Let's Play: You're the Campaign Manager!

[IceSpear]

1) In public: Give canned talking points about how well Rubio did. Say he was just so passionate about how malicious Obama he is that he needed to get the point across. In private: Insist that it was only one mishap and it will never happen again. Remind the media/establishment that they have already invested so much into the campaign, and that they can't afford to pull out after a single debate failure, particularly when doing so would essentially guarantee a Trump or Cruz nomination.

2) Pray. It's really too late to massively change strategy. Rubio's survival depends on finishing 2nd (or maybe 3rd if Cruz is 2nd). Hope the media and establishment is so scared of the Trump/Cruz spectre that they rally around you, double down, and slam the hell out of his establishment rivals.

[IceSpear]

By admitting that Rubio had a bad moment, but emphasizing that Rubio recovered and had good second half of the debate.  I'm not sure if there was a Luntz focus group tonight, but if there was, I wouldn't be surprised if Rubio's answers on what it means to be a conservative and abortion scored well with Republican primary voters.

I don't think anything can be salvaged between today and Tuesday.  Tomorrow's pretty much a dead day in the campaign, leaving only Monday to really change message.  I'd pivot to focus on Rubio's accomplishments in Washington and Tallahassee, if possible.

Luntz's focus groups have already been exposed as rigged for Rubio. I'm sure he'd have said he won the robot moment too.

In other words, let's dispel with this fiction that Frank Luntz doesn't know what he's doing. He knows exactly what he's doing.

[IceSpear]

Here's how they're spinning it, lol.

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[IceSpear]

I mean, it's really all they can do. They can't exactly embrace the fact that he did poorly 3 days before a crucial primary that could very well make or break his campaign.

Jeb got pretty lucky that he f'd up in the early debates, so he could at least admit he did poorly and have time to improve, and it looks like he actually has. This was the absolute worst time for Rubio to melt down.