Democratic Debate Spirals Even Further Out of Control as Candidates Tear One Another Down
Democrats have been ranting and raving for more than two years about their No. 1 target, President Donald Trump.
That was difficult to discern throughout most of Wednesday night’s Democratic presidential debate in Detroit.
Some of the spotlighted hopefuls’ gloves came off so often, even “The Daily Show” host Trevor Noah gleefully took note, Fox News reported.
“This was the debate everybody was waiting for,” Noah said, according to Fox News. “Coming into [Wednesday], we all knew it was about beef.”
Indeed, the beefs among on-stage individuals were bountiful.
Bill “The Thrill” de Blasio, New York’s embattled mayor, appeared to be under the impression he was one of CNN’s debate moderators. He asked more questions — unabashedly directed at former Vice President Joe Biden — than he answered.
De Blasio wasn’t the only one trying to take the 2020 Democratic front-runner down a notch. Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Kamala Harris of California piled on Biden as well.
By and large, however, Biden kept his composure while standing his middle ground (front and center). In general, he deflected challenges and accusations about his past decisions with poise, despite reiterating “The fact of the matter is” to the point it became a distraction.
Harris, looking to ride her rising wave from the Democrats’ first debate in June, could’ve taken lessons Wednesday from her 76-year-old counterpart. When Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard called out her track record as the Golden State’s attorney general — including saying, “She blocked evidence that would have freed an innocent man from death row” — Harris’ manner couldn’t be confused with calm and cool.
Nevertheless, during a Thursday interview with CNN, a more visibly relaxed Harris said, “I am very proud of the work I did.”
“I’m proud of the work that I’ve done.” Sen. Kamala Harris defends her past record as California attorney general the morning after Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard challenged her prosecutions during a CNN Democratic presidential debate. https://t.co/oKUv3BpDpD pic.twitter.com/ZNB99UqeT7
— CNN (@CNN) August 1, 2019
Booker took a wolf-in-sheepskin approach, using his well-recognized Cheshire grin and arched eyebrows while lobbing such disrespectful digs as “You’re dipping into the Kool-Aid and you don’t even know the flavor” when Biden criticized Booker’s work as mayor of Newark.
That quip led to Kool-Aid’s official Twitter account scoring some free advertising.
#Ahem @SenBooker OH YEAH #WeKnowTheFlavor #DemDebate pic.twitter.com/Xaq1bbFifB
— Kool-Aid (@koolaid) August 1, 2019
As Fox News reported, Noah described one segment of the debate as “Everyone coming after everyone.”
For his part, Booker didn’t waste time recognizing the infighting, having asserted early on that nobody was enjoying it more than Trump.
On the rare occasions when those 10 challengers weren’t throwing darts at one another, they found common ground and predictably placed a bull’s-eye on one target: the 45th president.
During the on-stage contenders’ closing statements, at least, Democratic order was restored.
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