4th Democratic Debate reaction.

Candidates at the 4th Democratic Debate. CNN.

As you may know, the 4th Democratic Debate was last night. It was a bit of a mess with too many candidates and not enough speaking time to go around. 12 candidates is way too much and it ensured that not all the candidates got a fair shake to say their share.

Moderation was God-awful. Anderson Cooper started with the most biased question I have ever heard from a debate moderator, saying, without evidence, that Hunter Biden did nothing wrong in Ukraine. That led to the first 20 minutes of the debate being nothing more than an attack ad for the Democratic Party bashing Trump for no reason while totally failing to have any debate at all. 

There was also some bias against some of the candidates. Though former whipping boy Andrew Yang got more speaking time this time around, neither Tulsi Gabbard or newcomer Tom Steyer got much time to talk. Project Veritas has undercover footage showing that Gabbard is extremely unpopular among the CNN staff so it's not surprising that she got screwed. 

I don't know if anyone won the debate but I think Bernie Sanders had a good night. He may not have completely put aside his health concerns but he did a lot to lessen the concern. Though not quite as spry and energetic as he was in 2016, he was much healthier than I was expecting. 

Sanders was helped by the awful night the two front runners had. Joe Biden has to be close to finished. He was making very little sense and said crazy things like stock brokers needing to clip coupons, called Bernie Sanders Vladimir Putin by accident and said he was going to repeal Roe vs Wade. It was an awful performance despite the fact that he got softball questions and the other candidates mostly left him alone. 

Elizabeth Warren got hammered. She came of as incredibly dishonest. She was asked many, many, MANY times to admit that her medicare for all plan would cause a middle class tax increase. She dodged the question each and every time. Sanders supports the same plan and was asked the same question but he handled it much better. He claimed that taxes would go up but people would save more due to lower health care costs. Regardless if that is true or not, it was a much more honest answer and made him seem honest and made Warren look like a snake. Plus, all her complaints about big tech could turn them against her. 

Andrew Yang also had a good night. He was much more assertive and got more speaking time. He also mostly stuck to policy and didn't spend the whole evening just bashing Trump. I think he made progress in turning his idea of a 4th industrial revolution into a meme that might just spread. I also liked that he didn't just focus on his universal basic income idea, but actually branched out into other ideas as well. 

The two candidates that were new to this debate, Tulsi Gabbard and Tom Steyer, did not do much. Part of that was due to the moderators who simply didn't call on them, and at one point even told Gabbard to shut up. But neither of them did much with the time they had. And Gabbard lost a battle with Pete Buttgieg over foreign policy. Given that's here area of expertise, it was not a good night for her. Steyer just didn't have any moments at all. 

The most surprising moment for me was the gun control debate. Once again Robert Francis O'Rourke went on about confiscating firearms and he actually got some pushback. Most of it was insincere, but there was a spectacular moment where Julian Castro, in no uncertain terms, said that people would die if cops go door to door to collect firearms. He did it in a totally leftist way, referencing a recent police shooting, but the point remains that someone finally told that idiot O'Rourke what the consequences for his insane plan would be. 

Overall though, the debate was mostly boring. There weren't any huge exchanges or shocking policy proposals. Most of it was just people just going over the same policy details that were covered in the past three debates. There was no real new information revealed here. 

As for the candidates, I fully expect many of the lower ranked players to finally drop out. The people that didn't make the debate will probably leave soon. As for the candidates that did, I can't see O'Rourke, Castro or Booker staying in for long. And I wouldn't be terribly surprised if Sanders overtakes Biden and Warren, though no matter what Biden's going to drop in the polls.