20 | POLITICO | THURSDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2019T
here was something
different going on with 12
Democrats on the debate
stage in Ohio on Tuesday night. It
was a serious conversation about
how to bring change to the party
and the country, waged by people
making serious claims about
what they would do if elected
president of the United States.
Wait, what’s this about? people
who had watched three previous
debate rounds this year could
be forgiven for asking. Where
were the gimmicky one-liners,
the cringeworthy pandering,
the well-rehearsed ambushes,
the whiny interruptions, the
confusing excursions into
obscure votes or ancient
controversies of little relevance
to the choice Democrats face in
coming months and all voters
will face a year from now?
Democrats for the most part
turned down the noise, and
turned up the substance. Most
candidates seemed to find their
authentic voices, and no one’s
performance was defined by the
sort of avert-your-gaze blunders
that marked previous outings.
Along the way, two new
dynamics shaped the evening.
The first was the degree of
critical focus on Sen. Elizabeth
Warren, reflecting a calculation
that she, rather than former
Vice President Joe Biden, has
the momentum in the race and
is setting the agenda for the
party. She took in the glare for
the largest share of the three-
hour debate without wilting, or
receding for significant chunks
of the evening (as she did in
previous encounters) when the
issues shifted away from terrain
where she is most comfortable.
The second dynamic was an
honest illumination of the party’s
left-vs.-center debate. In past
encounters, this conversation
often was portrayed as a choice
between “activists” and
“establishment,” or between
bold principles and expedient
moderation.
Thanks in part to articulate
and forceful performances by
Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Mayor
Pete Buttigieg, the centrist case
on specific issues like health care
and gun control, and broader ones
like how to drive change in an era
of relentless partisanship, were
made more robustly and with less
defensiveness than in the past.
The choice before Democrats
was laid out in plain and
unpretentious style.
People like Warren and Sen.
Bernie Sanders (whose pitch
and style never seems to change
much, even after a recent heart
attack) believe the way to earn
credibility with disillusioned
voters and beat President Donald
Trump is by advocating big plans
that fundamentally challenge
power structures in Washington
and in corporate America. Biden,
Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Sen. Cory
Booker and others argued thatthe way to earn credibility and
beat Trump is by building a
consensus for progressive ideas
that have near-term prospects
actually to be enacted.
That is by no means a new
argument for Democrats, but it
was engaged Tuesday in a more
authentic fashion. In contrasts
to early debates, the candidates
whose careers have been marked
by centrist impulses didn’t tiptoe
around their views, or alter their
substantive and rhetorical pitches
to project more radical personas.
The debate wasn’t defined by
dramatic contrivances, such as
last summer’s debate when Sen.
Kamala Harris attacked Biden on
his busing record 45 years ago,
even though support for busing
has never been a pillar of her own
record and she had earlier been a
Biden ally.
The essential sincerity of
the debate, which was held at
Otterbein University in suburban
Columbus, flowed in both
directions.
Warren became animated
when she defended herself
against former Rep. Beto
O’Rourke’s suggestion that her
anti-business views come off
“more about being punitive and
pitting some part of the country
against each other, instead of
lifting people up.” Along the way,
she seemed to forecast her likely
response to the same charge in
the general election should she
become the Democratic nominee.
“So I’m really shocked at
the notion that anyone thinks
I’m punitive,” Warren said.
“Look, I don’t have a beef with
billionaires. My problem is youmade a fortune in America, you
had a great idea, you got out
there and worked for it, good for
you. But you built that fortune in
America. I guarantee you built
it in part using workers all of us
helped pay to educate. You built
it in part getting your goods to
markets on roads and bridges all
of us helped pay for. You built it at
least in part protected by police
and firefighters all of us help pay
the salaries for.”
On her general philosophy of
change, she cited her experience
after the 2008 financial crash
successfully promoting
enactment of a new agency to
protect consumers. She ignored
advice from people who told
her, Warren said, that she was
more likely to win if she would
“go for something small, go for
something the big companies will
be able to accept.”
Sanders struck many of the
same themes: “The way you win
an election in this time in history
is not the same old same old. You
have to inspire people. You have
to excite people. You’ve got to
bring working people and young
people and poor people into the
political process.”
But others disputed the idea
that the way to bring change is
by pushing for the most dramatic
version of change, as quickly as
possible, or by dismissing those
who disagree as weaklings or
appeasers.
On the familiar question of
whether Democrats should
try to expand Barack Obama’s
Affordable Care Act or scrap it in
favor of mandatory “Medicare
for All,” Klobuchar defendedthe more incremental approach.
“I’m tired of hearing whenever I
say these things, ‘It’s Republican
talking points,’ she said. “I
appreciate Elizabeth’s work [but]
the difference between a plan and
a pipe dream is something that
you can actually get done.”
On the question of imposing
a “wealth tax” on big fortunes,
Buttigieg professed he is “all for”
it and other ideas he heard from
debate rivals. “Let me tell you,
though, how this looks from the
industrial Midwest where I live,”
he said. “Washington politicians,
congressmen and senators, saying
all the right things, offering the
most elegant policy prescriptions,
and nothing changes.”
Praising Warren’s vision, but
criticizing her vagueness about
how to pay for Medicare for All,
Biden said, “We’ve got to level
with people. We’ve got to level
with people and tell them exactly
what we’re going to do, how we’re
going to get it done, and if you
can get it done.”
While candidates highlighted
differences without artifice,
they also showed heightened
command of policy even on
places where they were in
agreement, or the variances of
their positions were matters
of degree rather than a deeper
philosophical conflict. Everyone
supported impeachment
proceedings against Trump,
though with varying degrees of
caution about the need to follow
due process or elicit a modicum
of bipartisan support. (This was
the first debate for billionaire
Tom Steyer, an outspoken
impeachment advocate).Everyone denounced Trump
for betraying Kurdish allies
by precipitously pulling a
contingent of U.S. troops out
of Syria and allowing a Turkish
incursion, though Rep. Tulsi
Gabbard launched a broader
critique of a U.S. “regime change
war” that she said had begun
under Obama, drawing a sharp
response from Buttigieg.
Everyone supported getting
tougher with regulations on
big tech companies, though
businessman Andrew Yang
said Warren is too simplistic
in thinking breaking up the
firms can solve more systemic
challenges, like the disruption
to workers from artificial
intelligence.
Everyone supported stricter
gun controls, but Julián Castro,
who was secretary of Housing
and Urban Development under
Obama, expressed skepticism of
mandatory buybacks of assault
weapons in distinctly personal
terms when he said, “In the
places I grew up in, we weren’t
exactly looking for another
reason for cops to come banging
on the door.”
What’s more, no one could
claim that the format left no
time for nuance or elaboration.
Earlier debates were marked by
shouts from candidates of “Let
me finish!” In this case, some of
the protests surely came at home
from viewers, “When will this
finish?”John F. Harris is founding editor
of POLITICO and author of “The
Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White
House.”BY JOHN F. HARRIS
Democrats stop faking it — and have a serious debate
The choice for voters
was laid out in a plain
unpretentious style
with no gimmickryJOHN MINCHILLO/AP
The exchanges between the candidates in Tuesday night’s Democratic presidential debate — including (from left) former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, Sen. Amy
Klobuchar and former HUD Secretary Julián Castro — were focused and policy-driven, a departure from earlier debates.