Hillary Clinton Strong in Second Democratic 2016 Presidential Debate

Well, first of all, I have to say that it was good to have a dose of sanity in the second Democratic debate just on CBS - sanity in comparison to much of what we've been seeing in the GOP debates.

As to who on stage did best and worst, and when -


Hillary came out strong on what happened in Paris yesterday.  Bernie, in contrast, quickly segued to economics, which seemed beside the point in the shadow of the ISIS attack.  Again, later, Bernie stood by the claim he made in the last debate, that the biggest threat to our national security is climate change.  That's a little too clever, especially on the day after people were gunned down in Paris.  Climate change, uncontrolled, may kill us eventually.  ISIS is out to kill us now, and needs an immediate response.Also on this issue, O'Malley's correction of Hillary that the fight against ISIS is not "solely" American was unnecessary and supercilious - that's obviously what Hillary meant when she said this is an American fight.   (His critique of Hillary for using the "boots on the ground" phrase was similarly much ado about little.)But if was good to hear O'Malley call out Trump again as a "carnival barker".In the best exchange of the debate, Bernie attacked Hillary about being too close to Wall Street. Hillary's response, which in effect pointed out that Wall Street is part of America - and indeed was attacked on September 11 - was unexpected, powerful, and to the point.On gun control, whatever Bernie now says, he shouldn't have voted against even one gun control bill - and Hillary was 100% right to call him out on this.Hillary and Bernie were both strong on black lives matter - but Hillary was better in citing some of the many African Americans who have lost their lives to guns, and Bernie was especially strong in calling out cops who murder innocent people.So, all in all, it was an excellent debate for Democrats, especially for Hillary Clinton.

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