Keller @ Large: Who Stood Out At The Democratic Debate
BOSTON (CBS) - A few observations on Thursday night's debate while waiting for my first $1,000 check from Andrew Yang to arrive in the mail:
• For the first part of this three-hour endurance test, Joe Biden looked like somebody slipped some Red Bull into his pre-debate bowl of Wheaties. He was relatively lucid and passionate in his early defense of Obamacare, and zinged Elizabeth Warren for backing Bernie Sanders' controversial single-payer Medicare For All plan: "I know the senator says she's for Bernie. Well, I'm for Barack, I think Obamacare worked." He faded a bit later on, especially in a near-incomprehensible discourse on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but surely the audience was fading too. A three hour debate? No thanks.
• It will be interesting to see if Julian Castro gets any traction from his performance. He was the most aggressive antagonist onstage, especially in one sequence when he questioned Biden's capacity to remember something he had said just moments before. Beating up on Uncle Joe can grab you immediate headlines, but isn't necessarily a ticket out of single-digit-polling purgatory; just ask Kamala Harris.
• Give Elizabeth Warren credit for message discipline. She has repeatedly promised to avoid attacks on her competitors in favor of outlining her own policies, and that's what she did Thursday night. As usual, she was articulate and blamed everything on corrupt politicians and greed-crazed corporate executives. It's a formula that has worked well for her so far, and seems to insulate her from attacks from others, notably Sanders, whose electoral lunch she is eating. Will it be enough to shed Bernie in time to give her the clean one-on-one shot at Biden she will need to thrive beyond Iowa and New Hampshire? (By the way, I haven't combed through the debate transcripts, but my guess is the next time the word "Massachusetts" escapes her mouth will be the first time.)
• "Hell yes," said Beto O'Rourke, he'd confiscate military-style weapons like the AK-47 and AR-15 that wind up so often being used in mass murders. No argument onstage or in the hall, but an edited version of that comment will wind up featured in a Trump campaign attack ad any moment now. Nothing to be done about that, I suppose, but I didn't hear any of the other candidates seconding the motion.
• Pete Buttigieg became a player in this race because he excelled in a televised "town hall" format where calm, articulate oratorical skills are showcased. In the multi-candidate short-soundbite miasma of these cattle call debates, Buttigieg becomes nearly invisible.
• Full disclosure: I struggle to analyze Kamala Harris objectively after she charmed my one-year-old granddaughter on an Amtrak ride from New York to Washington. If she could capture the warmth and immediate personal connection of that moment in these debates, she might be doing better. So far, it seems she can't.
• I realize his loyalists don't care, but I find it hard to believe that Sanders' appearance (he looks years older than Biden) and vocal style (especially grating Thursday night with what sounded like a sore throat) isn't a turn-off to other voters.
• I thought Amy Klobuchar had qualified for that debate. Where was she?
• Question for Yang: will you take out withholding from that check, or do I have to do it?