Remember when Carly Fiorina crushed the competition in the Republicans’ first undercard debate? That’s what Hillary Clinton’s performance was like at the first Democratic debate Tuesday night.
No, Clinton has never been as consistently smooth a communicator as Fiorina has proven to be this year, much less her husband Bill. But like Fiorina debating Jim Gilmore and company, this came across as a polished professional among amateurs, even though everyone on both stages was actually accomplished.
The difference for Clinton is that unless Joe Biden gets into the race, this is the only competition she’s likely to face for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Bernie Sanders undoubtedly appealed to more progressive Democratic voters with his passionate criticism of money in politics, making up for Larry Lessig’s exclusion from the debate, and his talk about income inequality. He tried to address the minority voters who have so far eluded him, embracing Black Lives Matters and strengthening his commitment to comprehensive immigration reform (though he didn’t back down from his criticism of frequently unfair guest-workers programs). Even his rumpled appearance and oratorical skills more suited to chasing kids from his lawn than delivering an inaugural address may be endearing to some voters.
But Sanders likely lost some liberals with his lukewarm position on gun control, especially in the wake of recent mass shootings, and he is still more comfortable as an old-fashioned class-conscious lefty than a modern, multicultural race-conscious-lefty. With apologies to Frank Luntz, he probably didn’t move many Hillary voters into his camp.
Hillary Clinton engaged the other Democrats sparingly, preferring to pivot to the general election and attack Republicans instead. But she did pointedly attack Sanders on guns. She also drew a subtle distinction between her criticisms of business with Sanders’ refusal to identify as a capitalist. Her line about saving capitalism from itself wasn’t an endorsement of Sanders’ lefty views, but a way of co-opting them while remaining a conventional New Deal liberal who still claims to be on the side of small businesses and entrepreneurs.
Clinton showed she was willing to go on the offensive against an opponent with a combination of socialist economic views, which help her seem more mainstream, and a rural, pro-gun Vermont constituency, which helps her seem more progressive. By coming to Clinton’s aid on the question of her emails as secretary of state, Sanders showed he is unwilling or unable to go on the offensive against her when it counts.
Martin O’Malley sounds like he can’t decide whether he wants to run against Clinton or audition for a job in her administration, so he vacillates between trying to attack her and sucking up to her. He was surprisingly soft-spoken and largely ineffective. With his transformation from relatively centrist Democrat with a Baltimore record that is now a liability to newly minted progressive, without his guitar he is like John Edwards without the smarmy charm.
Jim Webb came across as the Republican he once was rather than the netroots-backed Democrat who won a Senate seat in Virginia in 2006. He made good points and showed a greater willingness to defend his more conservative views than at any point during his short stint as a senator. But it’s hard to imagine a receptive audience for defending the Second Amendment, limiting affirmative action, controlling the border even after an amnesty that qualified current illegal immigrants for Obamacare, supporting the Keystone XL pipeline and an “all of the above” approach to energy and grinning about killing Viet Cong in his current party, outside of small pockets of surviving Southern conservative Democrats.
Lincoln Chafee was the only candidate willing to make direct attacks on Clinton’s ethics, though he still seemed to prefer running against George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. Unfortunately, he was completely inarticulate and ineffective. At one point, Clinton was asked if she wanted to respond to his criticism. She responded simply, devastatingly, “No.”
Chafee’s best argument against Clinton was that her vote for the Iraq war (which Sanders, Webb and O’Malley also opposed) should be disqualifying. But he totally undercut that critique when he asked for a pass on his vote for legislation repealing the Glass-Steagall wall between commercial and investment banking. Voters are likely to be sympathetic to the loss of his father (who was, by the way, a much more substantial man) while concluding we either give politicians do-overs for major decisions they regret or we don’t.
Clinton got marginally tougher treatment from CNN in the run-up to the debate than she would have gotten if she was in a truly competitive race for the nomination. But all in all, she avoided doing anything that would entice Biden into the race or make any big Democratic donors feel the need to keep their options open with the vice president. She won this round and she knew it.
