Alfonse D'Amato

The GOP debate: Get ready for a great show

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It’s the moment you’ve all been waiting for. Drum roll, please.

On Thursday, Fox News will host the first presidential debate of the GOP primary season. There is no stage big enough to hold the 17 announced candidates, so Fox decided that only 10 would be able to participate in the prime-time debate. The rest will take part in a second-tier debate at 5 p.m. the same day.

So who’s in and who’s out? Only the top 10 candidates, determined by averaging the five most recent national polls, will earn a spot in prime time.

The race has been heating up over the past several weeks, as Donald Trump remains on the offensive, criticizing his opponents and gaining support from the party.

Some of the not-so-popular candidates have had to resort to some pretty clever gimmicks in order to qualify for the last couple of spots in the debate, including talking about how much they hate Trump, challenging him to a pull-up contest, or beginning a campaign blitz that can only be compared to the election’s eve. Sounds to me like all of the candidates should abide by Ronald Reagan’s famous 11th Commandment: “Thou shall not speak ill of any fellow Republican.”

On a more serious note, according to an ABC News analysis on July 30 of five recent major national polls, eight candidates have already booked their tickets to the debate: Trump; former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker; U.S. Sens. Marco Rubio, Rand Paul and Ted Cruz; former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Ben Carson.

Govs. Chris Christie, of New Jersey, and John Kasich, of Ohio currently hold the last two spots, with former Texas Gov. Rick Perry trailing close behind.

Shockingly, right now this is Trump’s race to lose. Twenty percent of Republican and Republican-leaning voters have stated that they would vote for Trump if the primary were held today. That is the largest share that any single candidate has received in Quinnipiac’s seven surveys over the past two years.

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