Watching Tuesday’s GOP debate in Las Vegas this is what Republican voters are looking for and have yet to find: a leader who presents a vision to us—the American people—of how he or she will reverse a widespread sense of national decline and then lead an American revival.

Instead, all we see are quibbling, un-imaginitive candidates who focus on small things instead of the biggest issue of all: how to inspire a dispirited American people and infuse them with a belief that America’s best days are not in the past.

On technical grades, Herman Cain withstood withering attacks on his 9-9-9 plan, but what might hurt him has now been established: an average taxpayer will pay more under his 9-9-9 plan than he or she currently pays. If that argument proves to be accepted as true, then Herman Cain’s popularity will begin to wane. He is so intertwined with his plan that when that plan becomes less popular, so will he. (This happened in 1996 with Steve Forbes and his momentarily-popular Flat Tax; as soon as the people looked at it and compared it to their current taxes, the Flat Tax—and Steve Forbes—dropped like a rock.)

However, Cain is an enormously refreshing candidate who you cannot help but like. He is the repository of most Tea Party voters who like an out-of-the-box, non-politician.

Mitt Romney seemed a bit more petulant than his carefully-controlled performances in the three recent debates. He clearly dislikes Rick Perry, even though Perry has flat-lined as a candidate and should basically be ignored. But Romney couldn’t hold back and really tore into the lost-looking, in-over-his-head Texas Governor. This exchange made Romney look like less of a man – and certainly less presidential.

Ron Paul continued to say things that previous GOP presidential candidates would never have had the courage to say—especially about aid to Israel, closing foreign bases, not building a fence on our southern border and the Occupy Wall Street protestors.

Newt Gingrich always does well in these debates because he breaks the format, critiques the questions – and at the end of this debate criticized all the other candidates for “quibbling.” He was—and is—right. You get to the White House by going big and high – not low and petty.

Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum were almost invisible in this debate and they have no impact on the race anymore; they have become vanity candidates who stay in the race through Iowa—and then disappear.

Conclusion: not the best debate for the Republican Party overall. We did not present a Reaganesque, positive, hopeful, visionary face to the American people.

Last night’s GOP debate may be a turning point in the 2012 Republican presidential selection process.

In front of a huge Fox News Channel and Foxnews.com audience—which is basically the GOP primary voter universe—Rick Perry had a golden opportunity to solidify his front-runner position.

But, instead, Perry fumbled the ball and came un-prepared, lazy and lackadaisical—while his main rival, one-time-front-runner Mitt Romney, has gotten his game in order and won this debate going away.

Perry had no jobs plan—even though he and his staff knew it would be the first question asked!

All night, Perry looked befuddled and repeatedly stumbled on his pre-cooked lines. His attacks on Romney fell flat—while Romney exploited the debate rule where, if your name was mentioned, you automatically got a 30-second rebuttal. So Romney cleverly did not mention Perry as he attacked him—and simultaneously explained his own suddenly-conservative positions.

The most dynamic moment of the debate came when former Senator Rick Santorum hit Perry on Perry’s policy of giving a cheaper tuition rate to illegal alien kids than to American kids. Whew! That is not popular among Republicans! And Perry sank like a stone from that point on.

The latest Rasmussen Reports poll of likely GOP primary voters—taken before last night’s debate—shows Perry’s one-time eleven-point lead over Mitt Romney has almost disappeared. He now leads Romney 28%-24%. The fact that his lead is dissipating may very well mean that Perry, like other out-of-nowhere candidates i.e. Donald Trump and Michele Bachmann, is also beginning to deteriorate.

Last night’s performance will only accelerate Perry’s decline.

Former US Rep. John LeBoutillier is co-host of CAMPAIGN CONFIDENTIAL, along with co-hosts Pat Caddell and Doug Schoen, airing live every Monday at 2 PM ET on Foxnews.com.