Vox - CBS Democratic debate: news and updateshttps://cdn.vox-cdn.com/community_logos/52517/voxv.png2015-12-18T13:00:00-05:00http://www.vox.com/rss/stream/94928712015-12-18T13:00:00-05:002015-12-18T13:00:00-05:00"Helping" Hillary Clinton with little-watched Saturday debates was a terrible plan
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<p>Democrats are holding a primary debate tonight, much to the annoyance of political journalists everywhere whose Saturday nights are being ruined. Most galling off all, this appears to be a <a href="http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/12/9699836/democratic-debate-schedule">deliberate tactic to minimize viewership</a> taken by the Democratic National Committee as a favor to Hillary Clinton, who wanted to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/09/21/how-democrats-got-bogged-down-in-a-messy-dispute-over-debates/">minimize the number of debates</a>. If that's right, though, the party has done its frontrunner no favors. It makes sense for Clinton to want to have fewer debates rather than more, but as long as Democrats are going to debate, she should want said debates to be seen by as many people as possible.</p>
<p>The problem, most likely, is the calendar was set months ago, before the first Democratic debate reminded everyone of how friendly the debate format is to Clinton's political skills.</p>
<p>She eclipsed Obama on the debate stage in her previous run, but as one Hill Democrat put it to me, "that was seven years ago," so her allies worried that she might be rusty and wanted to keep her rivals out of the spotlight. "The thinking that Hillary is awesome at debates really only became prevalent again after her strong performance in the first debate."</p>
<p>Consequently, by underestimating their own champion, the Democratic establishment has ended up doing Clinton a disservice.</p>
<h3>Debates have a downside for Clinton</h3>
<p>The Clinton campaign's basic impulse to minimize the number of debates, though not great for the media, makes perfect sense. She is the overwhelming favorite to win the Democratic nomination, and anything she says or does can basically only hurt her — not so much by jeopardizing her shot at the nomination as by getting her to make commitments that could hurt her in the general. Debates are, among other things, a mechanism through which party stakeholders force candidates to make public commitments to pursue controversial policy goals.</p>
<p>To the extent that Clinton can reduce the quantity of opportunities stakeholders have to put her through this, it makes sense for her to do so.</p>
<h3>Minimizing viewership makes no sense</h3>
<p>But the idea — whether inferred by Clinton's campaign or by her allies at the DNC independently — that fewer viewers is better for Clinton is a mistake. The main problem is that all the downside risks of the debate are present no matter how few people are watching. One Democrat speculated to me that the goal was not just to minimize viewership but to make the event look "insignificant" in the eyes of the media. But the reality is that if Clinton commits a gaffe, all bets are off, and it will be replayed online and on cable endlessly no matter how little-watched and insignificant the original event was.</p>
<p>In policy terms, too, the risk for Clinton has nothing to do with how many people watch Saturday night's debate. Any unpopular commitments she makes will be recorded by the media and by her future opponents. The Republican nominee and his allies will bring it up during the general election, and the media will be on hand to verify that she really said it. Footage will be available. The size of the live audience will be irrelevant.</p>
<p>Debates are, structurally speaking, bad for primary election overdogs like Clinton. But Clinton also happens to be a candidate who tends to shine in debates. She is not a first-rate orator, and her consensus-oriented leadership style tends to make it impossible for her speechwriters to craft truly excellent rhetoric for her. But she is much wonkier than the typical elected official, and she's certainly a better public speaker than your average policy wonk. Very few politicians — and certainly nobody who is running in 2016 — can match the sheer range of issues she can talk about in a well-informed, reasonably persuasive way.</p>
<h3>Clinton is good at debating</h3>
<p>Clinton's depth of knowledge and breadth of experience is a huge advantage in the rambling, unpredictable context of a debate.</p>
<p>But this really only comes across if you actually sit down and watch the debate. Everyone who <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/14/9528881/2015-democratic-debate-cnn">watched the first Democratic primary debate</a> agreed that her performance was impressive. But it lacked a signature moment like the showdown where <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/28/9633248/rubio-debate-bush-win">Marco Rubio humiliated Jeb Bush</a>. Clinton didn't deliver a knockout punch to Bernie Sanders. She simply looked a little more comfortable and a little more conversant across a range of topics over an extended period of time. It's something you genuinely had to see for yourself to appreciate.</p>
<p>A Saturday night debate sticks Clinton with the worst of both worlds. If she gaffes or decides to come out in favor of <a href="http://www.vox.com/2014/5/23/5741294/slavery-reparations-are-workable-and-affordable">slavery reparations</a>, the damage will be done even if nobody's watching. But if she delivers another display of consistent competence and command, few people will be around to appreciate it.</p>
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https://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9725206/dnc-weekend-debatesMatthew Yglesias2015-11-16T11:10:01-05:002015-11-16T11:10:01-05:00So far, the Republican debates are way more popular than the Democratic debates
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<p>The <a target="_blank" href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9728830/cbs-democratic-debate-2015">Democratic debate on Saturday</a> drew just 8.5 million viewers — by far the lowest of the six primary debates thus far. To put this into perspective: During the same time slot as the debate, about the <a href="http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2015/11/15/tv-ratings-saturday-nov-14-2015/">same number of people</a> watched either the Baylor-Oklahoma football game on ABC or the Oregon-Stanford game on Fox.</p>
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<h3 id="by-the-end-of-debate-season-republicans-will-have-reached-far-more-viewers">By the end of debate season, Republicans will have reached far more viewers</h3>
<p>We knew this weekend debate wouldn’t garner a wide viewership; Saturday debates <a href="http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/12/9699836/democratic-debate-schedule" target="_blank">typically don't</a>. The Democratic National Committee has been accused of <a href="http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/12/9699836/democratic-debate-schedule">purposely scheduling debates on days people wouldn’t watch</a>. But DNC spokesperson Eric Walker told me, "During the height of the Clinton-Obama primary in 2008, the highest-rated debate was 10.7 million, so 8.5 million is a strong showing historically for a presidential primary, and very strong for a Saturday night."</p>
<p>Also on Saturday, there was a <i>Dateline</i> special on the <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9732700/paris-attacks-shootings-hostage" target="_blank">Paris attacks</a> that drew a significant audience in an overlapping time slot with the debate.</p>
<p><q aria-hidden="true" class="right">"Gap will be between 130 to 140 million viewers — a number equal to the total number of people who are likely to vote next year"</q></p>
<p>Still, it was a low number for this election cycle, and some aren't convinced the Democrats will end up with many viewers. Simon Rosenberg, a former DNC official and founder of the New Democrat Network, told Politico that by the end of the primary debate season, <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/on-media/2015/11/cbs-democratic-debate-sanders-clinton-omalley-215908#ixzz3rf4KcUIm">Republicans will have reached far more viewers than the Democrats</a>:</p>
<p>"If averages hold, and given next two debates on weekends, six Dem debates will reach between 60-70 million viewers, or less than GOP has already reached in its first four debates," he said. "Gap will be between 130 to 140 million viewers — a number equal to the total number of people who are likely to vote next year."</p>
<p>Of course, these debates are likely reaching a lot of the same viewers, so saying these debates will reach 140 million <i>more </i>viewers is misleading; it's more accurate to say that at this pace, Republican candidates will get a lot more face time with viewers than Democratic candidates.</p>
<h3 id="democrats-have-a-big-punch-planned">Democrats say they have a big punch planned</h3>
<p>The Democrats have one more Saturday debate, six days before Christmas.</p>
<p>Their next debate falls on the Sunday before Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Normally, this would be a dud of a time slot, since it's basically a Saturday. But DNC officials<b> </b>argue that the debate is right after an NFL playoff double header, which could carry over a large audience to the debate. It’s a legitimate argument — increased viewership in programs after big NFL games is a well-documented phenomenon, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Super_Bowl_lead-out_programs">especially after the Super Bowl</a>.</p>
<h3 id="saturday-debates-are-rare-but-not-this-election-season">Saturday debates are rare — but not this election season</h3>
<p>The GOP also has a Saturday debate in February, but the Republican National Committee has scheduled a total of 12 debates, compared with the six the Democrats put on the calendar.</p>
<p>Saturday debates are <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9729370/saturday-debate-rare">exceedingly rare</a>, and we found out why this past weekend.</p>
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<h3 id="next-up-for-the-democrats-another-saturday-debate">Next up for the Democrats: Another Saturday debate</h3>
<p>The next Democratic debate is on December 19, a Saturday.</p>
<p>The one after is on January 17, a Sunday, which is actually a <a href="http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/12/9699836/democratic-debate-schedule">decent day for debate viewership</a>.</p>
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https://www.vox.com/2015/11/16/9742782/cbs-democratic-debate-viewershipAlvin Chang2015-11-15T10:20:01-05:002015-11-15T10:20:01-05:00What everyone gets wrong about the link between climate change and terrorism
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<p>During <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/14/9737212/democratic-debate-winners-losers-bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton">the Democratic presidential debate</a> on Saturday night, CBS moderator John Dickerson brought up the recent terrorist attacks in Paris and then asked Bernie Sanders if he still believes climate change is our greatest national security threat. (Sanders had said as much in a previous debate.)</p>
<p>Sanders <a href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/bernie-sanders-climate-change-democratic-debate?utm_content=buffer08c69&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer">didn</a><a href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/bernie-sanders-climate-change-democratic-debate?utm_content=buffer08c69&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer">'t</a><a href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/bernie-sanders-climate-change-democratic-debate?utm_content=buffer08c69&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer"> back down</a>:</p>
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<p>Absolutely.<strong> In fact, climate change is directly related to the growth of terrorism. </strong>And if we do not get our act together and listen to what the scientists say, you're going to see countries all over the world — this is what the CIA says — they're going to be struggling over limited amounts of water, limited amounts of land to grow their crops, and you're going to see all kinds of international conflict.</p>
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<p>Much snickering <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=sanders%20climate%20terrorism&src=typd">ensued on Twitter</a>, especially over that bolded sentence, with the prevailing sentiment that Sanders's argument was self-evidently silly.</p>
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<p lang="en" dir="ltr">Sanders says climate change poses a greater threat than terrorism. Icebergs aren’t blowing people up, sir. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/DemDebate?src=hash">#DemDebate</a></p>
— toddstarnes (@toddstarnes) <a href="https://twitter.com/toddstarnes/status/665715117221240832">November 15, 2015</a>
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<p>I'd say Sanders' reply was a little oversimplified <em>— </em>but the outraged reaction to it was absurd. The truth about climate change and conflict is more complex and nuanced than a short sound bite can allow, but it's foolish to dismiss the entire topic out of hand.</p>
<p>Sanders was arguably going too far when he said that climate change is "directly related" to the growth of terrorism. It's hard to find any climate or security experts who would make that strong a claim. The linkages tend to be more indirect, as we'll see in the case of Syria.</p>
<p>But he's perfectly right to call climate change a security issue. What experts will<a href="http://ipcc-wg2.gov/AR5/images/uploads/WGIIAR5-Chap12_FGDall.pdf"> often say</a> — and what the Pentagon <a href="http://www.defense.gov/News-Article-View/Article/612710">has been saying</a> — is that global warming has the potential to aggravate existing tensions and security problems, by, for instance, making droughts or water shortages more likely in some areas. That doesn't mean war or terrorism will be inevitable in a hotter world; climate will typically be just one of many factors involved. But global warming could very well increase the risk of violence, which is why many military officials<a target="_blank" href="http://climateandsecurity.org/2014/10/13/military-leaders-agree-with-pentagon-climate-change-an-immediate-risk-to-national-security/"> take it so seriously</a>.</p>
<h3>The complex, indirect links between climate change and Syria's war</h3>
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<img alt="Syrian Kurds Battle IS To Retain Control Of Kobani" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/7GwTBr9xG9Jp-4TEI_ARDppxHd4=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4268027/457549042.jpg">
<cite>(Gokhan Sahin/Getty Images)</cite>
<figcaption>An explosion rocks the Syrian city of Kobani on October 20 during a reported suicide car bomb attack by ISIS.</figcaption>
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<p>One place to see this dynamic at work is in Syria's ongoing civil war. Few experts would argue that climate change "caused" the horrific violence in Syria (much less the rise of ISIS). That's too simplistic. But environmental factors arguably do figure into the story here.</p>
<p>The short version goes like this:</p>
<ul>
<li>The Fertile Crescent region (which includes Syria and Iraq) has experienced periodic droughts for many centuries. </li>
<li>In recent decades, global warming appears to have increased the odds of more severe, persistent dry spells in the region. (See <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/112/11/3241.abstract">this recent study</a>, led by Colin Kelley of the University of California Santa Barbara.)</li>
<li>From 2007 to 2010, Syria suffered an especially brutal drought that, when combined with other social and political factors, helped foster civil unrest — unrest that later became the war that's still raging today.</li>
</ul>
<p>For the slightly longer version, I'll quote <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/09/10/drought-helped-caused-syrias-war-will-climate-change-bring-more-like-it/">from this 2013 interview</a> I did with Francesco Femia and Caitlin Werrell of the Center for Climate and Security. Here's how Femia described the chain of events:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We looked at the period between 2006 and 2011 that <a href="https://news.vice.com/article/syria-after-four-years-timeline-of-a-conflict">preceded the outbreak of the revolt</a> that started in Daraa. During that time, up to 60 percent of Syria's land experienced one of the worst long-term droughts in modern history.</p>
<p>This drought — combined with the mismanagement of natural resources by [Syrian President Bashar] Assad, who subsidized water-intensive crops like wheat and cotton farming and promoted bad irrigation techniques — led to significant devastation. According to updated numbers, the drought displaced 1.5 million people within Syria.</p>
<p>Around 75 percent of farmers suffered total crop failure, so they moved into the cities. Farmers in the northeast lost 80 percent of their livestock, so they had to leave and find livelihoods elsewhere. They all moved into urban areas — urban areas that were already experiencing economic insecurity due to an influx of Iraqi and Palestinian refugees.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Notice how many moving parts there are here. Climate change likely raised the odds of a severe drought occurring in Syria. But even without global warming, a drought might still have occurred — if perhaps less severe. So climate change wasn't strictly necessary<em> </em>for disruptions to occur. At best we might say it made the situation worse.</p>
<p>It also wasn't sufficient for conflict. A severe drought, by itself, simply isn't enough to trigger a bloody civil war. (Note that California hasn't descended into armed frenzy.) You also have to mix in poverty, the Syrian government's squandering of water resources, the influx of Iraqi and Palestinian refugees, and a whole web of political and social factors. Syria is an autocratic regime with a long history of human rights abuses. Then you have the fact that Assad responded to the unrest in Daraa and elsewhere with extreme violence. There was <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/12/understanding-syria-from-pre-civil-war-to-post-assad/281989/">a lot of tinder in this tinderbox</a>.</p>
<p>"We can't say that climate change caused the civil war," Femia emphasized to me. At best, it might be one factor among many that deserves careful study. "It would be hubris to say that we can precisely disentangle those factors right now, particularly in Syria, where there's an ongoing conflict."</p>
<p>That said, it'd be equally rash to dismiss climate change and environmental stressors entirely. Before the Syrian civil war broke out, Femia explained, a lot of security analysts wrongly believed that the country was stable and immune from Arab Spring unrest — precisely because they were overlooking the effects of the drought. "What [those analysts] had missed," he said, "was that a massive internal migration was happening, mainly on the periphery, from farmers and herders who had lost their livelihoods completely."</p>
<h3>Climate change can be a security threat — but it doesn't make conflict inevitable</h3>
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<img alt="Command Ship Blue Ridge Of The U.S. Navy Visits China" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/xS6gIbDg2xd_NOaEkKAgCmpBnBM=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4267729/52489294.jpg">
<cite>Photo by China Photos/Getty Images</cite>
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<p>Over the past decade, a growing number of analysts and policymakers, including the Obama administration, have started to look more closely at the ways in which climate change could contribute to conflicts and security problems around the world.</p>
<p>They typically acknowledge that the linkages are complex, multifaceted, and often difficult to tease out precisely. <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/National_Security_Implications_of_Changing_Climate_Final_051915.pdf">Here</a>, for instance, is how the White House describes the relationship between climate change and conflict/terrorism:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Many governments will face challenges to meet even the basic needs of their people as they confront demographic change, resource constraints, effects of climate change, and risks of global infectious disease outbreaks. These effects are threat multipliers that will aggravate stressors abroad such as poverty, environmental degradation, political instability, and social tensions — conditions that can enable terrorist activity and other forms of violence. The risk of conflict may increase.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>On this account, climate change is a "threat multiplier," and one of many things that can lay the groundwork for conflict. That doesn't mean more war is guaranteed in a hotter world: Consider that the 2000s were <a href="http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2010/jan/HQ_10-017_Warmest_temps.html">the warmest decade on record</a>, but they also managed to be <a href="http://jpr.sagepub.com/content/early/2013/06/28/0022343313494396.full.pdf+html">"the least conflict-ridden decade since the 1970s."</a> In many places, geographic or political or economic factors <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2012/10/17/1205130109.full.pdf+html" target="_blank">will end up mattering far more</a>. Still, climate is one potential driver to take into account.</p>
<p>As both Femia and Werrell pointed out in our interview, there are quite a few places around the world where climate change has the potential to make already volatile situations even more volatile. Here's one example, picked at random: "The South China Sea is a traditional choke point for shipping," Femia noted. "But now the warming ocean is changing the dynamics of fishing in that area. So beyond the food security issues, it’s also a disputed area. And climate change <a href="http://www.cnas.org/southchinasea">could exacerbate that</a>."</p>
<p>That helps explain why more and more military officials <a href="http://climateandsecurity.org/2014/10/13/military-leaders-agree-with-pentagon-climate-change-an-immediate-risk-to-national-security/">are coming out and saying</a> it'd be a good idea to figure out how we're going to deal with global warming, how we can make sure that the inevitable stresses and dislocations caused by climate change foster cooperation rather than conflict and violence. It's why the CIA has tried to study climate change and its potential impacts. (Republicans in Congress <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/energy/2015/03/17/republicans-push-climate-change-cuts-cia-defense-department">are trying to prevent both agencies</a> from doing this.)</p>
<p>It's also strange to continually obsess over whether climate change or terrorism is a "bigger" security threat. They're two very different things, working in very different ways, and not strictly comparable. It's a bit like asking whether the floor or the sink is the most important part of the house. There's no reason we can't pay attention to both.</p>
<h3>Further reading:</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/08/05/will-global-warming-lead-to-more-war-its-not-that-simple/" target="_blank">Will climate change lead to more war? It's not that simple.</a></li>
<li> <span>This </span><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/09/10/drought-helped-caused-syrias-war-will-climate-change-bring-more-like-it/">interview on Syria's drought</a><span> has much, much more on the nexus between climate and conflict. </span> </li>
<li><span>Peter Gleick <a href="http://See%20also%20this%20paper%20by%20Peter%20Gleick%20drawing%20the%20connection%20between%20water,%20drought,%20and%20Syria's%20war." target="_blank">also has an insightful paper</a> drawing the connection between water management, drought, and Syria's conflict.</span></li>
<li><a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/5/22/8639965/climate-change-national-security">What Obama means when he calls climate change a national security threat</a></li>
<li> <span>Here are </span><a href="http://jpr.sagepub.com/content/49/1.toc" target="_blank">some good poli sci papers</a><span> on climate and conflict in the 2012 issue of the </span><i>Journal of Peace Research</i><span>. Work in this area is still very much ongoing and hasn't yielded a lot of easy answers just yet.</span> </li>
</ul>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/15/9738342/climate-change-conflict-terrorismBrad Plumer2015-11-15T01:24:36-05:002015-11-15T01:24:36-05:00Clinton, Sanders, and O'Malley all flunked Saturday's debate on Paris and ISIS
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<img alt="The November 14 Democratic debate." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/_bbCiXvZjWwIYNO4M0QR2gC7Tr8=/0x0:3926x2945/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/47666009/GettyImages-497195554.0.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>The November 14 Democratic debate. | MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty</figcaption>
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<p>One of the biggest challenges of preparing for a nationally televised political debate is the uncertainty. You cannot know what questions you will be asked, so you must prepare for dozens of possible questions on a range of topics and keep it all together in your head and ready to access at a moment's notice.</p>
<p>The Democratic candidates did not have this problem when they walked onto the stage for the <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9728830/cbs-democratic-debate-2015" target="_blank">CBS presidential debate</a> on Saturday. Shortly after terrorists launched a series of devastating attacks in Paris on Friday night, CBS announced that the entire debate — later whittled down to the first 30 minutes — would focus on the attacks and related policy issues.</p>
<p>Yet somehow, even though the candidates knew the subject ahead of time and could easily have anticipated many of the individual questions, all three of them undeniably flunked it. Even with 24 hours to prepare and full staffs to help them do it, at no point did anyone offer anything resembling an answer to the question that this was all about: What would they do about ISIS?</p>
<p>If you were an American — or a European or a Syrian or an Iraqi, for that matter — tuning in to learn how the next Democratic presidential nominee thinks about the challenge of ISIS, then you might well come away from this debate thinking the candidates aren't prepared even to stumble their way through a question about ISIS, much less take on the group itself. Maybe that conclusion would be wrong — maybe in fact some or even all of the candidates would be brilliant against ISIS — but you'd have little way of knowing it from this debate.</p>
<h3>The worst answer of the night came from Hillary Clinton</h3>
<p>No one shined in this part of the debate, and everyone failed. But possibly the worst answer of the night, from Hillary Clinton, came in response to the most easily anticipatable question: Americans are not thrilled with the Obama administration's effort against ISIS, and yet you were a senior member of the Obama administration, so why should Americans trust you to take on ISIS?</p>
<p>The video here shows Clinton's answer, and it really has to be watched to understand just how poorly it went.</p>
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<p>She rambled incoherently, at some points simply listing things — irrelevant lists of buzzwords were a major theme of the evening — and offered neither policy ideas nor even vague rhetorical themes. She half-attempted to put the onus of responsibility on George W. Bush over his administration's understanding with Iraq on not leaving American troops there, but the way she described it was so confusing and dissembling that I doubt most people even knew what she was talking about.</p>
<p>The closest she came to putting together a coherent sentence was when she said "it cannot be an American fight" as part of a quote that I guarantee you will appear on Republican attack ads if she wins the nomination. I <em>believe</em> she was attempting to say either that United States troops cannot play the role of ground army against ISIS <em>or</em> that the larger effort against ISIS must involve local allies and cannot be led by the US alone. It's not clear, and we debated this some in the office. But the point is that Clinton conceded some political ground for basically nothing — she neither scored political points nor articulated a foreign policy position. It was all downside.</p>
<p>The rest of Clinton's answers had the political merit, at least, of being far too nonsensical to do her much damage. Consider, for example, a few more of her quotes.</p>
<p>On whether her support for the US-backed intervention in Libya was a mistake:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The Libyans turned out for one of the most successful fairest elections that any Arab country has had. They elected moderate leaders. Now there has been a lot of turmoil and trouble as they have tried to deal with these radical elements which you find in this arc of instability from north Africa to Afghanistan. And it is imperative that we do more not only to help our friends and partners protect themselves and protect our own homeland, but also to work to try to deal with this arc of instability, which does have a lot of impact on what happens in a country like Libya.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>On whether her vote in support of the 2003 Iraq invasion was a mistake:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Well, I think it's important we put this in historic context. The United States has, unfortunately, been victimized by terrorism going back decades. In the 1980s, it was in Beirut, Lebanon, under president Reagan's administration, and 258 Americans, Marines, embassy personnel, and others were murdered. We also had attacks on two of our embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. When my husband was president. Again, Americans murdered. And then, of course, 9/11 happened, which happened before there was an invasion of Iraq. I have said the invasion of Iraq was a mistake. But I think if we're ever going to really tackle the problems posed by jihadi extreme terrorism, we need to understand it and realize that it has antecedents to what happened in Iraq and we have to continue to be vigilant about it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Even her opening statement — which she had the opportunity to memorize in advance — was gibberish:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Well, our prayers are with the people of France tonight, but that is not enough. We need to have a resolve that will bring the world together to root out the kind of radical jihadist ideology that motivates organizations like ISIS, a barbaric, ruthless, violent jihadist terrorist group. This election is not only about electing a president. It's also about choosing our next commander in chief. And I will be laying out in detail what I think we need to do with our friends and allies in Europe and elsewhere to do a better job of coordinating efforts against the scourge of terrorism. Our country deserves no less because all of the other issues we want to deal with depend upon us being secure and strong.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>When you look at the individual words, they make sense in a foreign policy presidential debate. But they have been strung together in a way that makes little sense, and often has nothing to do with the topic at hand. At best, you have meaningless platitudes like, "We have to do more on foreign matters." But mostly it's just gobbledegook.</p>
<h3>Martin O'Malley made every mistake Clinton made but a little bit worse</h3>
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<p class="caption">Martin O'Malley makes an effort. (MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty)</p>
<p>If former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley is indeed angling to be Hillary Clinton's vice presidential pick, as some speculate, then he played to form on Saturday night by following Clinton's stumbling lead, every painful step of the way, but still underperforming her just a little bit.</p>
<p>Take, for example, his statement on what to do about ISIS. Again, I need to reiterate, this is the question that every candidate knew absolutely and hours in advance would be asked. Yet, like Clinton, what he came in with was a bunch of rambling that veered between nonsense and pablum:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>This actually is America's fight. It cannot solely be America's fight. America is best when we work in collaboration with our allies. America is best when we are actually standing up to evil in this world. And ISIS, make no mistake about it, is an evil in this world. ISIS has brought down a Russian airliner. ISIS has now attacked a western democracy in France. And we do have a role in this. Not solely ours, but we must work collaboratively with other nations. The great failing of these last 10 or 15 years, John, has been our failing of human intelligence on the ground. Our role in the world is not to roam the globe looking for new dictators to topple. Our role in the world is to make ourselves a beacon of hope. Make ourselves stronger at home, but also our role in the world, yes, is also to confront evil when it rises.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>"Make ourselves stronger at home, but also our role in the world, yes, is also to confront evil when it rises." Too long to put on a bumper sticker, but maybe it'll fit on an inspirational poster.</p>
<p>O'Malley also got an entirely foreseeable question on whether he was prepared to handle tough foreign policy challenges as someone with little international experience. In his answer, he seemed to start each sentence with a prepackaged talking point — fair enough, it's worth planning ahead — but then immediately lose the threat, forget the point he wanted to make, and then try again with a totally different talking point:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>John, the world is a very dangerous place but the world is not too dangerous a place for the United States of America provided we act according to our principles, providing we act intelligently. Let's talk about this arc of instability that secretary Clinton talked about. Libya is now a mess. Syria is a mess. Iraq is a mess. Afghanistan is a mess.</p>
<p>As Americans, we have shown ourselves to have the greatest military on the face of the planet, but we are not so very good at anticipating threats and appreciating just how difficult it is to build up stable democracies, to make the investments and sustainable development that we must as a nation if we are to attack the root causes of these sorts of instability.</p>
<p>And I wanted to add one other thing, John, and I think it's important for all of us on this stage. I was in Burlington, Iowa, and a mom of a service member of ours who served two duties in Iraq said, "Governor O'Malley, please, when you're with your other candidates and colleagues on stage, please don't use the term 'boots on the ground'. Let's don't use the term 'boots on the ground'. My son is not a pair of boots on the ground.</p>
<p>These are American soldiers and we fail them when we fail to take into account what happens the day after a dictator falls and when we fail to act when a whole of government approach with sustainable development, diplomacy, and our economic power in align with our principles.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I am literally baffled by these answers from Clinton and O'Malley.</p>
<p>I can understand being ruffled by a tough question or caught off guard by a shot from another candidate. What I cannot understand is this: All the candidates knew 24-plus hours in advance that they would get some form of the question, "What would you do as president about ISIS?" They knew they would have just a few seconds of airtime to answer.</p>
<p>All they had to do was formulate some talking points — in many cases already available on their own websites! — memorize them, and spit them back out when the time came. Couldn't be easier. Neither seems to have done this.</p>
<h3>Bernie Sanders came into the debate not wanting to talk foreign policy and was surprisingly successful at that</h3>
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<p class="caption">(MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty)</p>
<p>In the hours before the CBS debate, Sanders's campaign team <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/politics/sanders-aide-pushes-back-against-cbs-switch-to-215805298.html">fought</a> with CBS not to make foreign policy and national security the entire focus of the debate. And they succeeded, getting the network to dedicate only the first half-hour to those topics.</p>
<p>When the debate began, the first prompt was for each candidate to give a one-minute opening statement specifically on the attack in Paris. Sanders's response to this was pretty simple: He dedicated two sentences to the attack and spent the rest of it talking about American economic inequality. He made no transition and no attempt to link the two.</p>
<p>Economic inequality is indeed an important issue. But by dodging the prompt of talking about Paris, Sanders ended up sending the same message that his campaign team sent when it lobbied CBS not to focus on the attacks: He is just not really prepared to talk about foreign policy and national security. Being unable to discuss those issues does not lend a lot of confidence he would be well-suited to lead on them.</p>
<p>The irony is that Sanders actually had the best performance of the three candidates on foreign policy. It's not that he offered brilliant ideas for dealing with ISIS, or even any ideas at all. Like the other candidates, he said nothing of value about what he would do. Unlike the other candidates, he at least did a good job of articulating what he would <em>not</em> do.</p>
<p>Sanders made clear argument for why he would not maintain heavy military spending on non-terror threats and why he would not support regime change. Fair enough! Viewers hoping for answers on the topic of the night, what to do about ISIS, did not get an answer.</p>
<p>The closest viewers got was this, in response to a question from the moderator on whether it was important to use the phrase "radical Islam" when talking about terror groups:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I don't think the term is what's important. What is important to understand is we have organizations, whether it is ISIS or al-Qaeda, who do believe we should go back several thousand years. We should make women third-class citizens, that we should allow children to be sexually assaulted, that they are a danger to modern society, and that this world, with American leadership, can and must come together to destroy them. We can do that. And it requires an entire world to come together, including in a very active way the Muslim nations.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Sanders separately argued that the ISIS conflict was "a war for the soul of Islam" and that it was to "the Muslim nations in the region" to "lead the effort" with "support" from the US.</p>
<p>Also unlike the other candidates, Sanders was pretty good at deflecting the questions he did not want to answer. When the moderator tried to nail him down on how many Syrian refugees he thinks the US should accept, a subject on which he's been vague, Sanders said he couldn't give a number, and then pivoted to arguing that US military spending was too high.</p>
<p>He scraped through it, in other words, without the self-inflicted of the other candidates — but that's about it. So I suppose on that metric, he won, but it's not much a victory.</p>
<h3></h3>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/15/9737412/democratic-debate-paris-isis-bernie-sanders-hillary-clintonMax Fisher2015-11-15T01:02:53-05:002015-11-15T01:02:53-05:00Bernie Sanders: People are “shouting” about guns, but “not you, Secretary Clinton”
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<p>At the second <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9728830/cbs-democratic-debate-2015" target="_blank">Democratic presidential debate</a>, Bernie Sanders repeated a talking point about guns and "shouting" that helped spark a <a href="http://www.vox.com/identities/2015/11/5/9671830/bernie-sanders-sexism">controversy over sexism</a>. And he said it in a way that sounded like a joking, self-conscious reference to the earlier incident.</p>
<p>"People all over this country — not you, Secretary Clinton — are shouting at each other" over guns, Sanders said.</p>
<p>At the previous debate, during an exchange on guns, Sanders had rebuked Clinton by saying that "all the shouting in the world" wouldn't accomplish what we'd like on gun violence. The Clinton campaign later responded to this by saying that "when women talk, some people <em>think</em> we're shouting."</p>
<p>Sanders's callback to the "shouting" quote was a somewhat awkward and defensive moment that probably would have been better left unsaid. Defensiveness over Clinton's quote <a href="http://www.vox.com/identities/2015/11/5/9671830/bernie-sanders-sexism" target="_blank">helped lead</a> to a much bigger <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-10-28/bernie-sanders-brain-trust-says-he-can-beat-hillary-clinton" target="_blank">gaffe</a> from the campaign manager about how Hillary would make a "great vice president."</p>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/15/9737360/sanders-shouting-againEmily Crockett2015-11-14T23:58:03-05:002015-11-14T23:58:03-05:00The Democratic debate's Wall Street fight left both Clinton and Sanders looking bad
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<p>Two things are true about Hillary Clinton on financial regulation:</p>
<p> </p>
<ol>
<li>
<span>She has </span><a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/9/9483329/hillary-clinton-banks" style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.65; background-color: #ffffff;">the most detailed</a><span>, and </span><a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/8/9482521/hillary-clinton-financial-reform" style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.65; background-color: #ffffff;">arguably the strongest</a><span>, financial regulation plan of the three Democratic candidates.</span>
</li>
<li><span>Wall Street skeptics don't really trust her to implement said plan.</span></li>
</ol>
<p> </p>
<p>Understanding those two points helps make sense of a fairly confusing, but important, exchange at the second Democratic debate — an exchange in which both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders played into their critics' hands.</p>
<h3>Hillary Clinton: Wall Street supported me because 9/11</h3>
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<p>It began when moderator John Dickerson asked Hillary Clinton, "You have received money from Wall Street. How will you convince voters you will level the playing field when you're indebted to some of its biggest players?"</p>
<p>Clinton initially tried to talk about her financial regulation plan, but Sanders wouldn't let her escape the issue of donations.</p>
<p>"Let's not be naive about it," Sanders said. "Why, over her political career, has Wall Street been the major campaign contributor to Hillary Clinton? Now, maybe they're dumb and they don't know what they're going to get, but I don't think so."</p>
<p>In response, Clinton, unwisely, played the 9/11 card.</p>
<p>"I represented New York on 9/11 when we were attacked," she replied. "Where were we attacked? We were attacked in downtown Manhattan, where Wall Street is. I did spend a whole lot of time and effort helping them rebuild. That was good for New York. It was good for the economy, and it was a way to rebuke the terrorists who had attacked our country."</p>
<p>Clinton's answer was bizarre — she doesn't believe Wall Street has backed her many campaigns primarily because of 9/11, and it's borderline insulting that she thinks anyone else would believe it, either.</p>
<p>Clinton didn't trust the audience with the truth. Wall Street supported her candidacy because both she and her husband often backed legislation Wall Street supported, because Wall Street routinely tries to buy favor with prominent politicians of both parties, and because many on Wall Street are Democrats who supported Clinton for other reasons.</p>
<p>That doesn't mean Clinton always backed Wall Street's priorities, or even that Wall Street was unusually positive toward Clinton — the financial industry also funneled <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?cycle=2008&cid=N00009638">a massive amount of money</a> to Barack Obama in 2008.</p>
<h3>Why Paul Krugman backs Hillary Clinton on financial regulation</h3>
<p>Clinton's answer was so absurd that it reappeared later in the debate. CBS put up a tweet where someone said, "I've never seen a candidate invoke 9/11 to justify millions of Wall Street donations until now."</p>
<p>Sanders saw his opportunity. "The major issue right now is whether or not we reestablish Glass-Steagall," he said, referring to the law that broke commercial and investment banks apart, and that Bill Clinton repealed.</p>
<p>But whether you support or oppose the repeal of Glass-Steagall, it's <a href="http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/aug/19/bill-clinton/bill-clinton-glass-steagall-had-nothing-do-financi/">very hard to argue</a> that its repeal was a major cause of the 2007 financial crisis or that its restoration is the most pressing financial reform issue now.</p>
<p>This speaks to Sanders's problem when it comes to Wall Street reform: His instincts on the issue thrill reformers — Wall Street's "business model is greed and fraud," he said — but his apparent familiarity with the details of the issue often leaves something to be desired.</p>
<p>This gave Clinton an opportunity to demonstrate her superior knowledge of financial regulation — and the serious endorsements her plan has racked up:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I will tell you who is on my side. Paul Krugman, the Nobel prize-winning economist who said my plan for what we should do to rein in Wall Street was more comprehensive and better. Paul Volcker, one of the leading lights of trying to rein in the excesses, has also said he does not support reinstating Glass-Steagall. This may seem like a bit of an arcane discussion. I have nothing against the passion that my two friends here have about reinstating Glass-Steagall. I just don't think it would get the job done. I'm all about making sure we actually get results for whatever we do.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The Krugman <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/16/opinion/democrats-republicans-and-wall-street-tycoons.html?_r=0">column</a> here is worth quoting, because it nicely sums up the real argument the candidates are having:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Mrs. Clinton had the better case. Mr. Sanders has been focused on restoring Glass-Steagall, the rule that separated deposit-taking banks from riskier wheeling and dealing. And repealing Glass-Steagall was indeed a mistake. But it’s not what caused the financial crisis, which arose instead from "shadow banks" like Lehman Brothers, which don’t take deposits but can nonetheless wreak havoc when they fail. Mrs. Clinton has laid out a <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/8/9482521/hillary-clinton-financial-reform">plan to rein in</a> shadow banks; so far, Mr. Sanders hasn’t.</p>
<p>But is Mrs. Clinton’s promise to take a tough line on the financial industry credible? Or would she, once in the White House, return to the finance-friendly, deregulatory policies of the 1990s?</p>
</blockquote>
<h3>The real issue: trust</h3>
<p>Bernie Sanders goes further than Clinton in his promise to break up the big banks, but many of the problems in 2007 weren't located in the big banks, or even in banks at all (AIG, for instance, was an insurance company).</p>
<p>That's why reformers appreciate Clinton's plan, which digs into the incredibly complex details of the financial system in its effort to find the pockets of risk and make sure they don't cause another catastrophe.</p>
<p>Clinton's problem is that many financial reformers don't trust her to implement that plan — they look at the donations she's taken from the financial industry, and the number of Wall Street veterans she's appointed to key roles, and they worry that her plan, for all its strengths, is a campaign document that will be ignored or watered down if she wins the presidency.</p>
<p>That was the critique Clinton was given a chance to answer when she was asked about the donations she's taken from the financial industry, and she whiffed it — playing the 9/11 card wasn't just a bad answer because it was a bad answer, it was a bad answer because it suggested Clinton doesn't have a good answer and because it was a wasted opportunity for her to assuage the left's deepest doubts about her candidacy.</p>
<p>The result was that Clinton exacerbated the real problem she has with the Elizabeth Warren wing of the Democratic Party, which is a problem of trust, not of policy specifics.</p>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/14/9737250/democratic-debate-clinton-sandersEzra Klein2015-11-14T23:57:12-05:002015-11-14T23:57:12-05:00Here’s how Bernie Sanders explained his “political revolution." Is it plausible?
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<p>One of the most revealing exchanges in <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9728830/cbs-democratic-debate-2015" target="_blank">Saturday's Democratic debate</a> came when moderator John Dickerson pressed Bernie Sanders on what, exactly, he meant by that "<a href="http://www.vox.com/cards/bernie-sanders-issues-policies/bernie-sanders-revolution">political revolution</a>" he always talks about. With such widespread GOP control of statehouses, Dickerson asked, wasn't there actually "a conservative revolution going on in America right now?"</p>
<p>So Sanders explained exactly what he meant. Here's what he said:</p>
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<blockquote>
<p>We are gonna do a political revolution which brings working people, young people, senior citizens, minorities together. Because every issue that I am talking about- — paid family and medical leave, breaking up the banks on Wall Street, asking the wealthy to pay their fair share of taxes, rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, raising the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour -- every one of those issues is supported by a significant majority of the American people.</p>
<p>Problem is, that as a result of a corrupt campaign finance system, Congress is not listening to the American people. It's listening to the big money interests. What the political revolution is about is bringing people together to finally say enough is enough. This government belongs to us. Not just the billionaires.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is really a key — maybe <em>the </em>key — question of Bernie Sanders's candidacy. Can he really assemble a national coalition that defies the apparent laws of national politics — turning out millions of people who usually stay home, and winning over many white voters and seniors who usually vote for Republicans?</p>
<p>If he can, he might be able to enact an agenda of sweeping change. But if he can't, a Bernie Sanders presidency might not look all that different from a Hillary Clinton one — and perhaps could never happen at all.</p>
<p>Because Sanders's political revolution is mainly about <em>mobilization</em>. He wants to mobilize not just traditionally liberal demographics but also people who don't usually vote, and Republican-leaning groups like senior citizens and working-class white people. He thinks he can do so by unifying them around an agenda that challenges the power of the wealthy. If these people actually a) turn out to vote, and b) keep actively pressuring their representatives to pass an agenda, Sanders argues, then true change can happen.</p>
<p>Why hasn't it happened already? The problem, he believes, is that Americans are not convinced the Democratic Party will fight for them. As Sanders <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/7/28/9014491/bernie-sanders-vox-conversation">told Vox</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Are the Democrats 10 times, 100 times, better on all of the issues than the Republicans? They surely are, but I think it would be hard to imagine if you walked out of here or walked down the street or went a few miles away from here and you stopped somebody on the street and you said, "Do you think that the Democratic Party is the party of the American working class?" People would look at you and say, "What are you talking about?"</p>
<p>There was a time — I think under Roosevelt, maybe even under Truman — where it was perceived that working people were part of the Democratic Party. I think for a variety of reasons, a lot having to do with money and politics, that is no longer the case. In my view that is exactly what shouldn't be happening. Instead of spending all of our time raising money, I think we should go out organizing people and getting them to unite around a progressive agenda which expands the middle class, which tells the billionaire class that they cannot have it all, which says to corporate America, "You're going to have to start paying your fair share of taxes," which says we're going to raise the minimum wage, we're going to make college available to all regardless of their income, that we are going to have pay equity for women workers, that we are going to create millions of jobs rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure. You need a progressive agenda, then you need the ability to go out and organize people. When that happens, things change here; it's not the other way around.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Sanders argues that he's managed to do just that in Vermont. It seemed inconceivable that an independent "<a href="http://www.vox.com/cards/bernie-sanders-issues-policies/bernie-sanders-socialist">democratic socialist</a>" could win a House or Senate seat, but he did both by winning over white, rural, and working-class voters. Indeed, he was the first independent elected to the US House of Representatives in 40 years. This past success is why he's so convinced that his model can work nationally, too.</p>
<p>But if Sanders can't manage to conjure up this unprecedented mobilization, he himself has admitted that his presidency would fail to bring about major change. "Sixty percent of the American people are not likely to vote in the coming election," he <a href="http://www.vox.com/2014/10/14/6839305/bernie-sanders-running-for-president-2016">said in Waterloo, Iowa</a>, shortly before the 2014 midterms. "You think you can bring around change with that dynamic? You can have the best human being in the world in the White House fighting all the right fights, and he or she will fail."</p>
<p>So in a sense, Sanders's campaign could be either self-proving or self-refuting. If his theory of change is right, his unusual brand of politics will change everything — massive support from a newly mobilized public would prove all the pundits and the naysayers wrong <span>and help a democratic socialist do the seemingly impossible and actually win the presidency in the United States of America. And a world where Sanders can win is a world where Sanders's agenda may well be able to pass.</span></p>
<p>But if he's wrong — if he manages to win the primaries anyway but the foot soldiers he hopes will join his political revolution never show up — his nomination could end up a fiasco for the Democratic Party.</p>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/14/9737202/democratic-debate-bernie-sanders-political-revolutionAndrew Prokop2015-11-14T23:45:25-05:002015-11-14T23:45:25-05:001 winner and 3 losers from the Democratic debate
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<figcaption>Two of these people are having fun. | Alex Wong/Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>The <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9728830/cbs-democratic-debate-2015" target="_blank">Democratic presidential debate on CBS Saturday night </a>was really Hillary Clinton's to lose, and she didn't disappoint.</p>
<p>The event took place in the shadow of the <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/13/9732700/paris-attacks-shootings-hostage" target="_blank">horrifying attacks in Paris</a>, and as such, the first section focused heavily on foreign policy, an area in which Bernie Sanders and Martin O'Malley don't demonstrate much interest. Clinton came in for criticisms, but none really landed.</p>
<p>The second section turned domestic, and got livelier, but neither challenger really landed the body blows against Clinton they needed to. They had the material — her Wall Street ties, her more moderate take on the minimum wage — but she parried the attacks well, and was never caught unprepared. Sanders and O'Malley desperately needed big moments to give them momentum with the Iowa caucuses less than three months away. They didn't get those moments, and so Clinton won by default.</p>
<h3>Winner: Hillary Clinton</h3>
<p>To some degree, Clinton wins by not losing. She's <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ia/iowa_democratic_presidential_caucus-3195.html">24 points ahead in Iowa</a>. Sanders has <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/nh/new_hampshire_democratic_presidential_primary-3351.html">pulled ahead in New Hampshire</a>, but he's from a neighboring state; he's likely to lose ground after a major Clinton victory in Iowa, just as Clinton herself won New Hampshire in 2008 by a smaller margin than she was polling at before Barack Obama won the Iowa caucuses. Barring major momentum to Sanders, or a major blow to her that causes her base to collapse, she's set to win.</p>
<p>And while she hardly had a perfect night, she definitely didn't lose. Despite being well to her party's right on foreign policy, and seemingly vulnerable to attacks on that issue, the vagueness of Sanders and O'Malley's ripostes in comparison with her considered answers was notable and blunted the attacks' power. Same with their attacks on economic issues. When O'Malley tried to attack her for only supporting a $12 — not $15 — minimum wage, he came across as unprepared, whereas she had a clear argument with supporting evidence. Her discussion of single-payer health care with Sanders was cordial rather than confrontational.</p>
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<p>Her most serious error of the night was implying that she received support from Wall Street, and took Wall Street–friendly policies as senator from New York, <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/14/9737026/clinton-wall-street-911">because the financial industry was targeted in the 9/11 attacks</a>. It was a bizarre moment. One recalls that the national policy response to 9/11 was not immediate deregulation of the financial sector, because whatever precise Manhattan neighborhood the World Trade Centers were located in, the point of the attack wasn't to reduce market liquidity (also, you know, the Pentagon got attacked too).</p>
<p>Even so, when CBS moderator John Dickerson used a tweet to confront Clinton on the answer, she backtracked, saying that she just meant that she met people involved in rebuilding the city after 9/11, some of whom were in finance and gave her donations:</p>
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<p>Well, I'm sorry that whoever tweeted that had that impression because I worked closely with New Yorkers after 9/11 for my entire first term to rebuild. So, yes, I did know people. I've had a lot of folks give me donations from all kinds of backgrounds say, "I don't agree with you on everything, but I like what you do. I like how you stand up. I'm going to support you." And I think that is absolutely appropriate.</p>
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<p>Sanders even conceded the point, saying he "applauded" Clinton for her work rebuilding New York.</p>
<p>Clinton's main goal was avoiding a big, gaffe-y sound bite on the order of, say, <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/6/4/8731957/rick-perry-oops">Rick Perry's "oops" moment</a>. It wasn't exactly a high bar, but she cleared it.</p>
<h3>Loser: Bernie Sanders</h3>
<p>To be somewhat tautological about it, Sanders lost by not winning. The one, narrow path he has to the nomination comes through a surprise win or close loss in Iowa, followed by a big win in New Hampshire — trusting that the momentum from winning early will carry him, much as it did for John Kerry in 2004. Given that Sanders is losing Iowa quite badly at the moment, and he has less than three months to go before the caucuses, he needed something big to happen to get his Iowa numbers rising again.</p>
<p>But while he didn't do a <em>bad</em> job in the debate, per se, he didn't have any real marquee moments that would make Iowa caucus-goers stand up and take notice. He didn't even have a moment as memorable as the time in the last debate when he declared to Clinton that <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/13/9528383/bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton-emails-democratic-debate">"the American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails."</a> The best he got was a good quip about not being as much of a socialist as Dwight Eisenhower, during whose presidency <a href="http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/14/9736994/bernie-sanders-dwight-eisenhower-tax-rates">the US had a top tax rate of 91 percent</a>:</p>
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<p>It was good, funny and memorable. But it's not an, "Oh, I should be taking this guy more seriously than I am" moment, or a sharp contrast to Clinton, who also expressed support for raising taxes on the rich during the debate. Sanders got in some real, substantive criticisms of Clinton on the Glass-Steagall law and her connections to Wall Street in general, and did a better job than O'Malley of jabbing at her Iraq War vote. But they weren't biting attacks that stuck with viewers. They were largely cordial and unmemorable.</p>
<p>His worst section of the debate, by far, was the section on guns. Sanders is simply <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/13/9514933/bernie-sanders-gun-control-democratic-debate">not where the Democratic base</a> has been on this issue ever since the Newtown shooting in December 2012. Representing Vermont, he voted to immunize gun dealers from lawsuits, and voted against the Brady bill, a major gun control law passed in 1993. But instead of straightforwardly saying, "I was wrong. I underestimated the damage that guns do in this country, and I will commit to tough measures going forward," he was extremely defensive, and repeatedly invoked his Vermont background. Here he is when asked if voting to immunize gun companies was a mistake:</p>
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<p>BERNIE SANDERS: There are parts of that bill I agree with, parts I disagree. I am certainly, absolutely, willing to look at that bill again and make sure there's a stronger bill.</p>
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<p>That's really, really weak sauce. So were his Rodney King–esque "why can't we all just get along" comments on the gun debate:</p>
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<p>BERNIE SANDERS: I don't know the difference on guns between us. But I believe coming from a state that has virtually no gun control, I believe that I am in position to reach out to the 60% or 70% of the American people who agree with us on those issues. The problem, people all over this country — not you, secretary Clinton — are shouting at each other. And what we need to do is bring people together to work on the agreement where there is broad consensus and that's what I intend to do.</p>
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<p>Primary voters aren't interested in "consensus" on the issue. They want fewer people to die from gun violence. Moreover, the reference to Clinton shouting about the issue was a weird strategic blunder. Sanders also accused her of this in the last debate, after which the <a href="http://www.vox.com/identities/2015/11/5/9671830/bernie-sanders-sexism">Clinton campaign made hay</a> over the gendered undertones the allegation had (would Sanders say a man speaking stridently about gun control was "shouting"?). The Sanders campaign vehemently denied that there was any sexist subtext to the comment, but talking about it at all is a loser for them. It's strange that Sanders would bring it up voluntarily.</p>
<h3>Loser: Martin O'Malley</h3>
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<img alt="O'Malley debate" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/Ss4KHUZZcRJTHsxuM2n2eSRFYhQ=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4267501/Screen_Shot_2015-11-14_at_9.08.39_PM.0.png">
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<div class="caption">Tough times for Tommy Carcetti.</div>
<p>Martin O'Malley was in a difficult position going into the debate. He's polling a distant third behind Sanders and Clinton, which means that the debate stage is the only time the Democratic primary is treated as a three-person race rather than a two-person one. On the other hand, he is, frankly, not a very good debater — especially on issues where he's not clearly distinguished from both Sanders and Clinton, which is most of them.</p>
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<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
<p lang="en" dir="ltr">This amazing moment captured by <a href="https://twitter.com/caseycapachi">@caseycapachi</a> of O’Malley trying to cut in on an answer <a href="https://t.co/FvcmiARZ4U">pic.twitter.com/FvcmiARZ4U</a></p>
— Tal Kopan (@TalKopan) <a href="https://twitter.com/TalKopan/status/665734768248668160">November 15, 2015</a>
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<p>John Dickerson treated O'Malley like the third wheel he was — forcing him to look stupid trying to butt in on other people. But when he did get the floor, he usually didn't acquit himself very well. His answers on the foreign policy segment that opened the debate were kind of incomprehensible. The only clear distinctions he made with either Clinton or Sanders were on issues of rhetoric (he seems to find the term "boots on the ground" offensive), while on substance he wasn't willing to commit to either Clintonian interventionism or Sanders-esque skepticism. He said he disagreed with Clinton on ISIS, then reiterated everything that Clinton had just said on the subject.</p>
<p>When asked about FBI Director James Comey's recent comments saying that <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/9/8/9273139/murder-rates-rising-sharply">more scrutiny of police would cause crime to rise</a>, he pivoted to a much vaguer and much more difficult question about how to repair the relationship between police officers and black Americans. He could've said, "Comey is wrong; there's no evidence that holding police accountable increases crime." Instead he wandered into murkier waters.</p>
<p>He brought up his public safety record as mayor of Baltimore as if it were something to be proud of, which was certainly a bold move given that he's usually blamed for encouraging the police aggression seen in the death of <a href="http://www.vox.com/cards/freddie-gray-baltimore-riots-police-violence" target="_blank">Freddie Gray</a> this fall. And he somehow managed to answer a question on the minimum wage by saying that the US needs to "stop taking our policy advice from economists on Wall Street" — right after Clinton cited Princeton economist Alan Krueger, perhaps the most prominent defender of the minimum wage among academic economists and no one's idea of a centrist Wall Street lackey.</p>
<p>O'Malley <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/11/14/9736950/martin-omalley-gave-by-far-the-best-democratic-debate-answer-on">came alive when he was talking about immigration</a>, in the context of both Syrian refugees and comprehensive immigration reform. But his preparation and passion on immigration just threw the rest of his answers into sharp relief. With Jim Webb and Lincoln Chafee gone, O'Malley doesn't look like the third serious candidate in a race of five; he looks like the last hanger-on in a two-candidate race. It's not clear why he's still in, and it's certainly not clear how things could get better for him from here.</p>
<h3>Loser: the viewers</h3>
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<img alt="They were as bored as us." data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/jTCgqtKWQxKfYXAxajwrZnI6mfU=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4267449/Screen%20Shot%202015-11-14%20at%209.05.19%20PM.png">
<cite>CBS News</cite>
<figcaption>The candidates.</figcaption>
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<p>Recent Republican debates have been fun to watch. They've had colorful characters like Donald Trump and Ben Carson. They've had candidates taking shots at each other and at the moderators. And they've had candidates <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/10/28/9633040/cnbc-republican-debate-weakness">blatantly dodging moderators' questions</a> in order to push their own pet issues.</p>
<p>Saturday's Democratic debate, in contrast, was serious, respectful, and dreadfully dull — without giving us much insight into how the candidates differ.</p>
<p>Instead of asking candidates how they would respond to the recent terrorist attacks in Paris, Dickerson asked about Hillary Clinton's 2002 vote for the Iraq War (she long ago admitted it was a mistake) and how the candidates feel about the phrase "radical Islam." It was an odd and mostly pointless semantic dispute.</p>
<p>Confronted by Sanders over her Wall Street fundraising, Clinton ludicrously suggested that the big checks were a recognition of her work rebuilding Lower Manhattan in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It was a strange, losing approach, but also one that didn't illuminate anything about the issues.</p>
<p>And as funny as Sanders's Eisenhower quip was, he didn't give a specific number for his preferred top income tax rate. Neither did Clinton. Neither did O'Malley.</p>
<p>Fundamentally, the debate was boring because the stakes were low. Hillary Clinton has enjoyed a comfortable lead throughout the campaign. If she doesn't make any big mistakes, she's going to be the Democratic nominee. So she carefully avoided saying anything controversial. That was good for her presidential prospects but no fun for the viewing public.</p>
https://www.vox.com/2015/11/14/9737212/democratic-debate-winners-losers-bernie-sanders-hillary-clintonDylan MatthewsDara LindTimothy B. Lee