Wednesday Open Thread [11.11.2015]

Filed in National by on November 11, 2015

SOUTH CAROLINAPPP: Clinton 72, Sanders 18, O’Malley 5
SOUTH CAROLINAMonmouth: Clinton 69, Sanders 21, O’Malley 1

SOUTH CAROLINAPPP: Trump 25, Carson 21, Cruz 15, Rubio 13, Bush 8, Fiorina 5, Kasich 3, Huckabee 2, Graham 2, Paul 2, Christie 1, Santorum 1

Steve Benen on Republicans trying to deny the economic gains under Obama:

By every possible metric, Obama inherited an economic catastrophe from Bush’s brother and took effective steps to get the economy back on track. Dan Diamond had a good piece over the weekend noting that Republicans have an even tougher case to make now that the unemployment rate has dropped to 5%.

Six years ago this week, BLS reported that unemployment had passed 10 percent, the first time in decades that the US unemployment rate had hit double digits, and a visible sign of how bad the Great Recession really had become. Obama can now argue that under his watch, unemployment has been cut in half. It’s a striking improvement – especially when measured against Obama’s predecessor.

[…] I’d add for context that the unemployment never dropped below 5.3% in the Reagan era. It’s 5% now. Why should voters care? In part because of that Jeb quote from June: there are 15 Republican presidential candidates, and each of them desperately wants Americans to believe President Obama’s economic policies have been a disaster. […] The question these candidates might struggle with, though, is why slashing the unemployment rate in half is a disaster in need of a far-right “fix.”

The answer to the question “Are you better off than eight years ago?” is yes. You would have to be a liar to say otherwise. And Republicans are liars.

Democrats no longer have to rely on Philadelphia to win Pennsylvania:

“It long has been the Republican mantra that Democrats only can win statewide if there is a large voter turnout in Philadelphia, a Democrat bastion. But this time, if you deduct all of the Philadelphia vote totals from the Supreme Court candidates, the three Democrats still win,” Joseph Sabino Mistick writes for TribLive.

Taegen Goddard on the Republican debate last night:

The defining moment of the debate was a heated exchange over the practicality of Donald Trump’s proposed deportation of 11 million undocumented immigrants. John Kasich, and then Jeb Bush, denounced the plan while Trump stood his ground. Ted Cruz later joined in defense of Trump’s position. Marco Rubio wisely stayed on the sidelines.

Trump won the exchange because he appeals to so many Republican voters who have lost patience with the “practical” solutions offered by establishment politicians. Immigration highlights this political divide nicely, but it was found in many other issues during the night, such as tax policy and trade.

Overall, Trump had his best debate yet and was the clear winner. The establishment should be very worried. He’s a real contender for the nomination. […]

Rand Paul had perhaps his best moment of the campaign attacking Rubio’s national security plans as too expensive. The problem is that his libertarian foreign policy views are not be held by the vast majority of GOP voters and Rubio swatted him down to much applause. But it was Paul’s first real opportunity to explain why he’s different than the others on the stage. […]

There were no big mistakes tonight, though Cruz nearly fumbled in a Rick Perry-like attempt to list government agencies he wanted to eliminate. Overall, I don’t see this debate shaking up the race significantly.

Rick Klein: “Cruz and Rubio did find moments to break through, in a debate that didn’t shake things up so much as it seemed to confirm the status quo of a volatile race… Rubio and his rivals, though, made clear that the next chapter is still being written -– and is likely to be a messy one.”

Some reactions to the debate last night found that Jeb Bush had his best night in the campaign, but is it too late?

New York Times: “On Tuesday night, Mr. Bush, whose chronic struggles on the debate stage have unnerved his supporters and dragged down his standing in the polls, was a feistier and more assertive combatant, demanding more time from moderators, offering flashes of improvised humor and delivering crisper answers than he has in the past.”

“Whether it will be enough to turn around his flagging campaign is uncertain: Mr. Bush has a well-documented gift for gaffes and his creaky candidacy feels out of sync with the furious mood of the electorate. But on Tuesday, unlike in earlier debates, he no longer seemed as desperate to be somewhere else.”

Politico: “The politically and financially embattled former Florida Governor wasn’t great, but he finally showed a little life… Unfortunately for Bush, he is at his most passionate on issues where he is most politically vulnerable – immigration … and in defending his brother.”

The Economist: “Mr Bush’s performance was solid, though probably not enough to give his ailing campaign much of a jolt. He appeared competent and serious, but he had no youthful charisma, like Mr Rubio, or devilish flair, like Mr Cruz.”

Politico: “This was the (relatively) harmonious and (modestly) party-building debate Republicans wanted after three trips to the flea circus. The Trump and Carson campaigns groused about the Democrats’ getting a free pass at their first debate in mid-October, and the FOX Business moderators responded by handing them the easiest 120 minutes of debate time the field has ever had. The questioning wasn’t precisely powder-puff, but the moderators mostly steered clear of the controversies that howled outside the venue all week.”

Brian Beutler says the Republicans have no answer to a key 2016 question:

[T]he most revealing question of the first half of the debate, addressed to Carly Fiorina, posited that Democrats will point out, accurately, that the labor market has performed better in modern times under Democratic presidents than under Republican ones, and that it performed particularly poorly under the previous Republican president.

“The Democrats will inevitably ask you and voters to compare the recent presidents’ jobs performance,” said moderator Gerard Baker. “In seven years under President Obama, the U.S. has added an average of 107,000 jobs per month. Under Clinton, the economy added about 240,000 per month, under George W. Bush, it was only 13,000 a month. If you win the nomination, you will probably be facing a Democrat named Clinton. How are you going to respond to the claim that Democratic presidents are better at creating jobs than Republicans?”

Fiorina, quite tellingly, had no answer. […]

“When Hillary Clinton runs, she’s going to say, ‘The Republicans gave us a crappy economy twice, and we fixed it twice. Why would you ever trust them again?’” Kevin Hassett, a Republican economist at the American Enterprise Institute, said earlier this year. “The objective for the people in the Republican Party who want to defeat her is to come up with a story about what’s not great.”

What’s not great is income inequality, but Republican policies of tax cuts, union busting and deregulation have created income inequality, not lessened it. So the GOP cannot campaign on that either.

Barbara Morrill on last night’s debate:

[W]e learned that … the 2016 GOP hopefuls opposed raising the minimum wage, would cut taxes to practically nothing and abolish the IRS, would repeal Obamacare, destroy ISIS with their steely gazes, not to mention spending billions more on the military, and, of course, that they really, really hate Hillary Clinton.

There were a few amusing moments: Ben Carson is still insisting West Point hands out scholarships and that he is not a liar; Donald Trump announced that wages were too high, along with seeming to believe that China was a part of the TPP; Carly Fiorina sneered at the idea (with finger quotes!) of protecting consumers from fraud; Jeb Bush kept forgetting that President Obama inherited a financial crisis from another Bush; Marco Rubio said that being a parent is the most important job in the world, and in the next breath said being president is the most important job in the world, and Ted Cruz announced the five government departments that he would abolish, but could only name four of them. Oops.

First Read says Cruz v. Rubio is coming: “Another big takeaway from last night’s debate is that a showdown between Ted Cruz and Marco is coming — maybe not today or tomorrow. But it’s coming. Just note Cruz’s reference to sugar subsidies (which are important to Florida and its big political donors).”

Said Cruz: “You know, I mention that the 25 programs that I put today, that I would eliminate them. Among them are corporate welfare, like sugar subsidies. Let’s take that as an example. Sugar subsidies. Sugar farmers farm under roughly 0.2% of the farmland in America, and yet they give 40% of the lobbying money. That sort of corporate welfare is why we’re bankrupting our kids, and grandkids. I would end those subsidies to pay for defending this nation.”

“When you combine that with Cruz’s statement against illegal immigration, you see how Cruz is angling himself for a future showdown with Rubio.”

About the Author ()