The clear highlight of Debate No. 3 was Texas Sen. Ted Cruz slapping down the pathetic CNBC moderators. It wasn’t pretty.

Top moderator Carl Quintanilla opened the debate with a meaningless question about what each candidate thinks his or her greatest weakness is. He then lashed into candidate after candidate, often with faulty facts, but always with loaded questions. Another CNBC moderator, the clearly over-her-head Becky Quick, joined in, asking questions that had nothing to do with issues.

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Finally, Cruz had had enough.

“The questions you have asked so far at this debate illustrate why the American people don’t trust the media,” Cruz said to huge applause.

“This is not a cage match. And you look at the questions: Donald Trump, Are you a comic book villain? Ben Carson, can you do math? John Kasich, will you insult two people over here? Marco Rubio, why don’t you resign? Jeb Bush, why have your numbers fallen?

“How about talking about the substantive issues people care about?” Cruz said to the loudest cheers of the night.

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A cowed Quintanilla tried to cut him off. Cruz was having none of it.

“Carl, I’m not finished yet. The contrast with the Democratic debate, where every fawning question from the media was, ‘Which of you is more handsome and wise?'” The crowd howled at the spot-on assessment.

Quintanilla broke in again: “You have 30 seconds to answer, should you choose to. ”

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But Cruz took over again.

“Let me be clear. The men and women on this stage have more ideas, more experience, more common sense than every participant of the Democratic debate. That debate reflected a debate between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks,” he said to snickers.

“And nobody watching at home believes that any of the moderators has any intention of voting in a Republican primary. The questions that are being asked shouldn’t be trying to get people to tear into each other, it should be what are you substantive issues.”

The crowd whooped, drowning out whatever Quintanilla was trying to say.

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