenal. >> mr. trump. >> i never attacked him on his look, and believe me there's plenty of subject matter right there, that i can tell you. defense plan. >> i would begin rebuilding the sixty fleet, the missile defense program in poland. >> which of the gop candidates is best placed to keep america

>> well, jeb bush in declaring that his brother kept us safe, it never helps jeb when he invokes his brother george, and he meant he kept us safe after the 9/11, kind of glossing over watch. i think jeb bush does have a view. his problem is that it's filled with people who served his father's administration and his brother's administration, and it's very hard for the public i think to accept he's his own man. rand paul, i know pat likes him but he's probably a little too libertarian, and doveish for the republican electorate, and car lee fiorina is -- carly fiorina is totally crazy the way she talks about the defense budget. >> you can see it on the issue of would you tear up the deal with iran as soon as you take office. you've got walker will do that.

rubio will do that. i think carly is going to call on the phone, and on the other side, you've got bush, and trump who says i would take a hard look at it, andland said i'm not going to tear -- rand who said i'm not going to tear that up, and kasich who said i'm not going to tear that up. i would say it's realist versus folks who want to go back into the middle east. >> i tend to think, actually, and i'm obviously not a fan of the deal, but i actually suspect marco rubio if he was to become president would not tear up the deal. let's face it. if the deal is working, if iran is complying, if there's verification, the deal will hold. the alternative very quickly, and anyone being honest admits they become complicated at best. i would say on fiorina, we

i think there's a point, some of the substance, rebuild the 6th 6th feet. there needs to be a little bit more complex in calling netanyahu, and i think republicans can own foreign articulate. to putin. she's so tough, she doesn't have to talk to him. she'll back off. it's unrealistic. >> the politics, i agree with you 100%, but the politics of the republican party are clearly still there, much more hawkish. they're moving the right away on trade, the right way on immigration, but they're still hawkish when it comes to intervention in the middle east. >> it hurt rand paul like it hurt ron paul, there's a sentiment to buy more weapons even though we have them. >> there's 14 guys against rand. he's one guy. and he can get that back, that constituency his father had. >> he made a lot of sense on the debate stage.

>> i agree. >> it's a problem at a time like now when the republican rank and file is fueling more hawkish than usual with what's happening with isaac. >> they don't have any solutions for anything. it's a lot of talk. nobody wants to send except for lindsay graham. >> he and putin can get on just like that. >> they'll be pals. that's what i said. >> the dynamic in the debate is quite interesting. and that is that the dynamic is the dynamic of something called bravo, which is house wives who argue with each other. >> bravo, i thought it was a cable tv channel. >> house wives of new jersey. >> yeah, because the dynamic is they argue with each other, and

that is what's going on here. chapel would put one of the candidates against the prospective view of another, and engage him in sprightly conversation. in bravo, the real house wives series one housewife confronts one about something another housewife is saying behind the other. cnn deliberately copied bravo real house wives formula, from the first questions. they prefaced each question with a statement another candidate had made about the candidate being questioned. this unusual debate format was taken directly from bravo. >> somebody described it as like the junior high, you go up and tell somebody, did you see what so and so said about you, and how do you respond to that. >> when you have that many people on the stage, and you have voters trying to decide what's different, what are the differences, i think it effectively pitted them against each other, and carly fiorina did say a long campaign will

reveal our character and our positions and i think that's starting to happen. >> once around very fast, who exhibited the most, was the most charismatic of the name. >> i would say rubio and carly. >> which of the two. >> rubio, and he hasn't been able to build that much. >> i would say rubio, with the line about spanish speaking. >> i think rubio certainly has those qualities. charismatic is a world that helps me to explain why dr. carson is still there. ben carson who's a very likable guy, but i can't see hem as president. i don't understand why people want him to be president. i call it the dr. huxtable factor, he's so likable.

answer is fiorina was the most charismatic. passion and deliberation.

lessons. tt0w!tx#h_!!%4@-j] tt0w!tx#h_!!el@-@zl tt0w!tx#h_!!ed@-fx( tt0w!tx#h_%!)8h-&&t tt0w!tx#h_%!kzh-;i( tt0w!tx#h_%!n-h-n $ tt0w!tx#h_%!0ph-pg< tt0w!tx#h_%!s"h-@5\ tt0w!tx#h_%!ueh-cw, tt0w!tx#h_%!7hh-_ux in brooklyn in 1907, four courageous ladies saw the despair of the poor, old, and sick and founded what would become mjhs. today mjhs provides quality home care, rehabilitation and skilled nursing, and advanced hospice and palliative care for adults and children, but the values of the brooklyn ladies still guide us.

tt2watx#`o4 p bt@q>v8 tt2watx#`o4 p "a@q.z\ tt2watx#`o4 p bm@q%qp tt4watx#`o4 r dztq yah tt4watx#`o4 r entq )e( tt4watx#`o4 r gzt& 0bp john: thank you three -- . lessons. >> this is a country where we speak english, not spanish. >> my grandfather instilled in me the belief that i was blessed to live in the one society in all of human history

bartender and maid could aspire anything and be anything i could work hard to achieve. he taught to me in spanish because it was the language he was most comfortable in, and he became a conservative even though he got his news in spanish. i believe free enterprise and limited government is the best way to help people who are trying to achieve upward mobility, and if they get their news in spanish, i want them to hear that directly from me, not from a translator at univision. >> he's right you gain ground if you spoke spanish. >> he's from the cuban community, and that would help you down there. the overall issue, the broad issue, when trump talks about, you don't have one country unless ultimately you have one language, and english is the language of the united states, and an overwhelming majority of americans, when you come speaking a different language, everybody should learn it, everybody should understand it, speak it, so that we can become

>> when you listen to donald trump. >> doing your lawn, and you pay unsubstantial with acceptable fee by your standards. >> i pay their boss. >> don't you want to communicate with them in spanish? >> no, they should try to communicate with me. >> but you can help them along. >> they're very good folks, i will say that. if you see them working anywhere, they're hard working and they're smiling. >> that's right. >> your earlier rhetoric is not going to help the republican party in the future of this country. if you listen to donald trump, listen to marco rubio, where is the future. it's not with donald trump saying we all need to speak english. i wish i spoke another language. i actually am the daughter of immigrants, i don't have their language, i should. i think people who speak spanish in this country bring a lot of rich experiences for us to learn from. and in a country that's going to be majority, minority, pretty soon.

speaking spanish is an asset, and if the republican party doesn't recognize that, they're missing a big bet here in terms of how to win an election in this country. >> that's the real issue. i don't know of anybody pushing for two languages. i don't know of anybody pushing people saying don't learn english, you know, speak spanish, german, speak something else. this is such an old issue in america. it's as old as america itself. every generation goes through this. the fact is people come here speaking their native tongue. the next generation learns english. more fully, that's the american way, and anything we do to slow down the process is bad, and that includes trying to eliminate bilingual education in the situations going to do some good. some places where it doesn't work well, and so don't do it there, but places where it does work well, do it. >> here is how trump spun it around to bush who gives speeches in spanish.

trump highlighted that jeb is weak in immigration. he made bush look like an advocate of a permanently bilingual country in which assimilation never happens. >> i think the issue is with donald trump. yes, he's trying to appeal to that immigrant community, right, but at the same time, marco rubio is articulating, yes, people should learn english in america. we need that because we need people included but things like cities and things that there is an articulatable opportunity for marco rubio to distance himself from trump. >> we must make sure we don't become like europe where there's a lot of tension between communities. >> they don't know howed to it right in europe. we do know how. let's keep doing with a we're doing. does uni vision want one language in america. no, that is the problem. you have huge numbers of radio,

tv stations, newspapers. we are developing into two languages, you're right, what happened before, doesn't mean it's happening now. >> we have to move. issue four. >> everybody has two languages has an advantage. it's not mandatory. >> government shut down strategy, let's go. >> the one thing i'm not going to do going into 2016 is shut the government down and tank our ability to win. what you're seeing and what senator cruz is saying, i'm really sick of hearing. >> ted cruz and bobby jindal right or wrong to call for a government shut down strategy. >> i think what they want, john, is they want a republican party that stands up and fights and even goes right up to the edge of the cliff. that's what they want and what our friend down in south carolina, mr. graham is saying. he doesn't want to do that. this is the battle inside the republican party on capitol hill, and it's coming up again. >> and it didn't work out too well for the republicans the last time it happened.

and if they're stupid enough to take us over that brink, and cost the country billions of dollars and disrupt people's lives, they're going to pay for it in the election. >> they're not going to shut down the government. the senate will shut it down by refusing to pass a continuing resolution. >> that's a very convenient way. you think you're going to blame it on the democrats. we know who's behind the push to shut down the government because they don't want to fund planned parenthood. that's what it's about. >> they never voted to shut down the government, never. >> that's a technicality, pat. >> will the government shut down this year hurt the republican nominee in 2016. >> it would certainly hurt the republican nominee. it makes sense for republican candidates, especially bobby jindal to say that because it appeals to the constituency. look at the planned parenthood videos, you can articulate that

in the campaign, this is why we should have reform. make the ideas to the electorate. the perception drives reality in the presidential election year, and you shut the government down, the perception would be in favor of the democratic nominee. >> if shut down, the massive stock market sell off and a downturn in consumer confidence, the gop nominee will pay the price, true or false. >> an economic downturn hurts the incumbent. >> it hurts everybody. >> are the democrats equally obstinate over funding for planned parenthood. >> democrats are in the tank for planned parenthood, they're going to be united on this issue, and republicans are not going to vote to shut down the government. harry reid and his gang will do it. >> that was once a tank that was filled with a lot of republicans back in the day when there were moderate republicans, thinking republicans and not everybody was pandering to the right.

>> issue five, flashes of humor. >> ever ready, it's very high energy, donald. >> mr. trump? >> humble. [laughter] >> mr. trump. humble. >> that's a good one. >> who was the most entertaining. >> trump made the show, john. on for months. >> i think jeb bush, secret service line was great. >> trump is the reason for the big ratings and he paid off. >> the answer is trump. we'll be right back with predictions.

. prediction, who will be the second republican to drop from the race? >> the occupants for the undercard debate are vanishing, i think bobby jindal would be my choice. >> i say pataki. >> lindsay graham, bye bye. pataki. >> i'd say pataki.