On today’s BradCast: Special coverage — and a lot of smart information — on Night Two of the second 2020 Democratic Presidential debate in Detroit, as hosted by CNN. [Audio link to today’s show is posted below.]
The ten candidates featured during the second night’s combative, two-and-a-half-hour long festivities were: former Vice President Joe Biden; CA Sen. Kamala Harris; NJ Sen. Cory Booker; entrepreneur Andrew Yang; Former HUD Sec. Julian Castro; NY Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand; HI Rep. Tulsi Gabbard; WA state Gov. Jay Inslee; CO Sen. Michael Bennet and NYC Mayor Bill DeBlasio.
As during night one, the broad array of topics about which CNN’s moderators worked hard to create confrontation between the candidates included healthcare (again leading the debate at the top and in the length of time spent on the issue), immigration, race, the climate crisis, the economy, foreign policy and, unlike the first night, even a question or two on how the candidates might take on Donald Trump and whether he should be held accountability for his crimes with impeachment.
Biden, the perceived front-runner, seemed at least slightly more prepared and less frail than in his first outing during the June debate in Miami, while finding his policies as a Senator over the last many decades and as President Obama’s Veep sharply attacked by a number of the other participants. For her part, Harris — who seemed to get the best of Biden in a number of exchanges during the June forum, seeing her fortunes rise thereafter — was met with tough attacks from both Biden and several of the other candidates hoping to grab the spotlight. Booker stood out in a number of exchanges, including several with the former Vice President. Other candidates had their moments as well, as we discuss, even as the field for the next debates in September may now be cut by half or more.
We’re joined today, once again, by two guests for our special coverage. Journalist, former CNN producer and healthcare reform expert JACKIE SCHECHNER is back with us again today, and we’re also joined by prolific investigative financial journalist and award-winning author DAVID DAYEN, who now also serves as Executive Editor for The American Prospect.
Their smart analysis and insight today focuses on, among other things…
- Whether CNN improved on its questioning and format for night two after facing sharp criticism for their opening round on Tuesday (Schechner saw moderate improvement, Dayen saw none);
- which candidates, if any, stood out over their past performances (Booker and Inslee receive the most noteworthy nods on that score);
- whether or not proposals by a number of the more progressive candidates for a Medicare-for-All style single-payer universal coverage system is actually affordable, or if the more modest proposals to build on the existing Affordable Care Act with a so-called “Public Option”, as sought by the more conservative candidates like Biden, is actually more realistic. (Dayen describing the “entire conversation about costs” as “a complete red herring”, offers a more concise, clear answer to that question than any of the 20 candidates over the past two nights! In short, he explains: “A Medicare For All system would save money. We know that because the Koch-funded Mercatus Center, which put together the very study that Joe Biden and these others are quoting, said that a system where the government would cover all medical costs would actually cost $32 trillion dollars over a ten-year period, but doing nothing right now would cost Americans, through their total national health expenditures, $34 trillion. So the overall savings to America from moving into a single payer system is two trillion dollars over ten years.”);
- how Democrats seem to be pulling their punches when it comes to one of the largest cost drivers of healthcare;
- whether debates over these weedy details are helpful or even necessary right now, or if they should take a back seat for the moment to the question of who can best defeat Donald Trump in 2020. (The conversation now simply “muddies the waters” and is “totally unecessary,” Shechner argues. “We need to bring this up to a higher level at this point, and say, ‘You’re going to have a choice in the election between somebody who wants to do something about the broken healthcare system and somebody who doesn’t care about the broken healthcare system, has no plan for it, has no interest in fixing it, and is simply interested in dismantling anything that President Obama put into place.”)
- how Yang’s interesting proposal for a $1000/month Universal Basic Income for every American would (or wouldn’t) actually work;
- and a number of concerns about Harris’ record as CA’s Attorney General before she became a U.S. Senator. That as she cited her record as a prosecutor taking on the Big Banks during her closing statement on Wednesday night.
All of that and much more is covered during our lively — and, I believe, quite enlightening — conversation on today’s BradCast special coverage…
Of the second set of ten candidates, there isn’t one who has won my vote. Granted it’s still early, but I didn’t hear a single thing I could support in a presidential candidate.