The Magnificent Seven? Hardly.

At long last, the debating season is over...for now. Thank God for minor miracles.

Last night was the finale of the seemingly endless Republican debates. I was beginning to think it was another weekly reality series on television. Only difference, the audience was the "survivor".

Last night's debate scene in Sioux Falls, Iowa, brought the seven Republican candidates to the fore once again as a final prelude to the January 3 Iowa caucuses. The caucuses signals the official start of the true race for the Republican nomination for President of the United States that will be confirmed on the stage at the Republican Convention in Tampa, Florida near the end of August. The winner in Iowa in January usually but not always, goes on to win the nomination of their party.

In eight months time, hopefully, the Republicans will choose THE party nominee that will defeat the incumbent President, Barack Obama. In collegial unison, the Republican candidates on stage last night stated repeatedly, "any one of us can beat Obama at this time." That may be true but never underestimate the other side. The ruling party will be vicious and unrelenting in their brickbats and unsavory smears on the appointed nominee. So, which Republican candidate can measure up to what is surely coming from the Democratic "scorched earth" Chicago-style brass knuckles do anything say anything offensive to retain White House power? The envelope please...

First, let's dismiss the wannabes:
Ron Paul. Never trust a man with two first names. This guy is your kooky, brilliant, whining, ancient Uncle Fester who rarely changes his clothes and always appears at the front door with a full appetite and thirst at all family functions. Last to leave too! Have you seen his "followers"? Remember '70s Laugh-in television show with Arte Johnson, Ruth Buzzi and company? You get the picture.
Rick Santorum. A true conservative but way too nice. Really too decent of a man for this post. This is war with these liberals not a Marriage Encounter. You don't want this job, anyway. Go home to your family and get a real job.
Rick Perry. Please, no more Texans for a while. Flunked debating class in high school. That is, if he went to high school.
John Huntsman. Another nice man. A family man. Knows China. Looks like a game show host with a voice to match. He witters on while his audience changes channels.

So who's left, oops, left is a bad word, who remains?
Newt Gingrich.First of all what kind of name is Newt? Wasn't Newt the bastard kid of Texas Ranger Woodrow Call in Lonesome Dove? I thought this Newt was banished to the island of the "please go far far away forever" group along with the Bushes, Clintons, Kennedys and Cuomos. Guess he turned down the invitation, like the others did. Sure, the distended polemicist would destroy Obama in a debate, but, God forbid, as President, he'd destroy any good will this country has left with anybody on the planet. Newt would even make the Martians mad at us.
Mitt Romney. Looks Presidential. Sounds Presidential. Handsome family. Smart. Business-minded. Successful. Wealthy as Croesus. Pedigree. But he flip flops more on the issues than an overweight, over-caffeinated, sleep-apneated flip flopper on an extra firm mattress. He bruises like a gardenia petal. Also, I really worry about a guy who spends millions of his own money, eg. Meg Whitman in California, to pursue elected office. His overzealous desire for this office makes me uncomfortable.

One remains, if you care.
Michele Bachmann. Before you cut me off and surf over to ESPN.com, question: did you see the final debate? If not, go to YouTube and cue it up. Strangely, as the only woman candidate, Bachmann demonstrated to me that she has the 'manjigglies' to take the fight to Obama and his cronies.

Bachmann took on Newt and emasculated him on his weather-changing stances on abortion and influence peddling for huge fees with the disgraced Freddie Mac (GSE) and she eviscerated the zany Paul on his dangerously goofy gobsmacking ideas on what to do with the world's bugbear, Iran.

She is authentic. She is the truest conservative of the bunch. She is smart though subject to verbal faux pas every now and then. A tax attorney by trade. A mother of five by vocation. A foster parent by choice. And the first Republican woman ever to be sent to Washington DC as a Congresswoman from that liberal coldbed, Minnesota. The same state that gave us Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale, Eugene McCarthy, Al Franken and God forbid Jesse "The Body" Ventura. A conservative emerged out of that closed society? How in the world of the ghost of George McGovern(I know South Dakota, same frozen neighborhood) did that happen?

Bachmann is the anti-Obama on every substantive issue. Cut taxes. Reduce the size of government. Don't spend money on what you don't have. Decrease the debt. Curb the unbridled powers of the judiciary. Pro-life. Pro-Milton Friedman. Pro-Nuclear. Pro Keystone pipeline. She wants to shutter Fannie and Freddie. And repeal Dodd-Frank. She is tough. I think she is alot tougher than the other candidates in her party. She speaks with a truthfulness and a honest certitude that the others sorely lack. Her tongue is not forked. Her message is steady and firm. There are no haunting soundbites from her past. She would be refreshing for this country. A strong woman. Instead of impotent male scoundrels. Sounds good, eh?

Her baggage is Samsonite not adultery. Her skeletons in the closet only come out on Halloween.

Near the end of the debate, Bachmann summed it up this way to the voters: "are you better off now than you were four years ago?" She smartly recited and borrowed that question first asked by the last great one, Ronald Reagan, in 1980 against President Jimmy Carter. The answer, rhetorically, HELL NO. Carter lost all but six states. Reagan won in a landslide.

But, all these good vibes aside, will Michele Bachmann win her party's nomination? Sadly, no. Her authenticity and her strong beliefs on the issues will not translate well to the 20% independents who are positioned to be the deciders in November.

And who will win the Republican nomination in Tampa? Mitt Romney. His "flexible" appeal to the independent voters is too attractive for the national party elite to ignore.

So, we're stuck with Mitt. Can he win? Yes. However, an imperfect Mitt is a helluva alot better than being stuck with an inept, divisive and infantile Campaigner in Chief for four more painful years.

ABO. ANYBODY BUT OBAMA.

"WE CAN'T WAIT".

Amen.