Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin praised all the participants in the third Republican presidential debate Wednesday in Colorado but singled out Texas Sen. Ted Cruz on
Newsmax TV because "he schooled the media."
"That's what the American people are craving — for our leaders who are already in these positions of authority to tell the media to start getting focused on the things that concern us," the 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate told host Steve Malzberg on the "Newsmax TV Post-Debate Special."
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There needs to be a focus on "the things that really make a difference in a presidential campaign because the state of the media … has been so poor and so unfair," Palin continued. "We have seen such a downfall of what the media has become [so] when Ted Cruz spanked them — they deserved to be spanked — he put them in order.
"It seemed like they kind of behaved a little bit better after that," Palin said.
In the debate at the University of Colorado-Boulder, Cruz slammed the media for not posing questions that dealt with "substantive issues."
"This is not a cage match," Cruz said before launching into his attack. "How about we talk about the substantive issues the American people care about?"
Palin called Cruz, Donald Trump and Ben Carson the debate's winners, adding that some candidates should drop out of the race.
However, she declined to be more specific, saying only that some should quit because "they are wasting ammunition on one another."