CNN hosted the Democratic Debate in Michigan between former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders, the two remaining candidates. The debate was moderated by Anderson Cooper.
As a conservative, watching the Democratic debates is a bit surreal. Trying to ignore the issues is tough, but the goal here is to determine how the debate will affect their poll numbers.
In short, this seemed to me a competition as to who can spend the most money the fastest. But that’s not the point.
Clinton -3 – Hillary has an interesting problem, in that she cannot be too aggressive in attacking Bernie Sanders. His manner is so genteel and grandfatherly that any attacks would certainly hurt her. She was unable to get the last word when Bernie cited polls he was beating Trump more thoroughly than Clinton and she seemed unwilling to address his attacks on her campaign finance. She seemed very willing to surrender as Bernie made point after point.
This was not a good debate for Hillary, she seemed very tentative. I do not believe it will hurt her substantially, since the Democratic debates do not have the appeal of the Republican debates at this point. However I giver her minus points.
Sanders +4 – Sanders expressed himself with confidence and got frequent cheers from the crowd. While the content was not new, the populist message resonated very well. He comported himself well, and polite and considerate to the point where one might call it condescension if one didn’t know Sanders was being completely authentic. This was very effective and Sanders was a clear winner.