The post-debate analysis continues but the same characters will be in the next set of debates and the kinds of adjustments will be important if any changes will be made.
Noting that by that time Robert Mueller will have testified among other events, what will need to change if all the candidates stay in the race.
Some in DK have already tried to write off some candidates, but some are still viable and perhaps need to adopt new tactics, if they are to get to the September debates, having gained more support by a factor of two.
The second Democratic debate, on July 30 and 31, will be a similar two-night affair, with similar qualification rules. (on CNN)
But after that, the DNC has said, it’s raising the bar. Candidates will have to hit 2 percent in at least four polls, and they’ll also have to have 130,000 unique donors. The donor threshold in particular will be challenging for many candidates who currently don’t have national followings. So the third debate could well have a far smaller lineup.
www.vox.com/...
Some things are clearly different:
- Biden's remarks on busing in the 1970s were generally very unequivocal -- "I oppose busing. It's an asinine concept." "A bankrupt concept." "Busing does not work." He expressed pride for making anti-busing sentiment "respectable" among liberals.
- As recently re-reported by WaPo, Biden said things like this about busing: “What it says is, ‘In order for your child with curly black hair, brown eyes, and dark skin to be able to learn anything, he needs to sit next to my blond-haired, blue-eyed son.’ That’s racist!"
- It wasn't just words: working with avowed racists, Biden pushed legislation to make it difficult to run busing programs. There *was* a caveat: he said he would support busing in cases where it'd been proven that a community had been intentionally segregated. But otherwise no.
- Biden's campaign says that his position on busing would not have stopped the particular local busing program that Kamala Harris was a part of, since it was voluntarily adopted by the local community. In general, though: she was not mischaracterizing his opposition to busing.