I have suffered through another presidential debate in order to offer my libertarian commentary. The big story for me is the absence of Donald Trump and the presence of Rand Paul. This will be most of my commentary.

As far as Donald Trump skipping the debate, we’ll see if it ultimately helps him or hurts him or neither. I doubt it is going to hurt him.

In the first Fox News debate, Megyn Kelly was sent out there as an attack dog. Trump turned the tables on her quickly. His poll numbers went up. That might be one argument of why he should have participated in the debate.   If he were attacked again, Fox News would look bad and he would probably go up more in the polls.

Ironically, Ted Cruz ended up getting into a debate with Chris Wallace (one of the moderators) about the debate rules. Actually, it was more Wallace just telling him off. It would not surprise me if Trump uses this as an example of why he skipped and that maybe Cruz should have done the same.

I don’t have a lot to say about Kasich, Christie, Bush, and Carson. They probably aren’t going anywhere but down in the polls. Despite the things I don’t like about Trump, I will forever be thankful for his presence in this process for squashing Jeb Bush like a little bug.

Chris Christie was asked a question about what spending he would specifically cut. Christie has actually been the only candidate who has pointed out the significance of the unfunded liabilities of the so-called entitlement programs. But for this question, Christie answered that he would cut Planned Parenthood. This was absolutely lame and pretty much tells you everything you need to know about him. I only wish the same question had been asked to all of the candidates.

Marco Rubio was a rather smooth talker as usual. I still suspect that the Republican establishment will coalesce around him. They will go with Cruz if they have to, but they would rather have Rubio. At this point, it is anybody but Trump.

Iowa will be important for Cruz and Rubio because the anti-Trump people may start to coalesce around whichever candidate they think has the best chance at beating Trump. After Iowa and New Hampshire, I expect several candidates will drop out.

At this point, I don’t see any path for anyone other than Trump, Cruz, and Rubio. Maybe someone will surprise us in the next couple of weeks, but I don’t see it right now.

Lastly, I want to talk about Rand Paul. His presence in the debate certainly made it more interesting.

I don’t usually like questions about polling and strategy, as I prefer questions about how they will use and abuse the force of government. But the first question to Rand Paul was interesting to me personally. He was asked about essentially shunning his father and it was pointed out that some Ron Paul supporters are even going for Ted Cruz.

Rand gave about as good of an answer as he could have, but let’s face the fact that this sums up his whole disastrous campaign. He was elected to the Senate with the last name of Paul. Ron was incredibly successful in 2007/ 2008 and again in 2011/ 2012. He was successful in introducing millions of Americans (and even foreigners) to the idea of libertarianism. The couple of millions of votes he received in 2012 is just a side effect of his success.

But Rand will not likely get anywhere near the vote total that his father did. And at this point, he still may not understand why.

Libertarians just don’t get enthusiastic for Rand Paul. When Rand answered a question about foreign policy, he quickly showed once again why almost nobody is excited about his campaign. He said we shouldn’t topple Assad and arm the allies of ISIS. But he still believe in intervention. He did not give a simple answer as his father would have given, which is that the U.S. should simply go home and stop intervening.

The other day, I was thinking back to late 2007. At the time, my daughter was a baby. Just down the street from where I lived, a group of Ron Paul supporters would get together about twice a week. I would head over there after work and do additional “work” for a couple of hours. But it wasn’t really work.

On an average night, we would probably have about 20 to 25 people there. We would make banners. We would occasionally call people. We would stuff envelopes with mailings. I really don’t know if any of it worked, but with the high volume, it must have made some kind of difference.

This was in a small office building. The owner of the business was a Ron Paul supporter. He generously allowed the use of his office space, as well as his office supplies. On many nights, we would all sit at a big conference table and stuff envelopes with thousands of letters and brochures. We would talk politics and libertarianism. When I look back, it was a really great time.

I was already a libertarian before Ron Paul’s 2007 campaign. It was surreal at the time, and it still is when I look back. All of a sudden, libertarians were coming out of the woodwork. When I drove around, I would see Ron Paul signs everywhere. I would see at least a few Ron Paul bumper stickers on cars every week. It was just a really exciting time to be a libertarian.

I remember the money bombs that were so exciting and I remember some people flying a blimp with Ron Paul’s name on it.

I hope to look back one day and see 2007 as the year that the world turned.

Back to Rand Paul, there is no excitement. There is nothing comparable to what we saw with his father. I don’t hear any stories of college students spending their winter breaks to go door to door campaigning.

If libertarians can learn one thing from this presidential cycle, it is that moderating your message is not going to get you anywhere. If anything, it will just turn people off. We have to be strong and have conviction. We have to stick to our principles. At least people will respect you for it. Rand has not learned this lesson, or more probable, he simply doesn’t have those principles.