The Democratic presidential primary already threatens to rival the 2016 Republican field as the messiest in American politics. The Democratic field already has 24 contenders, contrary to the mere 16 of the GOP, and half today’s candidates have ran a mile and a half to the left of the average American voter.
Because the party will have a vested interest in whittling down the field and, by every polling measure, voters seem largely undecided, the primary debates will hold an outsize influence. But by every indication, they’re bound to be a train wreck.
The first, hosted by NBC in Miami at the end of the month, will feature two debates with 10 candidates a piece. Unlike the 2016 Republican debates, the Democratic ones will not be split with an “undercard,” or second-tier, debate. That means front-runners former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., could hypothetically share a stage with self-help guru Marianne Williamson; California Rep. Eric Swalwell; former Maryland Rep. John Delaney; former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper; Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan; Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet; New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio; and tech entrepreneur Andrew Yang.
Or, as Yang puts it, he has an “8% chance of standing next to Joe Biden,” so “the country can Google, ‘Who’s the Asian man next to Joe Biden.'”
On top of this cornucopia of chaos, now NBC has announced that alongside news reporters Lester Holt and Savannah Guthrie, MSNBC commentator Rachel Maddow will moderate the debates. Regardless of your personal opinions of Maddow’s punditry, placing an overt opinion host next to objective news anchors is a recipe for allegations of rigging. Seeing as the Democratic National Committee was already caught skewing the debates to favor 2016 loser Hillary Clinton, this decision won’t inspire much confidence in either the contenders or the electorate.
So we have two debates, both with too many potentially mismatched people, and an explicit partisan as a moderator. In spite of all of this, there is a series of topics and questions that could still make these debates successful not just in providing voters with valuable information but in helping the DNC quickly collapse the size of the field.
For starters, the Democratic base is clearly enthused with abortion as a litmus test. Every single candidate ought to answer when they think life begins, whether they support the Hyde Amendment, whether they support laws like Illinois’ which legalizes abortion up until the point of birth, and, if not, when they would support restricting abortion.
All six of the senators running for president co-sponsored the Green New Deal, yet not a single one voted for it on the Senate floor. Every senator ought to be asked why, and every candidate ought to be asked for specifics on his or her climate plan. Emissions targets and nonbinding resolutions may make us feel good, but what about policies with actual effects, such as nuclear expansion, cap and trade, and carbon taxes? And unlike most of the other candidates in the field, Biden has actually made pressuring China into lowering greenhouse gas emissions a focal point of his plan. Do other candidates plan to do the same?
And how about the $32.6 trillion bill du jour, Medicare For All? Well, here’s a laundry list for Maddow and company to choose from:
- Would your healthcare plan abolish private health insurance?
- Seeing as the federal government only funds one-fifth of the nation’s $171.8 billion medical research and development bill, would the government step in to fill the void left by abolishing a profit-based system?
- How would you pay for a Medicare For All bill that would require doubling our annual tax revenue? (No candidate has offered a plan that comes remotely close to covering a simple plurality of the bill.)
Our firefighting media has failed thus far to hold the presidential contenders’ feet to the fire. These are the questions that, regardless of the stage combinations, would grant the American people answers they deserve to know.
