About the best thing that can be said about tonight’s GOP debate is it was better than the last one, this being far more the result of the tea party’s involvement than anything CNN or Wolf Blitzer conjured. It served as a reminder of why Sarah is easily the smartest person in the room… by not being in the room. Nothing is genuinely gained in these pseudo-debates. Nothing at all.

They are pseudo-debates because of the profound lack of substance manufactured by the format. Nothing is discussed at length. Everything is engineered for the “gotcha” sound byte. Red meat for political junkies, but of little if any interest or use to the populace at large. Pseudo-debates ought to be held in Oakland, moderated by the specter of Gertrude Stein. There’s no there there.

There are those who complain that by not being in the debates Sarah is somehow sloughing off and taking the easy path to running for President, if in fact she does run. Funny, one never hears that about Rick Perry blowing off Iowa and its straw poll. However, it must be kept in mind he is Teh Chosen Won, thus is immune to criticism. But of course.

One point that did come out of the debate, namely Michele Bachmann’s full throttle attack on Perry over his executive mandate for Gardasil vaccinations for girls, has created a massive firestorm on the right with people firing at each other at will, saving a few rounds for Will should he decide to jump into the fray. Perry admits the mandate was a mistake, but is being hammered for it nonetheless. Personally, his all over the map stance on illegal immigration is far more of a concern, but let’s set that aside for a bit and focus on the immunization controversy.

Something that seems to be almost universally overlooked is that it’s not solely amateur and/or agenda-driven members of the healthcare community who have raised a caution flag about a possible connection between some vaccines and autism. Parents have a right to be concerned about such things. Bachmann is a parent and then some, with five children of her own, three of whom are girls, and a slew of foster kids who have lived with her and her family for various periods of time. While it’s easy to say her going on the offensive against Perry on this issue is mere politics, it’s clear there’s more than a touch of the mama grizzly in the representative from Minnesota. When viewed in this light, is it that big of a deal whether she went over the top? No. It’s a minor issue politically and a much deeper issue for a parent. Which is as it should be.

Unless Sarah has entered the race by then, expect the next debate, being held on the 22nd, to be more of the same in the “not genuinely interesting” department. There will be one difference: given how the debate will be held in Orlando, expect the Disney character jokes to be flying fast and furious. And everyone to be furious with everyone else on Twitter afterwards.