Democratic Presidential Candidates: Debate 2

Last night’s debate confirms that the front-runners are still very much Hillary, Obama and Edwards. As for the rest, while they clearly make the debate more lively, its only a matter of time before they exit the race and hope for a VP spot on the ticket, unless one of the front runners slip up significantly. Among the front runners, Hillary literally took center stage this time. She was so much more at ease than ever before and seemed very much in control. She might have “goofed” when she said that “America is safer today but not safe enough”.

Obama on the other hand seems to be gaining with experience. He does sometimes get caught up in legislative detail and struggles when he has to give a concise answer. On the other hand, he was very quick to seize the opportunity and sound leader-like when he attacked the question about the National language issue by saying, “This is the kind of question that is meant to divide…”. On a side note, Obama was the only one who could pronounce “Pakistan” correctly (perhaps showing his attention to detail!).

The top punch lines of the debate where easily, Hillary Clinton’s reference to “This administration sometimes send Cheney on diplomatic missions…” and Obama’s “You were late by four and half years on leadership on this issue” response to Edwards’ complaint of the lack of leadership among Senators in bringing the war to end. The quality of the questions from the audience was a little disappointing.

Joe Biden seemed so angry for most of the debate! I guess he figured fireworks might get him some attention. Bill Richardson might have a good resume, but he was far from convincing for what was essentially a TV contest. Dennis Kucinich is perhaps the only one who is significantly different from the rest, but the man is completely unelectable in today’s big money world of American politics.