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From Joe Klein's Swampland comes a disturbing report about the reaction of a Republican focus group to that night's Republican debate. Using instant-dialing knobs, the viewers could basically register their sentiments to each candidate's comments in real time:

Last night, for example, it was apparent from the get-go that Rudy Giuliani was having a very bad night. Mitt Romney clearly got the better of him in the opening debate about illegal immigration. Romney's dial numbers hovered in the 60s (on a scale of 100) while Giuliani (40s) seemed defensive, members of the focus group later said.

In the next segment - the debate between Romney and Mike Huckabee over Huckabee's college scholarships for the deserving children of illegal immigrants - I noticed something really distressing: When Huckabee said, "After all, these are children of God," the dials plummeted. And that happened time and again through the evening: Any time any candidate proposed doing anything nice for anyone poor, the dials plummeted (30s).

But there was worse to come: When John McCain started talking about torture - specifically, about waterboarding - the dials plummeted again. Lower even than for the illegal Children of God. Down to the low 20s, which, given the natural averaging of a focus group, is about as low as you can go. Afterwards, Luntz asked the group why they seemed to be in favor of torture. "I don't have any problem pouring water on the face of a man who killed 3000 Americans on 9/11," said John Shevlin, a retired federal law enforcement officer. The group applauded, appallingly.

Two comments: 1) If these voters represent the base of the Republican party, can we finally put to rest the idea of "Compassionate Conservatism?" and 2) that fella, John Shevlin, is a retired federal law enforcement officer and he's equating waterboarding torture with pouring water on the face of a man? Doesn't he know that all 19 hijackers in 9/11 died?

Is it so difficult to realize that it's not in our best interest to have a national "waterboarding" policy of torture? Have these Republican voters forgotten that America is supposed to be a beacon of inspiration for the rest of the world? This might in fact be Bush's biggest legacy, where he has completely trashed America's image abroad for a generation to come.

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