Donald Trump's fatal mistake in the second Republican debate

Carly Fiorina probably won Wednesday night's spirited Republican presidential debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. The former Hewlett-Packard chief executive wasn't a strong presence in the last half of the debate, but in a three-hour, policy-heavy marathon you win by having the most memorable (positive) moment. Fiorina had two, and they were early on, when people were tuned in.

The first was an emotional and graphic (but highly misleading) soliloquy on Planned Parenthood and fetal tissue recovery. The other (more TV friendly) one was her equally polished, equally rehearsed retort to Donald Trump's infamous criticism of her visage:

Look at Trump's face. He knows he was beat, and then he proved it: "I think she's got a beautiful face, and I think she's a beautiful woman." The Trump brand is built on winning, and on never apologizing, and he lost the exchange and tacitly admitted he was wrong. He flinched. It will sting.

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"Never apologize" and "show no weakness" aren't only Trump's brand — they were the leitmotif of the entire Republican debate. With occasional dissents from Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Gov. John Kasich (Ohio), there was no problem in the world that can't be solved by strong, unapologetic American leadership and military might.

"Having met Vladimir Putin, I wouldn't talk to him at all," said Fiorina at one point, referring to the Russian president. "Vladimir Putin is someone we should not talk to, because the only way he will stop is to sense strength and resolve on the other side." How to demonstrate that? Flexing America's muscles (after a trip to the gym). "We need the strongest military on the face of the planet, and everyone has to know it," she said, as if the U.S. doesn't already have the most powerful military.

Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) said that "radical terrorism cannot be solved by intellect," but rather by military might — and "the United States military was not built to conduct pinprick attacks." When Kasich rebutted that the U.S. also needs to "win the bigger war with the battle of ideas," he added the caveat that for "Western Civilization" to win that bigger war, "we need to make it clear that our faith in the Jewish and Christian principles force us to live a life bigger than ourselves." (Got that, world's 1.57 billion Muslims?)

Trump wasn't absent from that conversation — at one point he said President Obama "just doesn't have courage" and could have prevented the Syrian migration crisis if he had "really gone in with force, done something to Assad, if he had gone in with tremendous force" — and he didn't always back down with his Republican rivals. In fact, he had some pretty good zingers, which CNN was kind enough to round up for us:

But while Trump has the carrying a big stick part down, he isn't so great at walking softly. In one instance, regarding Jeb's wife, Columba Bush, Trump should probably have refrained from mentioning that he won't apologize for suggesting that she is the reason the former Florida governor has "a soft spot for people from Mexico," because, in Trump's words, "I've said nothing wrong."

Donald Trump is 2016's master of the innuendo-larded aside. Calling Jeb Bush "low energy" crystalized Bush's wonkish earnestness and awkward verbal missteps, without Trump having to spell it out. Asking if we could imagine Fiorina's face in the Oval Office was probably meant to play up the fact that she is a woman in a country that has never elected one as much as it was a reminder that she is not a super model. "Loser" is a more potent political cudgel than its crudeness might suggest — Trump understands that perception matters in politics.

Did Fiorina crush Trump's presidential hopes Wednesday night? Probably not. But Trump betrayed an off-brand weakness that suggests maybe he's more a glad-handing businessman than the kick-ass-and-take-names outsider rebel he plays on TV. He has been making cutting jokes about Bush for months, for example, but when Bush got in on the joke:

A congenial businessman who is willing to back off when he's wrong would probably make a better, more effective president than a my-way-or-the-highway bully. But the Republican Party has plenty of the former, and after Wednesday night's debate, perhaps one fewer of the latter. What will Republican voters think? We'll find out soon enough.