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DEMOCRATIC WHITE HOUSE hopefuls rounded on frontrunner Bernie Sanders at a feisty debate last night, attacking him as too extreme for American voters and a flawed challenger to President Donald Trump.
Joe Biden, who needs a victory in South Carolina’s primary on Saturday to keep his campaign alive, accused Sanders of being soft on gun control, while billionaire tycoon Michael Bloomberg claimed Russia was working to help Sanders win the nomination – betting he would be defeated in November.
And Sanders’ rivals joined in savaging the democratic socialist as too radical to appeal to a broad swathe of Americans.
Fellow progressive Elizabeth Warren and centrists Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar, all desperate to halt Sanders’ momentum, laid into his ability to deliver on costly programs like universal health care and tuition-free college.
Buttigieg, a 38-year-old military veteran presenting himself as a unifier, warned a Sanders fight against Trump would spell “chaos” and divide the nation.
“I tell you what it adds up to,” Buttigieg said, “it ends up as four more years of Donald Trump.”
Pole position
Sanders is in pole position in South Carolina, the last step before “Super Tuesday” on 3 March when 14 states vote and a whopping one third of all delegates – the representatives who pick the nominee at the Democratic Party’s July convention – are up for grabs.
The 78-year-old hit back at the charge his policies were too “radical”, insisting such ideas “exist in countries all over the world,” including the notion that health care is a human right.
“The way we beat Trump, which is what everybody up here wants, is we need a campaign of energy and excitement,” Sanders said.
“We need to bring working people back in to the Democratic Party.”
Talking over one another in often contentious exchanges, the seven candidates on stage aggressively vied for attention, locking horns on everything from housing to China policy and whether or not to move the US embassy from Jerusalem back to Tel Aviv.
Seeking to prove he is still in the fight, the 77-year-old Biden put in a spirited performance and snapped back at moderators who tried to cut him off, telling them: “I’m not going to be quiet anymore, OK?”
The former vice president aimed a sharp attack at Sanders over gun control, an issue largely absent from previous debates, and a significant weakness for the Vermont senator who voted against legislation that would have allowed lawsuits against gun manufacturers.
Sanders had emerged largely unscathed from the previous debate. But he acknowledged he was now in the firing line, with rivals seeking to derail his push for the nomination following two straight victories, in New Hampshire and then Nevada.
“I’m hearing my name mentioned a little bit tonight,” he said to laughter. “I wonder why.”
Klobuchar hammered Sanders’s plans as “broken promises that sound good on bumper stickers” while billionaire activist Tom Steyer accused him of planning “a government takeover of large parts of the economy”.
Like Buttigieg, Bloomberg sought to cast a Sanders nomination as a sure path to losing.
“Vladimir Putin thinks that Donald Trump should be president of the United States, and that’s why Russia is helping you get elected so you’ll lose to him,” the former New York mayor told Sanders during the opening exchange.
“I’m the one choice that makes some sense,” said Bloomberg, emphasising his experience running America’s largest city for 12 years – a point hammered also made in televised ads during multiple commercial breaks.
Bloomberg found himself under assault too, including by Warren who called him “the riskiest candidate” on stage.
“I don’t care how much money mayor Bloomberg has. The core of the Democratic Party will never trust him,” Warren said. “He has not earned their trust. I will.”
Bloomberg jumped late into the race, and has not been on the ballot in the four early states, opting instead to make a splash on Super Tuesday. He has now spent more than $500 million on campaign advertising.
Rival centrist Biden desperately needs a win after dismal showings in Iowa and New Hampshire, and a disappointing result in Nevada where he won 20.2 percent, well behind Sanders’ 46.8 percent.
Biden has been counting on strong support among black voters in South Carolina to recharge his flagging campaign – earning cheers at one point when he promised to put a female black justice on the Supreme Court if elected.
Pressed on whether he would throw in the towel if he falls short on Saturday, Biden was defiant, saying: “I will win South Carolina.”
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Wanting a fairer United States is not a communist plot. Democratic socialism means a fairer society, corporate greed is a scourge on everyone.
@Twitruser2020: Democratic socialism is socialism through the ballot box rather than through a revolution. Same end result though.
@Stephen Brady: remind me again how Sweden/Norway have the same socialism as Cuba or Venezuela?
@Twitruser2020: There’s enough in Bernie’s past to paint him as an avowed communist. If he gets the nomination Trump will have a field day.
However you define Democratic Socialism, it contains the word socialism which reads as communism to most Americans. The energized youth vote will not be near enough to propel Bernie to the WH.
@Sean: The Scandinavian countries are not socialist countries, they are capitalist countries with very generous social welfare systems.
Cuba and Venezuela are socialist (state control of industry) or to be more precise, communist dictatorships.
@Will: the Scandinavian countries operate a system known as democratic socialism. They have policies similar to those now proposed by sanders.
The ideal system to benefit all citizens in any country is a sensible mix of capitalism and socialism. The pure form of either tends to mainly benefit a small cohort of the population at the expense of everyone else.
@Sean: Norway and Sweden don’t have socialism.,. They are both free market capitalist nations.
@john doe: Democratic socialism must be underpinned by a system that can pay for it. Private enterprise is what pays for all of these programs in Scandinavia, here, America, basically anywhere with a social welfare network.
So while I agree with you that we need a mix, I don’t think the likes of Saunders is on the same page. He advocates for state control of most things. State control of industry/enterprise will see the money disappear as there will be no incentive to excel and maximise profits.
Anyway, private enterprise is fine, it’s normal. The real cause of poverty in our society is not free market capitalism. The real cause is rampant corruption at the top and a parasitic banking system that takes far more out of the economy then it ever puts in.
I was once told by a banker that banks expect to make €40 for every €1 invested. The Mafia are saints compared to those guys.
@Twitruser2020:
“The goal of socialism is communism” – Lenin
Democratic Socialism is still socialism, no thanks.
@Sean: Sweden & Norway are free market capitalist countries, not socialist. Tell me why all those Cubans and Venezuelans are fleeing their countries for the US and Colombia for example?
@Sean: they are capitalist economies you plank
@john doe: they have capitalist economies to pay for enhanced so ial welfare etc. You can own a company and run it how you like that isn’t socialism its capitalism. It amazes me how many people cant see something that simple
It’s such a bizarre system they have where people on the same ‘side’ attack each other in public and then eventually endorse the winner and expect everyone to forget all the negatives that were raised.
@Rob Hunt: Humans lad, what can I say.
Franklin D Roosevelt took the US out of the Great Depression with Socialist policies & Programs so I guess Bernie can do the same almost 90 years later
@Moorooka Mick: it was also the slowest recovery up to that point. Also we’re not in a recession or depression at the moment. Why work hard at your career only to have the fruits of ones labour snatched away by the most inefficient body ever to exist, the civil service
@Vote4Pedro:
idk about you, but I don’t get the fruits of my labour, I get a wage. Most people get a wage. Profit sharing is pretty rare in the private sector.
I do however get a tidy sum of the fruits of other people’s labour through the shares I own. Wake up lad, sharpen up.
You’d think for a party that has spent the last 4 years bemoaning the petty actions of trump as president would have the cop on to run a clean and no bs primary considering they want trump gone why are they trying to skewer the only candidate that stands any chance against. The worst elements of the Democratic Party at play here
@Jake Kelly: hmm i dont think you have a good grasp of how the democratic system works in the US – how exactly do you propose they should pick who gets to run ?? The whole point is that its a bruising contest to see what voters want ffs
It’s Thump for four more years !!!!. Sanders can’t beat him
@smart cat: I wouldn’t be so presumptuous – have you been paying attention to the reality on the ground in the US ? The republicans were decimated the last time the voters got a say and almost every one of the many many polls show that every candidate can beat Trump based on voting intentions. We will see in November.
@smart cat: Saunders will get shafted again, the same way as last time. The super delegates will give it to one of the others then all Bernies buddies will run amok.
Sanders has to state how he will fund these important and necessary reforms (student debt, education, medical insurance). On CNN recently he couldn’t state how much would be raised to fund them. I sympathise with what Sanders hopes to do, but that is playing into the Trump campaigns hands.
@David A. Murray: people all know that the US system routinely hands out vast tax cuts to billionaires and huge bailouts to corporations with little to no handwringing from the poltical and media classes about where the money for those massive costs will come from. They also know how much the US spends on its military, while letting its poor suffer and remain under educated.
Sanders knows the US has the money for this, and people trust his long long record of being a largely honest and decent human.
@その男、凶暴につき: “Sanders knows the US has the money for this”
Saunders knows no such thing.
America has a national debt of $23 trillion. They have this precisely because they have to borrow to fund all the different programs on their books.
Saunders refuses to explain how he will fund his massive social programs, why? Because he knows full well the country can’t afford them.
@Will: Yeah, programs that squander vast sums on their military/security/prison complex and none that benefit the people. Having encountered their ‘Health Care’ system I can tell you it is a just one vast extortion racket. The biggest spend, with worst outcomes in the developed world.
@Will: He has never refused to explain how he would fund it. He has said time and time again that he would tax the rich and corporations appropriately to fund it. That’s why his opponents, who are all corporate shills, are running scared.
Dems in for a thrashing at the polls. 4 more years for Donald
Sanders is wiping the floor with all of them so far. They are not going to beat him in debates because their pro-business agenda is far too transparent. If Sanders loses, it will be because someone plays dirty.
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