My quick takes:
Obama did what he had to do. Kept his cool, didn't get flustered on policy. He clearly came not to "inspire," but rather to uneventfully ride the momentum he carries into New Hampshire.
Hillary tried to enlist Edwards into ganging up on Obama, but he turned it around on her, hammering away that he and Obama were the forces of change, and clearly implying that Hillary was a force of opposition to change... and turning the knife about her no longer being the front-runner. She got visibly angry. Lambert liked it, but IMHO it will play to a lot of people as peevish.
In the second half, she deftly handled an awkward question about her relative likability, as compared with Obama. The Likable One followed with a dry and not-so-saintly "You're likable enough, Hillary."
All-told, she made her case as a sturdy and experienced pro.
Richardson furthered his case for, as has commonly been suggested, a(nother) Cabinet position. Not "commanding" or "visionary," but mature and thoughtful and charmingly unaffected.
The Edwards money quote: "...these entrenched, moneyed interests that have a stranglehold on the middle class, that are doing -- incredibly destructive to American jobs and health care system, energy, all taxes, trade, they're in everything. Absolutely everything. You cannot nice these people to death. It doesn't work. I have been in the trenches fighting them for my whole adult life."
All in all, each candidate successfully played to his/her own strengths.
What did you think?
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I find Richardson’s
I find Richardson's hesitant way of speaking as if he's not really on top of the subjects he talks about off putting.
I never know what to make of Hillary even though I am a New Yorker. She was very popular in New York state before becoming a candidate. That's not an easy task for a Dem upstate. If anything, I had the impression that she was the Dem who could reach across partisan divides. Spitzer, by contrast, has been in a tail spin since his election despite his overwhelming win.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if the right wing hate machine were turned off for a while and she could run against something other than the idea that she is a cold, calculating, dyke, bitch, criminal.
Digby had an interesting recap of the health care so called debacle of '93, '94 that gives a very different picture of what happened from the CW
you get on the talk shows. If it weren't accepted that it was a debacle, she could be pointing out that she was saying health care needed fixing 14 years ago.
What I don't understand is the Dems not running against the Repugs. If you watched their debate, it was almost amazing. For one thing, they all talk about relying on free market forces. Then they say you need legislation. In health care, they talk about passing laws and "incentivising" people and insurance companies. Of course, the debate starts with "We have the greatest health care system in the world." If that's so, why do we need to fix it? And why with government action?
They were almost comical on immigration. And no one asked them how you deal on a practical level with 12 million people. I think it was Thompson who did say that it becomes a matter of attrition. But isn't it going to take another government beaurocracy to handle that number of people?
On Iraq, it's more of the same. And while the Dems did say they don't think the surge is so successful, they didn't tell Charlie Gibson that the terms of his question were more of the same from the press. We don't need to be hearing that things are hunky dory in Iraq because the death rate is down and just accept that "we" were wrong and "they" were right. That's basically what the Repubs were saying. And how bout hitting McCain on being in Iraq for a hundred years?
And what about this continuing nonsense that Iraq is center of the war on terrorism. Have they not been paying attention to Pakistan and Afghanistan?
These guys all adopted Obama's line about being the agents of change. They were all running against the government and then touting the same old policies. How bout the Dems talking about whether you want 8 more years of Republican rule? Maybe talking about what they want to change would be more effective. Do we really want to reach across the aisle to the likes of Giuliani, Romney, Huckabee or McCain?
Everything about Richardson's demeanor...
... says "supporting player." He knows it, we know it.
Fox News and their ilk, despite a few dickheaded racist outbursts that Glenn and company have pointed out, are gleefully embracing Obama. At least until "the bitch" is gone. And maybe longer, if Huck gets the nod.
Giuliani, Romney, and Huckabee
won't be part of the federal government if they don't become president in 2009. McCain will have two more years in the Senate and with his recent noises about wanting one term as president might retire
anyway. There will be no need to reach across the aisle to any of them because they won't be there. The Repubs who are aren't likely to keep embracing policies that screwed up the country and killed them politically. It's not just the left that wants change, the whole damn country is going to repudiate the modern conservative con job.