All around here and plenty of other places, the story coming from the CNN debate was the Left versus Center debate within the Democratic Party. If you’re cool around here, you lament that this does nothing but lead to the inevitable “Dems in Disarray” commentary.
Disarray is a stupid word for this “debate,” but nonetheless, it is a debate that the Democrats NEED to have. There is no getting around it, and if it all comes out in “Dems in Disarray” stories, then it makes the also-inevitable headlines that “Dems are United” that much more powerful. Worry not, brother and sister Kossacks, faced with the possibility of Trump’s reelection? Dems will be unified this time.
Any fratricidal squabble last time owed itself to the fact that Trump could not possibly win. Right?
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So, let’s not worry so much that — in the moment — this “Dems in Disarray” is a “thing.” Yes, worry about format and timing for questions more, as Mark Sumner has already noted well this morning.
This isn’t about that.
This is about the fact that the candidates are not embracing THE issue that polls indicate that Dems and Independents want to hear about: Electability, which translates to “how I am going to beat the ever living sh*t out of Trump.”
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Don’t just take my word for it. Michael Tomasky at the Daily Beast has a good rundown, matching my takeaway. (I will admit to not even watching the entire debate, I hated the shouting over each other.)
But I was watching for something else, too. Every poll shows that what voters care about is electability. Who can beat Donald Trump? I would have thought therefore that one of these people would have attempted to use tonight to scream: “Me. Look at me. I’m the electable one, and here’s why.” But none of them did.
They all took a stab at it here and there, and some of them had pretty good lines. But nobody said anything memorable. If you think about lines from this debate that people might remember three months from now, there was only one—Warren’s riposte to Delaney that “I don’t understand why anybody goes to all the trouble of running for president of the United States just to talk about what we really can’t do and shouldn’t fight for.”
“Nothing memorable” is the first, greatest, and only real sin in a debate.
Yes, it is tough when there is a veritable football team on the stage, but it can be done, needs to be done, and must be about beating Trump’s never-to-be-damned-enough self.
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I have heard the same lament three times this morning on my electric television.
But I haven’t read it here, yet.
Perhaps we are the more philosophical, wonky, types. I would wear that badge with honor. But in this election, I suggest we never forget that this is far closer to UFC than golf.
So, to all the candidates out there reading this great diary, please, please, for the love of all that is dog, talk about how the hell you’re going to beat Trump down … please?
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Peace, y’all.
We gotta do better.
My novels.