When it comes to presidential debates, everyone knows that after the show, it's the after-party, and after the party it's the avalanche of commentary from the peanut gallery. Here's a roundup of the best pundit reactions to last night's GOP debate.
Trevor Noah of "The Daily Show" took a swipe at CNN, referencing its 'round-the-clock coverage last year of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. The network was widely ridiculed as talking heads filled the hours by speculating about what could have happened to the plane, and at one point considered the possibility of a black hole having swallowed it up.
The always-memorable Bill Maher slammed the juvenile name-calling.
MSNBC's Joe Scarborough groused throughout the night about CNN's focus on Donald Trump.
Scarborough's colleague Chris Hayes imagined how the future would look back at all the denialism around climate change.
In what was perhaps the night's best moment of the pot calling the kettle black, Fox News' Bill O'Reilly slammed CNN for making the debate "all about the show." His guest for the night, Charles Krauthammer, said he didn't like the format and slammed debate moderator Jake Tapper for "throwing meat into the arena. It was like WWE without the entertainment value." H/T Newsbusters
Elsewhere in the Fox orbit, Megyn Kelly slammed debate moderator Hugh Hewitt for fawning over Donald Trump, calling his behavior "cringeworthy." "It was like batting of the eyes on Hewitt's part," Kelly said. H/T Washington Examiner
Numbers guru Nate Silver snarked about the media's obsession with pronouncing a "winner."
Ann Coulter, who criticized the GOP candidates for pandering in a column Thursday, boiled down the Republican candidates' strategy to a formula:
Coulter's remarks about Israel drew criticism from some folk who called her tweet below anti-Semitic.
Glenn Beck sounded off on Facebook. He really, really, really dislikes Trump.
We'll continue to update this post as the chattering classes chatter.
