Rand Paul is still running for president.<br />Rules call for only seven candidates to appear in the main event, and neither Paul nor Ms. Fiorina made the cut.<br />Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Ben Carson, Chris Christie, Jeb Bush, and John Kasich did qualify, the latter due to his strength in New Hampshire state polling.<br />Paul's decision to take his libertarianism home and not continue to play the GOP game did elicit a fair amount of social media snark, given that he's fallen under 3 percent in national polls.<br />"Uh, Rand?<br />Your campaign is not first-tier, but you're participating in that," wrote Laura Clawson in a post on Daily Kos .<br />Andrew Kaczynski tweeted out a poll question: "Better Rand Paul nickname while he complains about debate?"<br />The action on Thursday will be at the center, with Mr. Trump and Senator Cruz competing for front-runner status and Mr. Bush, Senator Rubio, and Governors Christie and Kasich struggling to emerge as a consensus establishment alternative.
