May 5, 2003
...on South Carolina Democratic Debate & Weekend
So who won?
Winner Number One undoubtedly was George Stephanopoulos, the often-maligned host of ABC's This Week. Stephanopoulos appeared confident and in control during the entire 90-minute debate, and he asked a terrific series of pointed questions to each Democrat about his or her alleged major weakness as a candidate. He deserves plenty of credit for his performance and for keeping the debate moving.
Winner Number Two, for my money, was Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman. Up to Saturday night, Lieberman had run an unmemorable Presidential race. His winter meeting DNC speech was fine but clearly overshadowed by Dick Gephardt's and John Edwards's presentations. His first quarter fund raising numbers were pathetic.
Democratic insiders who bare no grudges were already identifying the party's 2000 vice presidential nominee as the first credible presidential candidate to drop out of the race.
But Lieberman didn't merely hold his own - he stood out from the pack. He was at various times smart, serious, funny, empathetic and even indignant. He seemed upbeat and unusually confident. From his references to his civil rights activities to his defense of the war in Iraq and his combative answer on gun licensing, the Connecticut senator scored points.
Having said that, none of the top tier candidates flopped. (In arguing that, I suppose that I'm disagreeing with some who concluded that Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry had a "disastrous" night.) I thought that Edwards and Gephardt missed some opportunities, but generally did quite well.
One of the things that we learned from the debate is that the front runners - Kerry, Edwards and Gephardt - seem to think that Florida Sen. Bob Graham isn't a serious threat.
Of the eight other candidates who asked questions in the "candidate question" round, Graham was on the receiving end of half of them. He drew questions from Edwards, Dean, Gephardt and Sharpton.
Why the disproportionate questioning of Graham, the last major candidate to jump in the race? One operative with another campaign told me that Graham was the "safe" target. He has the stature of a statewide officeholder but isn't seen as a real threat to the heavyweights.
Neither Kerry nor Dean - the two Democrats who began the evening sneering at each other (per Stephanopoulos's intent) - received a question. That was not by accident. Both received more than their share of early face time, and the other hopefuls didn't want to give them a chance to score points.
So where does the Democratic race stand after the weekend?
On the basis of the debate, Kerry doesn't look as much as the clear favorite as he once did. Of course, he still has organizational and financial advantages.
Gephardt did well in the debate but was hugely disappointing at the Saturday afternoon state Democratic convention. He couldn't fit all of his point and anecdotes into his time, but he tried anyway.
Edwards did quite well in the debate and at the convention but got way too cute by half by intentionally missing the program portion of Cong. Jim Clyburn's Friday night fish fry. Lieberman was good at the debate but missed other opportunities to win support in the state because of the Sabbath. And Howard Dean was Howard Dean.
And that means the war of attrition for the Democrats will continue.