I find health care debates dry to begin with, and the part of the debate on health care is a fog. The candidates like good health care, they like fitness, they like low costs…

McCain hits Gibson for suggesting the European health care systems are better.

Romney: We found it is no more expensive to help uninsured buy their own private policy than to provide free health care… We established a connecter, where an individual could buy from any company. The premiums went down from $300 a month to $180 a month… We don’t need Hillarycare or socialized medicine.

It’s his best answer of the night.

Ron Paul says we can’t afford health care because of the war. Laments our “warmongering foreign policy.”

Thompson observes that people don’t comparison shop for health care and insurance the way they comparison shop for other products…

Thompson: “We’re probably never going to achieve total coverage.”

Gibson: You can have mandates.

Romney: I like mandates.

Thompson: I didn’t think you were going to admit that.

Romney: If you can afford health insurance, you should buy it.

Twice Romney has seemed a little… testy? It’s odd, not quite, angry… indignant?

The rest of his answer, saying that he wouldn’t force what he did in Massachusetts on every state, but that “every state should get busy” on systems to make sure insurance is available to every citizen. Again, probably his best answer, and perhaps best moment, of the night.

Huckabee gives more of his stock answer, and jokes that $1,000 is needed to pay for a Kleenex in most hospitals.

Romney: Don’t turn the pharmaceutical companies into the big bad guy.

McCain: But they are.

Romney defends the work of pharmaceutical companies, says he’s sure excesses occur, and that we ought to go after the excesses, but that they’re operating in a free market.

I think somewhere offstage, John Edwards just turned purple with rage.

The Politico has television ads?

And now a Joe Kennedy ad for “Citgo”, which he assures us is “owned by the Venezuelan people.”

“Some people tell me it’s bad politics to do this. I say, ‘it’s a crime against humanity not to.’” Thank you, Joe Kennedy, for stretching the definition of “crime against humanity” to include, “not participating in ads for Hugo Chavez and his thugs.”