Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Tonight's Democratic debate

was pretty much useless and horribly repetitive. The best lines were Obama's quips--when they played Hillary parodying him at a campaign rally, and he responded "Sounds good"; and when they were debating the ridiculous Farrakhan question and he said "If Hillary thinks that reject is stronger than denounce, I'm happy to concede the point and I both reject AND denounce." Obama noting (during that same exchange) that he wouldn't be there if not for Jewish supporters of civil rights was good too.

The only point Hillary made that I don't think Obama rebutted effectively was during the interminable health-care segment. She hit him on mandates and he said something about "we want to make sure that kids have care but we don't want to force adults if the subsidies are not enough." Not good if your health-care plan is based on lowering costs sufficiently without mandates. I think there is a way to rebut but he didn't do it.

Hillary's SNL line was bad. That's two debates in a row where Hillary has had a horrible planned joke/line and it sounded whiny.

Last question... why can't we ever get NAFTA and immigration covered simultaneously, since everyone talks about "getting environmental and labor standards" (for Mexico obviously) and everyone talks about "improving economic conditions in Mexico" (to cut immigration long-term). Any thoughts from the candidates on how to reconcile the two? How, exactly, can we renegotiate NAFTA to be good for all Americans (in the short term)? How would Mexico get any advantage out of it, then?

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