What Bernie Should do in Tonight’s Debate
Some quick thoughts about tonight’s debate: This may not be Bernie’s last chance to command a major national audience, but it’s doubtful there will be bigger ones in the future (unless he becomes president). Although statistically he’s a dead goner after the Florida primary, the coronavirus is the kind of all-encompassing crisis that can overturn all prognostications. It will still take a miracle, bur there’s really no downside to his acting as if the chance of pulling off a political resuscitation is in fact nonzero.
How does he do that? I watched his fireside chat last night, and it wasn’t what he needed. Bernie is never really bad–he stays coherent and says things that make sense–but he is rarely or never great either. I’d be stunned if that chat pulled one more person across the line, despite the fact that it’s obvious you’d rather have him directing the national response to this crisis than Trump or Biden.
He made solid points about the way lack of universal heatlh-care and extreme inequality exacerbate the crisis, and proposed more good ideas to deal with the fallout than we have heard from any other politician, like signficant expansion of unemployment benefits. But he diluted the impact in numerous ways. He quickly pivoted to regular campaign talk, saying for example that he wanted to quiz Biden about why he has donations from 60 billionaires–a question remarkably few people care about right now.
Worse, he speaks in generalities, understates when he should make targeted emotional appeals, and remains broad and unfocused. What is needed right now is a clear, pointed indictment of what Trump and his cronies have done that alarms people, coupled with a warm, reassuring prescription for what can be done. Bernie is good at neither of those things, but he needs to be.
He shouldn’t have done a fireside chat; he should have been looking directly into the camera doing a prepared speech that put flesh on the bones of his general indictment of Trump, with facts and figures. Instead of saying Trump didn’t mobilize for this crisis, repeat actual Trump quotes. Instead of saying this is a crisis, give people some updates on what’s happening globally. Instead of saying that it’s awful that people might be charged for coronavirus testing and treatment, point specifically to Trump’s abdication on this issue and mention that it was left to a freshman Congresswoman to obtain free testing for us. It’s not that people remember them, but specifics can be shocking. They also give people a sense that you know what you’re talking about and are not just engaging in partisan spin.
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It seems clear what his strategy in the debate should be. It’s an audition to be president, not Democratic nominee. And, as in a real audition, he should *show* that he is the better candidate, not *tell* us that he is.
First, every answer should be directed toward the crisis. There will be time later to hear about free college, criminal justice reform, and the rest of it. Second, he needs to attack Trump, not Biden. The reason seems clear: audiences tuned out and turned off to Democratic intramural debates about how exactly they were going to provide universal coverage or how much wealth tax Sanders had vs. Warren or whether they would do a lot for racial justice or much more than a lot. Not enough people cared about these distinction even before the crisis emerged into our consciousness.
Bernie needs to show he is the man (sigh…) to take on Trump and set the country on a path to sanity. Numerous commentators have suggested that the coronavirus helped Biden because people want safety and comfort, but Biden, who can barely read from a Teleprompter, does not inspire confidence in me. All the more so because this health crisis is also sure to be a crisis of capitalism as well. It should not be difficult for Bernie to come across as the person who is on top of what’s going on and has a plan to deal with all aspects of the crisis–at least by comparison with Biden and Trump. He needs to be evocative both about the scale of the crisis and the scale of his solutions. It will be a moment that calls for an FDR, not a Hoover/Biden. People are ready to hear this, as long as it’s from someone who can convince them that he know’s what’s going on.
It is vital that Bernie differentiate himself from Biden affirmatively, by showing he can do this better, rather than by attacking Biden’s negatives directly. All the more so since Bernie has already made it clear he won’t do the latter. Unlike many Berniebots, Bernie has no intention of bringing down the temple upon himself.