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Castle looks for different tone in second GOP presidential debate

Republican candidates for president meet in their second primary season debate Wednesday night.

The top 11 candidates according to recent polling of the 2016 GOP race will be on the stage for the main debate at the Reagan Presidential Library in California.

Former Delaware Governor and Congressman Mike Castle says he’ll be watching and would like see a different tone.

"I’d love to see these debate turn more, not around the ideological issues that people get excited about, but around the issues of really running a government correctly - fiscal issues, what are you going to do about revenue, what are you going to do about creating economic opportunity for people, those kinds of things.  There’s just not enough of the real things that really impact people’s lives as far as I’m concerned."

Heading into this debate, Donald Trump remains the front-runner – with another non-political, Ben Carson second.  Castle says those two will be in the spotlight

"Ben Carson will be judged a little more closely since he’s moved up.  I think Trump continues to be judged, and the question with Trump is does he have appeal beyond a sector of the Republican Party.  I don’t know the answer to that, but its something that needs to be answered."

The roster for this prime-time debate is the same as the first one last month,  with the exception of former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, who made the cut this time.

Castle says it’s good that Fiorina is on the main stage this time after a strong performance in the debate for second tier candidates last month.

Castle adds you may see the field start to thin after this debate and the next in late October, but it won’t really coalesce until the primaries and caucuses actually start next year.

Wednesday night’s main debate gets underway at 8 pm.  There is another debate for those lower in the polls at 6 pm.

Tom Byrne has been a fixture covering news in Delaware for three decades. He joined Delaware Public Media in 2010 as our first news director and has guided the news team ever since. When he's not covering the news, he can be found reading history or pursuing his love of all things athletic.
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