Pete and Bernie came out on top in Iowa, earning the slings and arrows that come with front runner status. Both proved up to the task in New Hampshire's debate last night.
Sure, Iowa
was a mess. The hours and then days waiting for results. An impossibly close
finish that resulted in two “winners.” An organizational and technological humiliation
for a party at just the moment Trump crowed about his acquittal. Iowa was a Chernobyl-grade
meltdown.
But
through it all, real human beings had actually voted.
After
all the polls, pundits, and possibilities, the first real votes out of Iowa suddenly
made the stakes of the New Hampshire primary ever more intense. Iowa elevated
two candidates, wounded several others, but did not eliminate any. Each of the
candidates arrived at the debate last night with a great deal on the line.
Pete
Buttigieg, one of two winners in Iowa, arrived in New Hampshire under the glare
of the intense lights that bounce wildly off a shiny new object.
Bernie
Sanders, the other Iowa winner, has witnessed the erosion in his “top three”
national rivals Biden and Warren. He has no doubt been reading the articles saying
that he is suddenly in a commanding position to take the nomination. He also knows that this terrifies party
centrists, who see his nomination as a replay of George McGovern’s 49-1 loss to
Nixon. He, like Buttigieg, came to the debate with a giant target on his back.
Facing
far greater pressure: Elizabeth Warren knows that with her third place finish
in Iowa, she is fading and desperately needs to close the gap between her and
Sanders for leadership of the progressive wing. Compounded her challenge: New
Hampshire neighbors both her home state of Massachusetts and Sanders' home in Vermont. They are therefore both expected to
have a certain amount of “home field advantage” relative to the field. Another weak showing could be
devastating to her campaign.
Amy
Klobuchar may have had the most on the line. She had done just well enough in
Iowa that no one was calling for her to drop out… but another fifth place
finish could well choke the flow of money, the oxygen of politics. At a certain
point, simply beating expectations no longer matters, and actually beating the
competition does.
Still
and all, no one was feeling more heat more than Joe Biden, fresh off a disastrous
fourth place finish in Iowa, and urgently needing to avoid another embarrassment. Biden surely understands that another poor finish could raise questions about his viability just as he heads to South Carolina, the state he is counting on to restore his mojo.
Tom
Steyer raised his profile with a feisty performance, simultaneously taking on
the role of cheerleader for the team, while chiding his fellow candidates for
petty internecine bickering and failing to see the bigger picture: how does
this party beat Trump?
Andrew
Yang fired staffers for a disappointing showing in Iowa, and the stress showed
last night. There was little of his trademark humor and affable charm, and his
relatively tiny amount of time on the microphone further marginalized what has
long been the longest of long shots.
Benefiting
the most from the heightened tension on the stage? Michael Bloomberg loomed
over the field, instantly ready to step into the place of whoever faltered.
They say there are only two tickets out of New Hampshire, but Mike Bloomberg and
Tom Steyer have their own private jets.
Given
the pressure, give these candidates their due. This was a good debate, and
everyone on the stage had good moments.But the two leaders were strong, and the challengers may not have done enough to change the essential dynamic before New Hampshire votes.
Biden:
Better Than Average… For Biden.
Joe
Biden had an above-average performance – particularly in the first hour – but
the past six months have proven that debate is not Joe Biden’s gift. Biden was
above average for Joe Biden, but that is no longer enough. When he
attempts to be high energy, he appears rushed, even a bit manic, and
occasionally angry. When he tries to be “statesmanlike” and “presidential,” he
appears slow, low-T, and unpersuasive; often given to hurriedly ticking off a
litany of resume items.
Over
the course of watching debates since last August, one notes a rather annoying
linguistic tick that is repeated ad nauseum: “Here’s the deal.” It is
Biden’s way of saying “I am about to give you the final word on the way things
really are.” Unfortunately, it comes off
as patronizing and too often is not backed up with a sizzling insight. Biden
was fine last night, but other candidates were better.
Biden
did have strong moments. In the early stages of the debate, Pete
Buttigieg locked and loaded his standard generational theme about how “old
solutions won’t work.” Biden finally figured out how to pivot on this one,
declaring “I don’t what about the past of Barack Obama and Joe Biden is so
bad.” Buttigieg appeared momentarily knocked off his game: he hadn’t expected a
high hard one from Joe Biden, and he sure as hell did not want anyone to think
that he had a problem with Saint Barack.
Biden’s
high water mark for the evening was when he very cleverly called for the crowd
to rise and applaud Lt. Colonel Alexander Vindman, who had only hours before
been fired by the White House in an apparent retaliation for his testimony
during the House impeachment hearings. The crowd cheered lustily, and one
supposes that Biden could close his eyes and pretend that it was an outpouring
of love for him. It was, in fact, the strongest video moment of the evening,
and Biden owned it.
Klobuchar:
Strong and Snarky, But Was It Enough to Vault over Biden or Warren?
While
Amy Klobuchar had exceeded expectations in Iowa, she had still finished fifth. She
arrived in New Hampshire no doubt knowing that the winnowing process would soon
begin in earnest, and that another fifth place finish could end her candidacy.
She clearly
knew that she had to take off the gloves and shake up the campaign mojo in
order to keep her campaign alive, and she was not shy. Klobuchar has a tight
game plan: she attacks progressives Warren and Sanders on the impracticality of
their extreme policies, pointing out that a number of their most progressive
ideas do not even have the support of a majority of Congressional Democrats.
Within
her centrist lane, she seems to have decided that attacking Joe Biden directly
is like pulling out Grandpa’s cane, so she targets her darts at Pete Buttigieg
and secondarily at Tom Steyer, archly dismissing their lack of Washington
experience by talking about how hard it is when you are actually “in the
arena.” At one point she seemed to go full “Demean Girl,” attempting to betlittle
Buttigieg for behavior that “makes you look like a cool newcomer.” She doubled
down on this middle-school ridicule, at one point even appearing to draw an
equation between Buttigieg and Donald Trump. “We got a newcomer in the White
House and look where it got us.” This line of attack seemed to land with the
dull thud of a clumsy cheap shot. Amy can throw elbows, all right, but there is
little by way of subtlety and charm.
However,
when Klobuchar is not going after competitors, she can radiate a warm,
nurturing compassion that is authentic and compelling. She riffs off a story
about a hard-on-his-luck man who sobbed at the death of FDR, and when asked if
he knew the President, the man replied, “no, but he knew me.” Klobuchar then
repetitively employs this phrase as a rhetorical device to prove that she, too,
knows the plight of everyday people who need government help.
Still
and all, Klobuchar was energized, passionate, and human, and she probably won
supporters last night. Time
will tell, and her debate performance was very strong… but it simply may not
have been enough to change the game and vault over either Biden and Warren.
Buttigieg:
Sharp, Steady, and Very Ready for Prime Time
Even
with his powerhouse Iowa showing, Pete Buttigieg still had to have been
startled at the amount of artillery lobbed at his lectern from virtually all
corners. Mayor Pete was put on his heels several times, but on balance, he
turned it yet another very solid evening. Somehow, this 37-year-old continues
to appear so measured, thoughtful, and unflappable that he comes off as the
adult in the room.
Probably
the most uncomfortable moment Pete has encountered in the debates to date was
when he was confronted with data that showed that marijuana arrests in South
Bend increased while he was Mayor, which appeared at odds with his campaign
position that he would end incarceration as a penalty for drug use. We are accustomed to a Pete Buttigieg who has thoroughly anticipated every question and elegantly
parries each attack. He seemed unprepared for the question, and his attempt to
reframe it did not sway the moderator, who doubled down and asked him a second
time to address the question. Spinning to Elizabeth Warren, the moderator asked
the Massachusetts Senator if Buttigieg’s answer was satisfactory. Warren didn’t
equivocate: “No.”
But
this moment was the exception. Buttigieg flawlessly handled the question of how
he would beat Trump (leading with his service in the military was a key point),
and Buttigieg was brilliant in explaining why Hunter Biden should not be an
issue in the national debate, or in the Democratic primary. Finally, asked
whether he would have taken out Qassem Soleimani, Buttigieg gave the kind of
thoughtful, comprehensive, and fully analyzed response that appeared so utterly
lacking in the rationales offered by the White House that actually killed the
Iranian General. Buttigieg also changed his game a bit in this debate, being
much more aggressive in direct attacks on Sanders (on healthcare) and Biden (on
Iraq) than he has in the past.
Was it
Buttigeig’s best night? Maybe not. Did he lose ground? Hard to see how that
could have happened. Most important: under the intense scrutiny that falls on a
“front runner,” Buttigieg was steady and very effective.
Nobody
Stays on Message Like Bernie Sanders
With
Bernie Sanders, what you have always seen is what you will always get. The man
disarms with candor, maintains his fiery intensity throughout, and can pivot
just about any question into one of his wheelhouse issues, for which he has a
tightly scripted debate-size rant. He seems to understand that each audience is
new, and that he wins when he sticks to the thoroughly rehearsed sound-bytes
that engender the big applause lines.
Bernie
is most appealing when he delights in saying the politically incorrect answer.
Where other candidates seemed to sense that it would be wrong to admit they
would employ a Roe v. Wade “litmus test” for Supreme Court appointments,
Sanders looked puzzled at their equivocation. “Is there a litmus test? Yes!!”
Bernie
may have gained ground on Elizabeth Warren in their zero sum battle for the
progressive wing. It’s not that Warren was particularly weak… it is that Bernie
got more air time (19 vs 16 minutes, which actually makes a difference), and
made more of the time that he had.
No
Indication that Elizabeth Warren Stopped the Erosion.
Nobody
does righteous indignation quite like the Senator from Massachusetts. She had
her moments last night, but there was no break-out moment that could reverse
the progressive tide currently flowing toward Bernie Sanders.
Warren’s
problem seems to be that she rose in the early polling by appearing to be a
more palatable, more electable progressive than Bernie Sanders, embracing many
of his programs along the way. But her stumbles – particularly on her plan for
funding universal healthcare – put her in free-fall. Now, she is in a box…
Bernie is back out in front of her, and there is little that she can do to gain
ground back because her policy positions overlap so thoroughly with his.
Now
that they have had their angry spat on whether or not Sanders told her than a
woman could not win in 2020, their supporters seem to have frozen in their
positions… and Warren is holding the short end of the stick. Last night, Warren seemed a bit out of step
in her demand that we end all troop deployment in Afghanistan, particularly in
the way that such a step echoed Trump’s abandonment of our Kurdish allies in
Northern Syria. Warren, however, was masterful in diagnosing our national “gun
violence problem.”
Steyer
Steps Up
Give
it up for Tom Steyer, who went bold last night, repeatedly chastising his
colleagues on the stage for getting tripped up in the weeds and missing the
bigger picture: beating Trump. I, for one, was delighted to hear a candidate
announce that he was tired of listening to the exact same healthcare debate for
the seventeenth time. Steyer is the embodiment of the riddle of money in
politics: billionaires are not beholden to anybody, so an idealistic
billionaire with a good heart can use that platform to broadcast a great deal
of good messaging. But it’s really not fair that he can prop up his candidacy
by spending millions and millions of dollars, while an Amy Klobuchar has to
send me seven emails every day begging me to spring for another fifty bucks.
Steyer’s
big moments last night came on the topic of racism in America. Midway through
the debate he scolded the ABC moderators for not even having brought up the
topic of race. He announced that he is in favor of reparations, which alone distinguishes
him from his competitors. Steyer spoke of creating a commission to study the 400
year history of race in America, to correct and redefine the narrative of race
in the United States. This narrative, Steyer maintained, should inform policy. Perhaps
Steyer was looking ahead to South Carolina, where his polling numbers are strong
and the percentage of African American voters is vastly higher than Iowa or New
Hampshire, but Steyer owned this issue last night. Biden, beware.
And it
is important to note: at least Tom Steyer is the billionaire who is playing in
the same ballpark as the other candidates. Mike Bloomberg is hovering above it
all, pounding away from 40,000 feet with beautifully produced ads… and well
positioned to win a sweet chunk of delegates on Super Tuesday without ever
having participated in a single debate.
What
did we take away from Friday night?
I was
in the advertising business for many years, where there is a
time-honored truths: “When Coke and Pepsi fight, Dr. Pepper gets hurt.”
Last
night, Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders more than held serve. They both turned
in very solid, sturdy performances. This serves to reinforce their standing as
front runners.
It is
the other candidates who must worry. Amy Klobuchar performed well, but did she do
enough to leapfrog Biden and Warren in the primary? And if she wins
fourth place, is that enough? Will it be time for her to stand down and
instantly become a top-drawer candidate for the VP slot on someone else’s
ticket?
If
Elizabeth Warren’s performance in New Hampshire mirrors her showing in Iowa, it
becomes extremely hard for her to articulate the path to victory. And she did
not do enough in this debate to change the math.
Joe
Biden? He appears to now be putting all his chips down on South Carolina, and it is
no longer a certainty that he will excel there.
Recent polling in South Carolina shows that Steyer and Sanders are
challenging him. Perhaps Biden will ride name recognition and familiarity to
a reasonable delegate count on Super Tuesday. But
the bottom line for Biden is simple: no amount of
delegates will generate charisma where none exists. Another fourth place
showing puts Biden on the respirator. Did he do enough Friday night to pass
Warren? Maybe. Just maybe.
Here’s
our take:
Winners:
Klobuchar
Buttigieg
Sanders
Steyer
Status
Quo:
Biden
Fading:
Warren
Yang
Happy
on the sidelines:
Bloomberg
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