BREAKING NEWS. As this blog was being prepared for posting, the terrible shootings in El Paso and Dayton intervened. Those dreadful events will be the subject of a future blog, but at the moment I can only ask whether this will finally be the moment when America rises up, says enough is enough, and actually does something to address the national disgrace of mass shootings (which total 251 for the year).
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Watching Round Two of the Democratic Debates was a depressing experience for many of us who believe that the defeat of Donald Trump in 2020 is a matter of paramount importance. None of the candidates seemed to demonstrate the combination of qualities required to prevent Trump’s re-election. While the Trump presidency has been marked by scandals and failures, Trump the campaigner remains a formidable force not easily quelled. Vanquishing Trump for a candidate will require not only debating skills and strength of personality, but policies tempered with common sense and some instinct for the political center. Moreover, if a Democrat is elected, he or she will need the same qualities to unify the country and to deal effectively with serious issues at home and abroad. After Round One of the debates, I expressed the concern of many conservative NeverTrumpers that the Democrats’ leftward lurch could only benefit Trump. In Round Two however, the Democrats largely doubled down on their devotion to the progressive extremism of Medicare for All, the Green New Deal and something uncomfortably close to open borders. Conservatives Bret Stephens and Max Boot among others wrote anguished but excellent columns summarizing Round Two and expressing their dismay at what they saw.
I want Trump to lose next year as much as anyone. The party on view in Detroit was not close to being up to its historic responsibility of defeating him and governing responsibly in his place. Bret Stephens
Don’t mess this up, Democrats. To preserve American democracy, we need to get rid of Trump. Then we can return to debating our normal policy differences. Max Boot
Political debates are a form of performance art, and the stars of the first night, and perhaps the entire round, were Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, both fiercely anti-business. The flavor of Warren’s approach and rhetoric was captured in a Wall Street Journal editorial:
Ms. Warren said no fewer than five times that companies want to “suck” profits from everyone else, as if they’re vampires providing no social good. She wants to eliminate private health insurance because the companies “sucked billions of dollars out of our health-care system.” She opposes trade deals because “they have become a way for giant multinationals” to “suck more profits out for themselves.”
The second night was notable primarily for the attacks mounted by many of the candidates against Joe Biden. As the overall front runner in the polls, Biden was a natural target, but he also happens to be the leading candidate in the “moderate lane” of the party. Thus the attacks on Biden, and indirectly even on President Obama, heightened the sense of ideological cleavage within the party. The general consensus was that despite stumbles, Biden did noticeably better than he had in the first round and certainly well enough to survive. There remain, however, serious doubts as to his capacity to succeed in taking on Trump.
The particular criticisms directed at Biden from the left would have little or no relevance in a contest with Trump. Still, one argument against Biden is that if he is the nominee, the party’s progressives will not be sufficiently energized to provide their vigorous support. Arguing for her more radical agenda, Elizabeth Warren declared in her closing statement “We need to give people a reason to show up and vote.” To that I can only say, “Good Grief.” The imperative to remove Trump from office should be more than enough incentive to vote for anyone not blinded by loyalty to the Republican Party (or, more accurately, the Party currently claiming that name).
To be sure, moderate voices were heard on at least some issues on both evenings. Those voices included Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg, John Delaney, John Hickenlooper, Michael Bennet, Steve Bullock and Tim Ryan. Yet their overall impact was diffuse and did little to alter the impression of a progressive locomotive gathering steam. Moreover, of that group, only Klobuchar and Buttigieg appear to be certain even to have a place in the next round of debates. (And Buttigieg has some notably odd ideas including doing away with the electoral college and radically restructuring the Supreme Court.)
Do Democrats need to reach beyond their base to reach the middle if they are to succeed in 2020? There is compelling evidence that they do. A Brookings analysis explained:
Playing only base politics is a dangerous game. For instance, President Trump may be making a big political mistake in spending so much attention on fueling his racist, immigrant-hating, xenophobic base. It cost him the votes of moderate suburban women (and other groups) in 2018, and Democrats and some Republicans think it will cost him in 2020. But if base politics is bad for Republicans, playing only to your base is even more dangerous for Democrats because of the simple fact that the Democratic base is smaller. While neither party can write off moderate voters, Democrats need them more than Republicans do. Table 2 shows that in the years when Democrats have won the presidency, they’ve done so by winning more than 55% of the moderate vote.
Table 2: Democratic share of the major party moderate vote
1980
1984
1988
1992
1996
2000
2004
2008
2012
2016
46
47
51
61
62
53
54
60
56
52
Put another way, progressives may do for Democrats in 2020 what George McGovern did for them in 1972.
Apart from the problematic postures of the candidates, the debates left much to be desired in their organization and the questions by the moderators. Taking the candidates in bites (or gulps) of ten was inherently awkward, and the moderators often seemed more interested in stirring up disagreements among the participants than exploring issues in depth. Many issues were touched on only superficially or not at all. In a blog prior to Round Two, I had identified a few areas of inquiry, suggesting that the moderators:
a) not only attempt to pin down the participants on the particulars of how they will fund their various proposals, but also elicit their views on the burgeoning federal debt. (According to a recent report by the Congressional Budget Office Federal debt is expected to rise from 78% of GDP in 2019 to 92% percent in 2029 and 144% in 2049, the most ever in history. “That level of debt,” says the report, ” would be the highest in the nation’s history by far, and it would be on track to increase more.”)
b) inquire what if any changes in the asylum law they would accept. (Should we be prepared to accept an unlimited number of adults and children with credible claims to be victims of gang violence or domestic violence?) Are there any changes in the law relating to legal immigration they would accept, for example, provisions with respect to “chain migration” and the lottery system?
c) ask if they support USMCA, the revision to NAFTA negotiated by the Trump administration and presently before Congress? Would they attempt to revive TPP, the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiated by Obama, initially supported but then opposed by Hillary Clinton, and abandoned by Trump?
Of those questions, only TPP came in for mention and, unfortunately in my view, only John Delaney indicated his support for the agreement. Even Joe Biden, who fully supported the agreement as a member of the Obama administration, now says that it would have to be renegotiated. Another major domestic issue, and one on which the moderators should have needed no prompting, is the opioid crisis that continues to grip communities across the country. Although the issue will surely demand the attention of the next president in finding and funding better methods of prevention and treatment, it never came up.
But perhaps the most surprising omission from the discussion was the matter of security for the 2020 election. Russian interference with the 2016 election, and the virtual certainty they will repeat their efforts in 2020, are facts that the President stubbornly refuses to acknowledge or address. And Trump’s Enabler in Chief in the Senate, Mitch McConnell has shamefully blocked important bipartisan legislation that would reduce our vulnerability to interference by the Russians and others. To McConnell’s immense irritation, his actions earned him the sobriquet “Moscow Mitch” and he may find a way to retreat, but the matter is one that deserves priority from Democrats as a major campaign issue in 2020.
Finally, the debates provided hardly any illumination on matters of foreign policy. Such matters may be of secondary importance to voters, except when major combat is in progress or appears imminent. Yet there is obviously no area in which the exercise of presidential judgment is more important. Observers of Rounds One and Two of the debates will have come away with the impression that Democrats are unenthusiastic about the commitment of troops and treasure to conflicts abroad, but so, for that matter, is Donald Trump. We have been given little insight into what strategies or approaches the candidates would pursue with respect to our principal adversaries, Russia, China, North Korea and Iran.
One specific foreign policy issue that was raised concerned an expedited withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, which most of the candidates appeared to favor. Only John Hickenlooper objected:
I look at it as a humanitarian issue. And with all due respect, you’re looking at the condition of women. If we completely pull our troops out of there, you’re going to see a humanitarian disaster that will startle and frighten every man, woman, and child in this country. And I don’t think — I mean, we have troops in over 400 different locations around the world. Most of them are small, they’re peacekeeping, they’re not greatly at risk.
We’re going to have to be in Afghanistan. Look at the progress that’s happened in that country. We’re going to turn our backs and walk away from people that have risked their lives to help us and build a different future for Afghanistan and that part of the world?
Hickenlooper might also have added that if our withdrawal led to Taliban control of Afghanistan, it could pose a serious national security risk of the very kind that gave us 9/11. If the subject of Afghanistan returns to the next debate stage, I hope there will be a more thoughtful discussion of the potential consequences of a precipitous withdrawal.
We are in early days and much territory lies ahead. But while it is too soon to despair, there are abundant reasons for concern.
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I have noted with pleasure and relief the withdrawal of the nomination of John Ratcliffe to be Director of National Intelligence. While many had questioned that nomination, RINOcracy.com had been one of the few to flatly urge its rejection. It would stretch post hoc logic beyond the breaking point to claim any credit for that result, but it was a source of some satisfaction. Let us hope the President does better on his next attempt.
Thanks so much for your insights and expertise. I agree that the so-called debates have been silly and, if I may say so, rather boring. Fortunately, most voters are not paying attention and probably won’t do so until late in the primary season or, perhaps, not until the general election.
Just about any likable and reasonably intelligent person should be able to beat Donald Trump (including Mitt Romney if he would only take the GOP nomination sway from him).
Democrats have always been a rather unruly lot. As Will Rogers famously said, “I don’t belong to any political party; I’m a Democrat.” But they will hopefully nominate a good presidential candidate.
As reported in a recent magazine article, Warren is a very bright woman who knows a lot about finance and poverty in America. She is also a fighter and a star debater. Judging from her campaign for Hillary, she sure knows how to dish it out to Trump.
But Warren must moderate her positions (merit worthy as they are) on healthcare and free higher education in particular. She does have a plan to pay for these reforms: a “wealth tax” of 2% on people having over $500 million dollars. This is indeed proper but will the voters support such a plan? (Only if is not perceived as class warfare.) And why would the government prohibit people from having privately financed health insurance? England, France, Canada etc guarantee health care to those who want it while also permitting anyone to pay for private health care.
So Elizabeth needs to drop the class-warfare rhetoric and get down to basic policies most people can be persuaded to support. She might then even get her “wealth tax” and use much of the revenue to bring down the federal debt — a huge problem that latter-day “Republicans” choose to ignore.
Trump’s biggest weakness is that he is not a true populist. He has done nothing to help working families, only promoted tax policies to fatten the super-rich. A winning Democrat will hit him hard on bread and butter issues, show him up to be a faker and a fraud.
Unfortunately, Biden seems old and tired of the political game; the gay mayor of Indiana cannot win; Harris is a phony with little more than experience as a criminal prosecutor; Klobuchar is sensible but rather too nice for the likes of our thuggish president.
I’m putting my money on Warren if she pulls back and moderates her positions. She certainly has the guts and brains to beat the crap out of Trump, the “just grab the pussy” president, the pal of Vladimir Putin and other dictators around the globe. His China-bashing is hurting the middle class and accomplishing nothing. His immigration policy, locking up infants and children in cages, is a national disgrace. His gutting of environmental and workplace safety regulations a giant step backward. His disbelief in climate science, pulling out of the Paris agreement to reduce global warning, a threat to the planet. And on and on.
Trump, so vulnerable on many fronts. But he is indeed dangerous and must be crushed and killed in the general election (assuming Romney won’t step up to the plate).
Sadly, I agree with all your points, Doug. As Monica MacAdams correctly pointed out above, it is not enough to declare, “I’m not Donald Trump. Vote for me.” The progressives are so full of themselves, they are oblivious to reality. They are not in touch with most of America and what it wants. Today’s local paper ran a cartoon showing a pollster interviewing a homeowner holding a newspaper headlining Trump’s Tweets and Dems’ Debates and asking, “If the election were held today, would you want to move to Canada, Australia, the UK or Undecided?” Great cartoon; lousy situation!
I am in deep despair, on so many levels I can’t even count them. But thx for citing the Brookings analysis asserting that if Trump’s playing only to his racist/xenophobic base is dangerous, the Dems’ playing to their (much-smaller) lefty-base is even more dangerous. Most Dems are not lefties, and this includes most black Dems, whom many white people (Dems and Republicans alike) mistakenly think are lefties.
The Democratic nominee will not prevail vs Trump without a ROBUST turnout of the moderate vote (Dems, Independents and anti-Trump Republicans) and most especially, the black vote. DUH.
While Trump’s increasingly-blatantly racist rants are undoubtedly helpful in inspiring such voters to drag themselves to the polls even if they aren’t wildly enthusiastic about the Dem nominee, that shd not embolden the Dems to dampen already-tepid enthusiasm by nominating a candidate whose main (or perhaps only) virtue in their eyes is that he/she isn’t Trump. (Just ask Hillary Clinton: a critical subset of these voters will just stay home or vote for a token 3rd-party candidate.)
Right now, I think Biden is still the best-bet (perhaps paired with Klobuchar as VP), notwithstanding his lackluster current personna (which stuns me, frankly; it wasn’t so long ago that Biden EXUDED energy). Nevertheless, he is still polling overwhelmingly-well with African Americans, and seems acceptable to moderate whites.
I might personally prefer Bennet or Bullock as the nominee, perhaps paired with Harris (although as someone joked, anyone who picked Harris as his VP might be well-advised to hire a “taster”), but those guys don’t have the chance of the proverbial snow-ball to win the nomination.
Suffice it to say, this country is never going to elect any of the current front-runners (other than Biden) President. PERIOD.
Respectfully, Monica, I don’t agree. The country is sick and tired of Trump’s lies and incompetence. A street fighter with brains (Elizabeth Warren) can kick his butt if she moderates her rhetoric and becomes more pragmatic. Right now, she’s just trying to excite the crowd and pass up her rivals, including old-man Biden and old testament prophet, Bernie Sanders. In other words, she’s trying to out-Trump Trump with a loudspeaker. I guarantee she will get with the program once she takes the lead. As one writer said, she’s making a big bet that people want big change that really helps working families, playing the outsider game, but is a master of the insider game.
Warren’s proposed 2% wealth tax on people with over $500 million could be wisely used to make America, America again. Two-percent, small potatoes for the super-rich who have, indeed, sucked up too large profits, freezing out the middle class and resulting in a level of income inequality not seen in the U.S. since 1929.
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