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Democrat Debate Recap: Crabs in a Bucket
When you’re shucking a bucket of crabs, the smart ones try like hell to escape. But as soon as one gets to the edge of freedom, the rest of the crabs yank him back down. That was the Democratic debate Wednesday night in Las Vegas.
Bernie Sanders is the frontrunner but would lose if the so-called moderate lane unified behind a single candidate. Instead, the other five Democrats spent two hours pulling each other down, leaving the Brooklyn Bolshevik free to yell about whatever it is he yells about.
Mike Bloomberg got quite the hazing in this, his first debate. Elizabeth Warren opened with a savage attack.
“I’d like to talk about who we’re running against,” the former Native American said. “A billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians, and no I’m not talking about Donald Trump, I’m talking about Mayor Bloomberg.”
“I think we need something different than Donald Trump,” Amy Klobuchar added, blasting Bloomberg’s call for others to drop out and support him. “I don’t think you look at Donald Trump and say we need someone richer.”
After everyone torched Bloomberg in the first few minutes, Warren took aim at everyone else.
We need to get everybody’s health care plan out here. Mayor Buttigieg really has a slogan that was thought up by his consultants to paper over a thin version of a plan that would leave millions of people unable to afford their health care. It’s not a plan, it’s a PowerPoint.
And Amy’s plan is even less. It’s like a Post-It note: Insert plan here.
Both blasted back but then tore into each other. Ever smarmy, Buttigieg hit Klobuchar for forgetting the name of Mexico’s president. “Are you trying to say that I’m dumb? Are you mocking me here, Pete?” she replied.
Later in the evening, Klobuchar told Pete, “You memorized a bunch of talking points,” saying he’s never been “in the arena.”
“I’m used to senators telling mayors that senators are more important,” Buttigieg responded. “You don’t have to be in Washington to matter.” He then polished several shiny red apples and handed them to the moderators. (I might have made up that last part.)
Biden was strong compared to his last few debates, which isn’t saying much. Between Tourette’s-style grunts of “Malarkey!” and “C’mon, man!” he hit Bloomberg’s initial opposition to Obamacare. “The mayor said when we passed it … it was a disgrace. Look it up. Check it out.”
The former vice president then hit him for not releasing his taxes. “It just takes us a long time,” Bloomberg said. “Fortunately, I make a lot of money, and we do business all around the world, and we are preparing it … I can’t go to Turbo Tax.”
As the attacks were aimed at everyone else, Bernie could mostly stick to his 50-year-old stump speech. (Turns out he’s not a fan of billionaires.)
In the second half of the debate, Bloomberg had a few moments.
“I can’t think of a way that would make it easier for Donald Trump to get re-elected than listening to this conversation,” he said. “This is ridiculous. We’re not going to throw out capitalism. We tried that, the other countries tried that — it was called communism — and it just didn’t work.”
The rowdy audience responded with anxious “ooohs” and “aaahs.”
“What a wonderful country we have,” Bloomberg added. “The best known socialist in the country happens to be a millionaire with three houses.”
Outside of an attack here and there, Sanders was the obvious winner. He walked in on top and left on top; that’s what counts. Everyone else — Biden, Bloomberg, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, and Warren — limped away bleeding from their all-against-all deathmatch.
Onto Saturday’s Nevada Caucus. Crab is on the menu.
Published in Elections, Politics
Power move, puts questioner in a weaker position.
Crab is on the menu, but it’s smelling more and more like crow.
@jon1979 I think my preferred nickname for Sanders is “Bernie Three House”.
Would be a great Brooklyn name for Brooklyn-born Bernie, and certainly something a guy from Queens would taunt him with.
Have you read Schweizer’s book, “Profiles in Corruption?”
I think that Jim Geraghty, in this morning’s National Review, had the best take on Bloomberg, “He radiates the warmth and empathy of the head of a DMV office”. That pretty much says it all.
It’s like a title of nobility. Which the Constitution expressly prohibits.
Idiocracy was prophetic. The only thing they got wrong was the timeline. It’s happening way faster than they predicted.
Bloomberg and Bernie move closer together continuing the argument and suddenly kiss passionately. They break the clinch.
“It’s like…we were made for each other,” Bloomberg says wonderingly as he gazes up into Bernie’s adoring glasses.
Exactly. They won’t pay on their own, they want government to make them pay. And these aren’t working people with wages, these are [redact]-hats with assets – IOW they still won’t pay. The people who will pay will be middle-class after they get battlefield promotions to “The Rich”.
Somewhere in Massachusetts there is a school board that she should be screwing up.
Some of the titles are rightfully (US historically) retained. Interestingly, ‘President’ is not one of them.
This. Obama is Senator Obama. Bush 43 is Governor Bush. And those are just honorifics because they were President. Everyone else should resume Mr./Ms. That includes Republicans out there: Newt Gingrich is not Speaker Gingrich. The only good thing about Hilary becoming President (I think I just gagged a little) is that SUDDENLY everyone would have known that the only person who can be called President is the current, sitting President.
Oh way too big a job for her.
I’m thinking more along the lines of the local Home Owners Association.
Me too.
Should be filed under: Things a billionaire should not say while participating in a Democratic Party debate.
The other part was how he worked hard. OMG!
You can’t make billions and billions by “working hard.” Democrats don’t buy that and neither does anyone else.
You have to invent something and manage the company well, hire the right people and make good decisions. That’s what he should have said. Really a pathetic poster child for capitalism.
Worth mentioning: This is something governments are designed not to do well, and with good reason.
Right. The ruling class doesn’t pay. Those in politics make laws for other people, not for all people.
Yeah, that one was great! He got a pretty rousing response from the “I can’t think of a better way to get Donald Trump elected than to listen to this conversation” line. My biggest concern with Bloomberg is that if he gets the nomination and loses, the party may come back to the conclusion that they need to be more radical.
I think that was a swipe against he and Buttigieg.
I’ve been following @senatorshoshana too long. Her tweets about Bloomberg’s advice about staying at your desk at work and not taking lunch or bathroom breaks had me reading your headline as Craps in a Bucket, which seemed appropriate now that I think about it.
I’m glad I’m not the only one! And I’ve put land crabs in a bucket, myself.
But the title reminds of Chris Farley’s line about guarantees: “Look, if you want me to crap in a box and mark it ‘Guaranteed’, I’ve got spare time.”
That’s not a bug, it’s a feature.
Clearly, Warren was sticking up for the only other woman on the stage and Amy was loving it, although I could see her gritting her teeth with aggravation at Pete. You have left four white guys – three old – one a socialist/ borderline comm…..this is clearly not the Democrat wish list to take the country by storm. If the rumors are true about Bloomie considering Hilary as a running mate, it goes down hill – a rabbit hole – ok – a black hole in space – pure insanity. The Democratic party is about beating Trump, revenge, payback, control and has nothing to offer the country in a positive way. If that is not accurate, what else are they offering that isn’t already being done?
I just saw clips of this train wreck. Hahahaha, it was hilarious. Saturday Night Live could not have spoofed the Dem debate better than the real thing. I wished I watched it. I would have doubled over in laughter. When is the next train wreck?
2 panderdebates. First the Congressional Black Caucus:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Democratic_Party_presidential_debates#Tenth_debate_(February_25,_2020)
SC primary is on a Saturday.
Then the Congressional Hispanic Caucus:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Democratic_Party_presidential_debates#Eleventh_debate_(March_15,_2020)
Note, the latter is after Super Tuesday.
Yeah, I keep wanting someone to ask one of these rich people who say they should be taxed more, “OK, since you think the government should have more of your money, how many deductions and tax credits have declined to claim on your tax returns, and how much money have you donated to the IRS above and beyond your legal obligations in the last five years?”
I don’t see anything wrong with taking every possible tax deduction and credit while working for higher taxes for your socio-economic group. There’s a lot wrong with turning over more of the economy to the government, though.
I see an enormous contradiction. If you think your socio-economic group should be taxed more, it means you think the government would spend your socio-economic group’s money (including your own money) better than the members of your socio-economic group (including you) would. If you think the government would spend your money better than you can, then you should not be trying to minimize your taxes under the current tax system. And some of the people advocating higher taxes even explicitly say, “Tax me more.” But they don’t have to wait for a tax (mandatory) to achieve their desired purpose of handing more money to the government. If they respond that their objective is really to get other people in their socio-economic group to hand over more money, then they are just being covetous jerks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CA8xTGP_M8g
Turns out, that Bloomberg has been friends with Harvey Weinstein for more than 20 years.
Daily Mail article