Pitting the moderates against Bernie and Warren was a mistake for CNN. I guess they thought Warren and Bernie were going to go at each other Highlander there can be only one style instead of a team up. This seemed like a cake walk for the both of them. Even Williamson got some good stuff in there which bolstered many progressive talking points. Tomorrow might be a blood bath for their guys Biden and Kamala. No one is teaming up tomorrow. EDIT: or maybe CNN playing 3 dimensional chess and didn't want Biden up there to get beat up by Bernie and Warren like the other candidates today.
It would be really great if everybody outside of that top 3 ^^^ dropped out after tonight. They need to quit wasting peoples time, these debates suck, not enough time for real discussion, or to even finish simple short statements for that matter.
Seriously. Delaney sucks so hard. He unironically referenced George freaking McGovern. This is the quintessential baby boomer Democrat living in the past and still afraid of their own shadow. These turds are the spineless sellouts that gave us Donald Trump and they cannot be relegated to the dustbin of politics soon enough.
I don't know how anyone could think Bernie or Warren are dumb enough to spend a single fraction of a second fighting each other when they are basically outnumbered in the primary 5 to 1 by moderates.
There's like 10 more debates to go and the requirements are only getting more difficult. Plenty of time to cull the herd. We should see a handful drop out or not qualify for the next debates in September.
It's the people that think Bernie and Warren are simply trying to get elected and want power. Everyone knows there can be only one. They think they are like every other politician and would throw each other under the bus. The Progressive agenda still remains the goal. Look at the post game on CNN for goodness sake, they are trying to undue everything Warren and Bernie did on the stage today because they thought they would go after each other and they didn't. Now all their talking points they had lined up are gone.. CNN is trash, man.
CNN did a much better job with time management, keeping things on the rails, and overall fairness. The worst thing they did was blow a whole chunk of time on a dumb lead-in/build-up. This format sucks but it'll get better soon.
The reparations segment was beyond embarrassing. It's just not happening, it's not. 78% of AM want cash payments? No ****ing ****, who doesn't? CNN continues to embarrass themselves as a network.
In general I thought it was a pretty good debate and for the most part the candidates did well. Warren and Sanders did very well considering that numerically they stage was numerically tilted towards the center. Unfortunately for Delany, Bullock, Hickenlooper and Ryan was that while all of them got in a few good points they are all way too similar and such a large field indistinguishable as the moderate white guy. Where they differ doesn't really help as Delany isn't photogenic (again brilliant King of the Hill reference Donny). For Warren's "epic takedown" of Delany I agree it was a good line and frankly emphasized that Delany is limited politically. Bullock is right though that that line works well in a primary debate it might not so much in the general. For the "moderate" wing I think Klobuchar did the best and she is spot on that it is ultimately about winning and we need to be straight with the American people about how likely or not these plans will be passed. Buttigieg had a similar message and I think he did a great job and kept up his calm and cool demeanor. Frankly I felt he looked the most presidential. Even Marriane Williamson did a good job too. The one candidate that I think did poorly is Beto. In the two debates he continues to seem more like an empty suit that while looking like a Kennedy doesn't seem to have as much command of the issues or even gravitas. I thought it was very telling when he and Buttigieg gave there closing statement back to back. One seemed like they were trying too hard and the other one I could actually see as President and it wasn't the older taller candidate. Overall this debate though was good for having a public ideological debate between the Progressive and Moderate wings. It was done forcefully but substantively and while differences were emphasized it never descended into acrimony.
