Bernie Sanders Set the Tone in the South Carolina Democratic Debate

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Charleston—If presidential debates really were scored liked boxing matches, you’d have to call tonight’s bout a split decision. Bernie Sanders supporters will have been cheered by their candidate’s counter-punching against the Clinton attacks, telegraphed in the press all week, on his call for truly universal health coverage. And they did cheer, loudly, at his relentless jabs at our corrupt political system, which persistently thwarts any effort to reform our rigged economy.

Meanwhile, partisans of Hillary Clinton will point with pride to her effective flurry of blows on gun control, her obvious command of foreign policy (and inscrutable smile when asked about her relationship with Vladimir Putin), and, most of all, the way she used President Obama as a human shield all night long. It was as if Clinton was following her own weird variation of a rope-a-dope strategy: Instead of draping herself over her opponent, she wrapped her arms around an imaginary Obama and held on for dear life. From healthcare to the economy, her answer was always: I Heart Obama. At one point she even turned a question about her ties to Wall Street into an attempt to depict Sanders as an enemy of Obama

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But there were moments—like the exchange between a visionary O’Malley and a presidential-sounding Sanders on climate change—where it was possible to forget Clinton was even on stage. For a candidate whose appeal is so tied to her inevitability, that can’t be encouraging.

http://www.thenation.com/article/bernie-sanders-set-the-tone-in-the-south-carolina-democratic-debate/

[CrispyQ]

1. I would love an O'Malley/Sanders debate!

But there were moments—like the exchange between a visionary O’Malley and a presidential-sounding Sanders on climate change—where it was possible to forget Clinton was even on stage.