Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama debated last night in Texas and, while the initial reviews seem to be that both parties did well, it doesn’t sound like Clinton scored the kind of knockout punch she needs to get to revive her campaign:
AUSTIN, Feb. 21 — Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama disagreed sharply on how to achieve universal health care, debated about which of them is most ready to serve as commander in chief and argued over who can best change the country as they appealed for support Thursday ahead of showdown primaries in Texas and Ohio.
The Democratic debate began politely but gathered force in the closing portions with pointed exchanges on substantive issues and about the traits required of a president. The forum closed with a flourish, after the candidates were asked to describe how they had dealt with crises in their lives.
Y-A-W-N.
That question alone makes me glad I was too tired to stay up and watch this thing. I don’t want to hear new age, feel good nonsense from a politician, I want to hear substance. Unfortunately, even the substance was pretty distressing:
With the battle for Ohio looming, Clinton took the more populist tone that Obama has been adopting since the Wisconsin competition earlier this week. Obama repeated his pledge to renegotiate trade accords, such as the North American Free Trade Agreement, one of the biggest achievements of Bill Clinton’s presidency.
But this time, his rival had a response. She said she would establish a new “trade prosecutor” to ensure that labor, environmental and safety standards in existing trade deals are being enforced. She again called for a “timeout” before pursuing additional free trade agreements to examine which treaties are working and which are not.
And, Hillary, what gives the United States the right to impose labor conditions in other countries ?
The two also exchanged words over the Clinton campaign’s charge of plagarism against Obama:
Clinton jabbed at Obama over his appropriation of words and phrases from the 2006 campaign of Massachusetts Gov. Deval L. Patrick, something her campaign has called plagiarism.
“I think that if your candidacy is going to be about words, then they should be your own words,” she said. “That’s, I think, a very simple proposition. And, you know, lifting whole passages from someone else’s speeches is not change you can believe in, it’s change you can Xerox.”
But the line fell flat in the hall, and Obama batted away as “silly” the idea that taking the advice of one of his national campaign co-chairmen was plagiarism.
On the whole it seems like this was pretty close to a draw, which for Obama constitutes a win at this point.
February 22nd, 2008 at 6:40 am
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