Sanders and Clinton Drill Down on the Issues in PBS Debate

MILWAUKEE – With Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders neck and neck after Iowa and New Hampshire, the two candidates took to the stage in Wisconsin Thursday night for the PBS News Hour Debate.

 

From her opening statement, Clinton tried to re-calibrate her message, borrowing a few lines from her opponent. Clinton acknowledged that we do have a "rigged economy that favors those on the top," while doing more to make sure "that Wall Street never again wrecks Main Street."

 

The most charged disagreements came over health care with Clinton attacking Sanders’ Medicare for All plan as unrealistic and overly-expensive. Clinton said she would work to continue to expand health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act, but did not support moving toward a single-payer system.

 

Sanders countered that because of the inefficiencies in a for-profit system, America currently spends as much as 50 percent more per-capita as countries with universal health care, such as France, the United Kingdom, Australia and Canada.

 

Both candidates agreed that not enough was being done to improve economic opportunities in minority areas that have been deeply entrenched in systemic, generational cycles of poverty and that increased educational opportunities and community investment were the key. However, Clinton again dismissed Sanders’ call for universal, free college education as pie in the sky.

 

 

Sanders responded that in many ways, a college education today is the equivalent of what a high school diploma was only a few decades ago and pressed that increasing education was the only way to increase economic opportunities and was directly related to the high incarceration rates in minority communities. Both candidates agreed that criminal justice reform was a critical issue, particularly among African American males, and in need of reform.

 

Another disagreement emerged when Senator Sanders brought up his plan to "scrap the cap" on Social Security taxes for those making more than $250,000 a year, in order to expand the Social Security Trust Fund and increase payments to those making less than $16,000 a year in benefits. Clinton said that she too wanted to expand the trust’s revenues but wanted to focus on "passive incomes" and wouldn’t commit to such specifics.

 

The event stayed relatively tame for the first hour, until the issues of campaign finances and Wall Street influence came up. Sanders touted his record 3.5 million donations at an average of $27. Clinton countered that she had over 750,000, "most of which were small donors." Moderators then brought up Clinton’s PACs and huge donations from donors like billionaire financier George Soros. Clinton went on the defensive, distancing herself from Soros and claiming the Wall Street money did not influence her, noting that President Obama had gotten even more from Wall Street in 2008 and claiming he had still gone after Wall Street.

 

Sanders delivered his most stinging dialog of the debate, asking Clinton, "Let’s not insult the intelligence of the American people," sarcastically suggesting that perhaps Wall Street made all of those donations just because they wanted to throw some money around or that the fact that the pharmaceutical industry gives huge donations and Americans pay the highest prices for prescription drugs in the world might be a coincidence.

 

In the second hour, the debate shifted to foreign policy, where Clinton showed a much stronger command of the issues in the last debate. Clinton reiterated her strategy to deal with ISIS and the situation in Syria and the larger region.

 

Sanders reiterated his vote not to invade Iraq and went on to explain that he felt the fact that the concerns he expressed on the floor of the House prior to the vote came to pass in the form of the quagmire that followed spoke to his judgment. Sanders said he disagreed with Clinton on the issue of regime change and pointed to the destabilization in places like Lebanon. He recounted our rarely mentioned history in Iran, pledging to be much more careful about the "unintended consequences" of aggressive foreign policy.

 

In response, Clinton delivered her best pre-scripted line of the night in response, saying, "I do not believe that a vote in 2002 is a plan to deal with ISIS in 2016." Sanders reiterated, "I led the opposition against it, she voted for it." On Syria, Clinton was much more hawkish on Russia, pledging to assure that "we implement what has been agreed to." It should be noted, that Clinton's position is remarkably similar to a recent op-ed by Soros.

 

Clinton criticized Sanders for his willingness to work to improve U.S. relations with Iran, to which Sanders made a reference to Cuba and said that’s how peace is achieved. Clinton fired back with an aggressive response that she would not look to open relations with Iran and would move aggressively if any of the terms of the recent nuclear deal were violated.

 

More fireworks flew when Sanders brought up Clinton having bragged of praise she received from former Nixon-era Sec. of State Henry Kissinger, noting his role in escalating Vietnam, the illegal bombing of Cambodia and genocide that followed. Clinton later struck back at Sanders, saying that the kind of criticisms she’d heard by Senator Sanders of President Obama were ones that she would expect from Republicans.

 

Sanders called that "a low blow," responding, "last I heard, we lived in a Democratic society, last I heard we were allowed to disagree." Sanders noted that President Obama had campaigned for him as Senator and said that he has supported the President on virtually every issue. He ended by noting, "One of us ran against Barack Obama. I was not that candidate."

 

In closing statements, Sanders said that his campaign was not about one person but bringing tens of millions together to effect change. Clinton said hers was about breaking barriers and giving every American a chance to reach their potential. In summary, Senator Sanders seemed to carry the first hour on domestic social issues, while Clinton won the second hour on foreign policy–provided you're not an anti-war Democrat–though Sanders’ performance definitely improved on the foreign policy front.

Next up, the candidates will face off in the Nevada Caucus on February 20, followed by the South Carolina primary on February 27.