If You Want to Know About the Democratic Debates

Don't ask me; we didn't watch them; I watched Siren while Georgia slept on the couch last night. We rarely watch political events, Democrat or Republican; that seems to me to be the time when politicians lie with the greatest facility and conviction. What I've seen of the coverage convinces me that whoever is nominated by the Democrats will have two main issues, "free" Medicare for all, including illegal immigrants, and open borders, so that all of Mexico and Central America can join the party and suck off what's left of the middle class.

But Stacy watches and reads, so DNC Debate Night I: The Aftermath

Stephen Green nails it: “It was a high-speed multiperson press conference where the questions were asked by cheerleaders. That’s the show the DNC wanted, and it’s the show NBC delivered.”

Julian Castro had the biggest gaffe of the night:

In the first 2020 Democratic presidential debate on Wednesday, former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Julián Castro said that “reproductive justice” involves allowing “trans females” to get abortions. Even in terms of pandering to the transgender community, this was a huge fail.
“I don’t believe only in reproductive freedom. I believe in reproductive justice,” Castro declared. “Just because a woman, or let’s also not forget someone in the trans community, a trans female, is poor doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have the right to exercise this right to choose.” He went on to pledge that he would appoint judges who would uphold Roe v. Wade (1973).

Get that? A man pretending to be a women (he may even be convinced he is one) is entitled to a tax payer funded abortion he will never need. When Monty Python can no longer be considered a parody?

Roger Kimball:

The best comment I heard tonight came from my 11-year-old daughter. Walking into my study at one point and overhearing something Elizabeth Warren said about ‘corporations’ or ‘Medicare for All,’ she asked ‘does she know about a thing called money?’

Indeed, while the liberal media seem to think Warren did just fine, her wild-eye attacks on corporations — profit is bad! — indicated a woman who knows nothing about money except how to spend it.

And the second debate? Democrat Debate Post-Mortem: MSNBC’s Obvious Bias and the ‘Beautiful Lunatic’

The 10 candidates onstage for Round 2 of the Democratic National Committee debates Thursday night spoke for a combined total of about 66 minutes. Four of those candidates (Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg) consumed 45:21 of that time. In other words, 40% of the candidates got almost 70% of the speaking time. It might be argued, of course, that the former Vice President of the United States deserves more time than other candidates, especially given the poll numbers as reflected by RCP’s national average: Biden 32.0, Sanders 16.9, Elizabeth Warren 12.8, Buttigieg 7.0, Harris 6.6.

Why, however, would Harris — currently polling at fifth place, in single digits, more than 25 points behind Biden — be given more time than second-place Sanders? Isn’t it obvious that the MSNBC hosts made a decision to lift up Harris, to the disadvantage of other candidates?

The MSNBC crowd still has not forgiven Sanders for daring to challenge Hillary Clinton in 2016, blaming him for undermining her support and (so they think) contributing to Clinton’s defeat by Trump. Furthermore, it seems obvious, the MSNBC hosts don’t want an elderly white male to be the Democrat nominee in 2020, so they deliberately set up a confrontation between Harris and Biden over the issue of race . . .

Marianne Williamson

and the "Beautiful Lunatic"? Stacy's personal favorite, Marianne Williamson?

Jim Geraghty rather humorously describes the performance of my favorite candidate:

I wonder if non-Republicans felt about Donald Trump in 2016 the way I, and it seems quite a few other conservatives, feel about Marianne Williamson. Marianne, you beautiful lunatic. Every time you spoke, I didn’t know whether you were going to do a rain dance, cast a hex, or hold a seance. On those rare moments you got a chance to talk, I leaned forward because I had no idea what kind of absolute insanity was going to come out of your mouth. It was as riveting as a hostage situation. She contends American have chronic illnesses because of “chemical policies,” she wonders where the rest of the field has been for decades (er, in public office), and her first call will be to the prime minister of New Zealand, and she wants to harness the power of love for political purposes. In many ways, she is exactly the candidate that today’s Democratic party deserves.

More seriously, my hunch is that the “beautiful lunatic” could have a Trump-like impact. Doesn’t it seem logical that an outsider candidate might have the best chance of beating Trump? If the system is broken, you can’t fix it with someone from inside the system. I can’t get inside the minds of Democrat primary voters, but there’s actual evidence that Williamson caught people’s attention: She was the most-searched candidate on Google after Thursday’s debate. Here’s a video clip of her debate highlights: