Life isn’t fair. There’s no “fair” way to hold the presidential debate in the blessedly crowded Republican field. But choosing the top 10, by poll averages (and letting a second tier have its own debate) is about as fair as it gets. Or, as my colleague Jason Russell put it, “the Fox format is the worst debate format, except for all the others that have been proposed.”
A quick look at the polls used to determine eligibility confirms that.
National Journal has pulled together the polls that Fox used to determine eligibility. What’s striking is the near-unanimity in the polls.
Nine candidates make the top 10 in all five polls. That’s amazing agreement. Trump, Bush, Walker, Carson, Cruz, Huckabee, Paul, Rubio, Christie are above the cutoff line in every single poll. In fact, that’s the top nine (in slightly different orders) in 4 of the 5. Christie is in 10th in only one poll — and that’s the oldest.
The only slightly contested position is 10th place, which Kasich won. Kasich is in 10th place in 3 of the 5 polls, and in 9th place in one of them. The only other two candidates to ever crack the top 10 are Jindal and Perry, who tied for 10th, in one poll, barely edging out Kasich — in the poll with the highest margin of error among the top 10.
And in the other polls, Jindal finished 12th, 13th, 13th, and 14th, while Perry also finished 14th in one poll.
So the closest thing to a dispute would be Perry complaining that Kasich edged him out — but even there, Kasich beat him in 4 of 5 polls.
