This debate is lame. Biden spent all of his time talking about Latinos when he was asked about Reparations for Blacks. I know...I know...he still has the support of the majority of African Americans...but it is an unforced error.
Right on Q, Elizabeth Warren went down a road base democrats don’t care about by attacking Buttigieg on fundraisers. She just keeps alienating herself from the Democratic Party every chance she has. Biden actually seemed with it, which is good. Then he got a big helping hand from Sarah Huckabee Sanders when she tried to make fun of him for his stutter. Perfect timing for Biden to have the lying witch of the east mock him for a stutter during a debate where he stuttered very little. Very nice. My girl, Amy K, rocked it a little last night but did not smash through. She will go up in Iowa - watch. The shine is coming off of Buttigieg. He is no better for the wear even though Warren’s attack on him was errant. But to be fair I don’t know how his swing through South Carolina a couple weeks back worked out - there hasn’t been state polls in weeks. Yang did well. He talks about things that resonate with people like life expectancy declining and depression increasing. These are the things people can grab onto. His only problem is his platform is too abstract. He should get a bump but he may not make the next debate. That’s sad because he really grabs those big macro issues well. Tom Steyer who? Sanders was the same as always. He does that. Nothing to really comment on about him it’s always the same.
I think Biden did well. He might have the secret nod from the MSM too. I don't know if any of you caught it, but they asked Booty about reparations for the infants down at the border, they then asked him about reparations for African Americans. He answered and then they directed the same question (African American reparations) to Biden. Now all night, they wouldn't let the candidates side-step the questions... they'd come back with "you didn't answer the question". But when Biden got the question about reparations for blacks... he TOTALLY avoided it with some other rant. Not one mention of what he thinks about reparations. The moderator didn't say boo and moved on. That was bs. I'll see if I can find it. EDIT... here it is. This vid will queue right there at the end of Booty's answer. Biden gets it and uses his "anger" to completely deflect and ignore the question. How 'bout an answer to the question Joe?!!
Yeh, they let Joe have his way more than once. Similarly, they asked him why the frig he/his administration did not close Gitmo. He said something to the effect "because we had a Congress" then went off on Israel, Bibi, and the Palestineans for the entire rest of his answer.
I'll give Yang huge credit on one thing... in all these debates, he has never sidestepped one question. He gives a direct concise answer to each question as its posed to him. No beating around the bush. I like that about him. Booty kind of does too, but he is waaay too polished. That cat has a politician's "dream brain" when it comes to answering questions. He is very smooth, a smart dude for sure. Anyone that slick with their words.... be careful. He's a master bullshitter... hopefully he means what he says... but he could just as easily not, saying what he thinks people want to hear at the time.
The thing about the debates is that when you are done analyzing everyone's little ups and downs, the reality is that there are still big blocks of votes that are not moving sufficiently to achieve major consolidation before the primaries. If the states polls come out at some point and show that, well then I might adjust my view when that happens, but I have to see it first. Chances are increasing considerably that primaries will go every which way, which is to say that we have convention food fight coming up. I continue to follow and accept the fact that Joe has a God-level lead in the polls. Excuse, I meant to say, NATIONAL polls. We are about to enter the phase where no one gives a shiite how you are doing nationally when they vote in their primary. Duh. Refer, to the aforementioned food fight. Because if it goes to a brokered convention, there is a whole different set or power players and dynamics beyond what the Morning Consult poll says. Bernie, for example, is never going to be the nominee but is tying up a massive block of votes. Votes that will need to be redistributed at some point.
I finally looked up what all a brokered convention entails. In United States politics, a brokered convention (sometimes referred to as an open convention and closely related to a contested convention) can occur during a presidential election when a political party fails to choose a nominee on the first round of delegate voting at the party's nominating convention. Once the first ballot, or vote, has occurred, and no candidate has a majority of the delegates' votes, the convention is then considered brokered; thereafter, the nomination is decided through a process of alternating political horse trading—(super) delegate vote trading—and additional re-votes. In this circumstance, all regular delegates (who may have been pledged to a particular candidate according to rules which vary from state to state) are "released" and are able to switch their allegiance to a different candidate before the next round of balloting. It is hoped that this extra privilege extended to the delegates will result in a re-vote yielding a clear majority of delegates for one candidate. The term "brokered" implies a strong role for political bosses, more common in the past and associated with deals made in proverbial "smoke-filled rooms", while the term "contested" is a more modern term for a convention where no candidate holds a majority but the role of party leaders is weaker in determining the eventual outcome. For the Democratic Party, unpledged delegate votes, also called "Superdelegate votes" used to be counted on the first ballot. Although some used the term "brokered convention" to refer to a convention where the outcome is decided by Superdelegate votes rather than pledged delegates alone, this is not the original sense of the term, nor has it been a commonly used definition of a "contested convention." As of 2018, Democratic party superdelegates will only participate if no winner emerges after the first round of balloting.
Quite so. That is one example of what I was getting at when I said that these guys seem even less genuine now that they have been on the trail and have become robots. Booty has absolutely followed a bell curve. Struggling for a long time but the direction was good. Then he was at the top, and now he is too-canned and programmed to play the innocent choir boy gig. Also, he has those "wine caves" to deal with. Yeh, that's fatal. Times have changed for sure. Being caught in a "wine cave" now is the equivalent of a being caught in a bath house in the 1950's I guess.
Yeh, or to summarize: A food fight. And just to keep things scary and keep some tin foil theories alive, keep in mind that there is no requirement that they pick someone who has even announced or been running at that point. Hillary knows this.