The morning’s consensus is that Michele Bachmann was the standout performer in last night’s vaudeville act GOP debate. News stories say the audience applauded enthusiastically at everything she said. Mitt Romney also had a good night, they say, but his biggest applause line was announcing that the Boston Bruins were leading the Vancouver Canucks.

This morning Pawlenty Dim Tim is being soundly denounced as a weenie for refusing to repeat his recent trash-talking of Mitt Romney to Romney’s face. Pizza magnate Herman Cain failed to deliver. Ron Paul was Ron Paul and Newt was Newt. Rick Santorum seems to have disappeared into the woodwork.

I skimmed through the transcript. Most of the “debate” amounted to someone asking the candidates “what would you do about blah,” and the candidates responding that President Obama is failing at blah, or doesn’t appreciate the importance of blah, or even is trying to undermine blah.

If you listened to this crew without knowing any better, you might think President Obama actually wants to shrink the economy and throw more people out of work, for example. Republicans, on the other hand, are in favor of economic growth and more jobs. Bold.

Only Romney and Bachmann were asked about the debt ceiling. Romney refused to respond to what would happen if it weren’t raised, and instead preached about the evils of government spending. Bachmann just said she voted no on the debt ceiling and then made some remarks about failures of leadership. No feet were held to fire, in other words.

The Ryan budget came up a few times. Most of the candidates repeated the party line about “entitlement reform” being the only way to get the budget balanced. Both Romney and Bachmann criticized President Obama for taking $500 billion out of Medicare to fund “Obamacare,” ignoring the fact that this money was mostly the overpayments to the private insurance companies offering Medicare Advantage policies, and not a single Medicare benefit has been taken away from seniors on regular Medicare.

To clarify: The Affordable Care Act does not take anything away from seniors to give to younger people, but rather eliminates some waste that was mostly paying for marketing and profits, and uses that for other health care funding. The Ryan plan, which they all praised, would take benefits away from seniors and give the money to millionaires in the form of tax cuts.

So the candidates are simultaneously denouncing Obama for taking benefits away from seniors, even though he didn’t, and praising Paul Ryan’s plan that really would take benefits away from seniors.

Pawlenty and Gingrich said they loved them some Ryan budget Medicare plan but would do it differently. Exactly what they would do differently will be announced. Mitt Romney simultaneously took credit for and denounced his own “Romneycare” plan in Massachusetts:

“I can’t wait to debate him and say, Mr. President, if, in fact, you did look at what we did in Massachusetts, why didn’t you give me a call and ask what worked and what didn’t? And I would have told you, Mr. President, that what you’re doing will not work.”

No one pressed Romney to give examples of what worked and what didn’t, however.

This is really my gripe about such debates — the candidates are allowed to weasel out of answering anything, and the moderators don’t push it. For example, moderator John King asked a pretty decent question —

Governor Pawlenty, answer the critics — and as you do so — who say 5 percent every year is just unrealistic. And as you do so, where’s the proof — where’s the proof that just cutting taxes will create jobs? If that were true, why during the Bush years, after the big tax cut, where were the jobs?

Now, that’s an excellent question, and one that all Republicans ought to be asked frequently. But here’s Pawlenty Dim’s answer:

Well, John, my plan involves a whole plan, not just cutting taxes. We’re proposing to cut taxes, reduce regulation, speed up this pace of government, and to make sure that we have a pro-growth agenda.

This president is a declinist. He views America as one of equals around the world. We’re not the same as Portugal; we’re not the same as Argentina. And this idea that we can’t have 5 percent growth in America is hogwash. It’s a defeatist attitude. If China can have 5 percent growth and Brazil can have 5 percent growth, then the United States of America can have 5 percent growth.

And I don’t accept this notion that we’re going to be average or anemic. So my proposal has a 5 percent growth target. It cuts taxes, but it also dramatically cuts spending. We need to fix regulation. We need to have a pro-American energy policy. We need to fix health care policy. And if you do those things, as I’ve proposed, including cut spending, you’ll get this economy moving and growing the private economy by shrinking government.

So, he evaded the question — which was not asked of the other candidates — and simply declared he is for strong economic growth while President Obama is, apparently, against it.

Toward the end they were asked about religious faith — they’re for it — and abortion — they’re agin’ it. Like this is a surprise. When asked about foreign policy, they all love the troops deployed overseas and think President Obama has failed at leadership.

Bachmann spoke at some length about Libya saying that we have no business messing around in Libya because no vital interest of America is being served there, and then she denounced President Obama for ceding leadership in the Libya action to France. No one pressed Bachmann about whether she thought being a participating member of NATO was still a vital interest of the U.S.

If I come across any particularly sharp analyses of the debate, I’ll add them here.