So, I went over to my brother's house tonight to watch the debate, which was my first glimpse of most of the Democratic candidates in the flesh. Here are my impressions:
First and foremost, the thing that seemed most likely to turn into big news was General Wesley Clark's refusal to sell out Michael Moore. Moore has endorsed Clark, and Clark was getting grilled about Moore's description of Bush as a "deserter." Instead of disavowing the statement, Clark pled ignorance of the facts, but did allow that many other people had made similar assertions. I admire him for this, but obviously in the grand scheme of things it was a tactical error. I don't think there were any real hay-making quotes, but Rove'll figure something out. Clark also asserted that the Bush administration could have prevented 9/11 had their intelligence been better, and that their assertion that more attacks are inevitable is a disavowal of responsibility. This borders on Dean's previous speculation on the Saudi connection. Clark is officially more scary than Dean, though – he's like a taut-skinned Frankenstein.
Howard Dean was almost a non-story, but if you listened to what he actually said instead of looking for histrionics, he was still vicious – in all the right ways. He got in a truly excellent blow on Bush, calling him out on his use of the word "quota," saying it was clearly an incitement of racial fear. He's really unafraid to be a Democrat, and he's following through on his commitment to make race an issue, though I would guess that language politics probably go over most people's heads. It may only be a point of interest to guys like me, but I have so much respect for this man. In another somewhat obscure but vital point, Dean asserted that the Bush deficits were a deliberate tactic to undermine the government's power – which is the absolute truth. It's becoming part of neocon doctrine that deficits somehow "discipline" the government by limiting spending. Which is clearly a totally insane way to go about things, even if it did work, which it doesn't – see the editorial in the recent TIME with Dean on the cover for some fun math.
Dean also went briefly aggro on his Democratic opponents, essentially arguing that Kerry and Edwards' support for the war showed a lack of judgment, intelligence, and leadership ability. Without being obvious about it, Dean managed with these comments to be the most negative of the candidates. Dean also cited his excellent health care record in Vermont, how he provided health care for everyone under 18, and a prescription benefit . . . and then he quickly moved on to repealing the tax cuts. I admire the man for his honesty, but does he need to say it like he's promising to buy us each a pony?
Kucinich looks like some sort of benevolent forest creature – like he's going to sneak into your village late at night and make everyone shoes. And when he touts the need to emphasize "creativity" in schools, he's a little too hippy-dippy even for me. But I was quite impressed with him at several points – I loved his dramatic graph showing loss of new Hampshire jobs traceable directly to the WTO and NAFTA. "My first act as president would be to dissolve the WTO and NAFTA and return to a system of bilateral trade conditioned on human rights, environmental concerns." This was the only time in the whole debate my heart actually leapt a little bit. The crowd loved it, too.
The only other major revelation of the evening for me is the level of revulsion I feel towards Joe Lieberman - a.k.a. Pussymouth (really, look at those lips). His repeated insistence on the war in Iraq as just, his proud statement that he was the only Dem on stage who had fully and unwaveringly supported the removal of Hussein, his claim that America was now safer, his championing of faith-based organizations – all of this made me literally ill. This is what is destroying the Democratic party - trying to beat the Republicans by joining them. He did say some interesting things about legalizing the import of prescription drugs from Canada, though.
My (non) opinion of Kerry only solidified – blah, blah, blah. I really don't think this guy can beat Bush. He did get in some very important comments about Bush's cuts to veteran's benefits, but when he took a question about small business and very glibly rode it off the rails into a line about his ability to take on Bush, he seemed wantonly slick. He also evaded questions about his "yes" vote on the war in Iraq, which is for me the deal-breaker.
Edwards looked good, but failed to really make an impression on me, except with a bit of extremely trite boilerplate on "Washington lobbyists" and their influence-peddling ways. He also seemed to trip over himself slightly on the issue of gay marriage, saying it was a state's-rights issue, to which Sharpton swiftly and unerringly responded that human and civil rights should never be left up to the individual states.
Sharpton provided some good moments, but didn't seem all that sharp on policy. He got in the best zinger of the night by far, saying to Dean of the post-Iowa scream, "If I'd spent the money you did and gotten 18% in Iowa, I'd be hollerin', too." In contrast, he slipped into edgeless generalities when asked pointed questions about foreign and monetary policy. He called Bush out on the whole Mars thing - Whitey on the moon, indeed. Most importantly, he did get in perhaps the most substantive single point of the whole debate, using a condemnation of the death penalty's racial bias as a springboard to slam the way the Democrats let Republicans set the terms of the national political debate. He used an excellent example, that of Republicans' definition of "values" as a united nuclear family, rather than as a government that supports the health and safety of its people.
The debate was a smorgasboard of lefty rhetoric that warmed my heart. But I don't think there were any dramatic outcomes, and I doubt any Independent watching them would be likely to glom onto any of the candidates as a result. Also, without Dean in full dudgeon, I don't know if I could make a clear personal pick. Well, actually, still Dean. He kicked ass, just in a rather understated way.
