Trailhead: A campaign blog.

Richardson's Last Laugh

Gibson gives each candidate a chance to take back a remark they made during the campaign. Hillary and Obama dodge. Edwards takes back his comment about Hillary's jacket. But Richardson delivers a genuinely sweet moment of self-deprecation:

"We were asked who our favorite Supreme Court justice was, and I said [Justice Byron] White. ... And then later I learned that White was against abortion rights. He was against civil rights. So that wasn’t a good one."

And with that, he can drop out.

Hillary’s Case Rests on This

“Words are not actions. As passionately felt as they are, they are not actions. We have to turn passion into action, and feeling into reality.”

That’s the case against Obama, distilled. Hillary is not appealing while on the offensive -- at least that's my takeaway from this debate. She's more natural, more poised as a frontrunner. But she just encapsulated the argument that is keeping many Democrats from siding with Obama.

Here's his response, a few minutes later: "Words do inspire. Words do help people get involved. Words do help members of congress get in a position to enact legislation."

If New Hampshire buys that, Obama's a lock.

What About the Generals?

Almost all of the hawkish Republican candidates have skirted questions about what they’d do in Iraq by saying they’d defer to their generals. It lets them avoid the sticky details while vaguely committing themselves to the war effort.

So Gibson confronts the Dems with the flipside of that question: Would they still pull the troops out if their generals said they needed more time?

Edwards tries to have it both ways. On the one hand, he says, it’s the responsibility of the president to make policy. That said, “I would listen to the generals—directly. … If they say we need more time, of course I’d listen to what they say.” But he still promises to “end the occupation of Iraq within one year.”

At no point does he acknowledge that these two actions -- listening to his generals (with a willingness to act on their advice) and pulling all combat troops out -- could be utterly at odds. A better question might have been: What would you do if your generals told you they needed another 20 years in Iraq?

The Knives Come Out

Oh here we go. Gibson asks Hillary: What does Obama need to be vetted on?

Hillary dives in, charging Obama with “having a pretty good debate with himself” on the subject of health care. He first supported a single payer system, she says -- now he has a health care plan that won’t cover every American.

Obama tries to clarify, saying “If I could set up a system from scratch, I’d set up a single payer system.” But given the system we already have, under which many people are already covered, he thinks it would be more pragmatic to lower the cost of health care than to force people to buy it.

Obama calls it a “philosophical difference” between them. Hillary says he’s being inconsistent, since his plan would mandate coverage for children but not adults. Obama responds that he requires it for children because “they don’t have a choice.”
 
These, these are the sparks we’ve been waiting for. And they're flying over one of the most contentious questions of the campaign -- to mandate or not to mandate. Not even Richardson's saccharine odes to positivity can extinguish this one. Props to ABC for letting them rough it out.

It’s 9:10

And Sen. Clinton is speaking for the first time.

And boy does she take her time. Responding to Gibson's question about what she would do if she had actionable intelligence about terrorists operating in Pakistan, she gives a five-part answer. She would strike, with these things in mind:

1) We must train the Afghan army so it can help.
2) Any actionable intelligence that would lead to a strike must be given careful consideration.
3) The Pakistani government has to know they’re on the way.
4) Get musharraf to share responsibility for protecting nuclear stockpiles.
5) Repair the failed policies of the Bush administration.

Again, notice how ABC sets up the question so all the candidates have to respond to Obama's statement that he would  strike Pakistan if there is actionable intelligence. They're treating him as the front-runner and letting him set the tone.