The biggest winner
Donald Trump. Reason: His numbers rose.
The biggest losers
(1) Mike Bloomberg. Reason: His numbers fell.
(2) Telemundo senior correspondent Vanessa Hauc. Reason: Hauc wouldn’t let go of a relatively trivial issue like a dog with a bone. Amy Klobuchar admitted she didn’t know the name of the president of Mexico but argued that she knew a lot about Mexico. But Hauc went back to it as if Klobuchar hadn’t said a thing. To her credit, Elizabeth Warren gave a better defense of Klobuchar on this than Klobuchar herself gave. Interestingly, though, Klobuchar didn’t seem to appreciate that.
(3) Lester Holt and the other questioners. Reason: They lost control.
Most interesting and upsetting thing about the economics
Bloomberg, though, not Mr. Personality, did make a good point:
It’s ridiculous. We’re not going to throw out capitalism. We tried. Other countries tried that. It was called communism, and it just didn’t work.
Many in the audience booed.
Second most interesting thing about the economics
Bloomberg said to Sanders:
What a wonderful country we have. The best known socialist in the country happens to be a millionaire with three houses. What did I miss here?
Bernie replies that he has a house in Washington, one in Burlington and, a “summer camp.” Clearly, Bernie sees nothing wrong with this.
My comment. First, my long-time Congressman Leon Panetta didn’t have a house in Washington. He shared one long-term with fellow Congressmen. Indeed, in the summer of 1986 or the summer of 1987, my wife and I were on a flight from Dulles to San Fran on which I saw him and his roommate, Democratic Congressman George Miller. (It was actually an interesting conversation but I’ll save that for another post.)
Also, although Bernie didn’t make the point last night, he has often defended his being a millionaire as follows:
I wrote a best-selling book. If you write a best-selling book, you can be a millionaire, too,” he recently told the New York Times, striking a downright Trumpian note.
Clearly, in context, Bernie sees nothing wrong with that. And he’s right. So what if someone else, say, J.K. Rowling, sells a lot of books and becomes a billionaire? At what number of sales does virtue turn to vice? Or what if someone, say Mike Bloomberg, comes up with a computer system with a lot of keyboards at financial institutions around the country and charges thousands a year, becoming a multi-billionaire? How is that worse? Would Bernie argue that Bernie earned his money because people valued the book but Bloomberg didn’t earn the money because people didn’t value his service? That’s wrong on its face.
Other Interesting Things
I found one thing to like about Bernie. When someone acknowledges something he likes about Bernie, there’s usually a “but” afterwards. But when Bernie hears the first part, he typically smiles and thanks the person. Then he goes on the attack, but that first part is old school and we could use more of it.
At one point, I think Amy Klobuchar felt so under attack (and I think rightly so–my wife and I noticed that she was being systematically cut off) that she seemed on the edge of tears. From what I think I know about how she treats her Senate staff, I don’t like her. But I did feel some compassion for her.
READER COMMENTS
Thomas Hazlett
Feb 21 2020 at 3:26am
Hi David —
Note the dressing Bernie sprinkled on his statement: “And like thousands of other Vermonters, I do have a summer camp,” Sanders said, referring to the $575,000 lakefront home in North Hero he purchased in 2016. “Forgive me for that.” [https://www.sevendaysvt.com/OffMessage/archives/2020/02/20/bernie-sanders-said-thousands-of-vermonters-own-summer-homes-do-they]
So, to defend his personal choices in the failed capitalist economy, Bernie seeks to hide his third home — lakefront, and half-a-million, no less — among the thousands of other “dachas” enjoyed by the exploited working class in a small North Eastern state.
Tom Hazlett
P.S. Watching in real time, I believe I heard Bernie say “summer cabin” rather than “summer camp,” but the transcript goes with you.
David Henderson
Feb 21 2020 at 10:23am
You wrote:
Good point. From my understanding of the real estate market in summer homes, this is probably in the top 20 percent.
You wrote:
I thought what you thought, but I was writing this at work rather than at home. At home, I could have checked because I DVRed the whole thing. So I went to the transcript.
Patrick T Peterson
Feb 21 2020 at 9:40pm
In the Northeastern US “summer cabins” are usually/often called summer “camps.”
In Michigan, where I am from originally, they are called “cottages” no matter how rudimentary or palatial.
KevinDC
Feb 21 2020 at 10:14am
A couple of random musings of my own –
Regarding the issue of Bernie Sander’s being a multimillionaire and the question of when “does virtue turn to vice” regarding income – my sense is that among those with leftish inclinations, it’s not so much about the level of income, as it is the way the income is derived. I’ve almost never heard anyone on the left complain about the wealth of entertainers, athletes, or authors, even when the total amount of wealth of those people is similar. I think that at a gut level, the wealth of entertainers just doesn’t feel like it came from bad or immoral means. There is a sense that people who got wealthy as corporate executives or in the finance industry did so wrongly – big corporations exploit their workers, use awful sweatshops, and trample over mom and pop stores. Financial institutions rob people of their retirement, exploit poor people to trap them in debt, take away their homes, and so on. So when an Amazon executive who made $50 million in yearly income just feels more “wrong” than Taylor Swift making $185 million in the same time frame. The standard leftist would say that both the Amazon exec and Taylor Swift should pay more in taxes, but they just can’t get that worked up about Swift’s income as such.
I have also been very wary of Amy Klobuchar after reading about how she treats her staff. I’m hardly the first to observe that a good measure of someone’s character is how they treat people over whom they hold power. I was especially disheartened by when she addressed this by saying “Have I pushed people too hard? Yes. But I have kept expectations for myself that are very high. I’ve asked my staff to meet those same expectations.” This just sounds like a polished way of saying “I only treat people like garbage because they’re not being as awesome as I am.”
That said, I do think far too much was made about her blanking on the name of the Mexican president. Unless you are Mr. Data from Star Trek, the odds are you have completely blanked on similarly basic things a thousand times in your life. If I was on camera basically 24/7, I’m sure you could create quite a montage of me having similar moments. Luckily, I’m not in that situation.
David Henderson
Feb 21 2020 at 10:27am
You wrote:
That’s my perception too.
You wrote:
Ditto my perception.
I think there is that sense. I’m not saying that you’re making a mistake here, but they are. An author who makes a lot of money depends on a lot of people in the chain, almost all of whom make far, far less money. Also an author of a best seller probably does marginally push out the “mom and pop” sellers.
Mark Z
Feb 22 2020 at 1:42am
I’m going to partially disagree. I think it’s fairly common for people (not just leftish people) to juxtapose athletes or actors with school teachers, with the implication that the latter are more useful for society but get paid so much less.
I think it’s true though that certain means of making money are inexplicably viewed as less valid than others. Anyone who works in finance, for example, or a managerial position in a large company. I find this amusing because I work at a job where when I tell people what I do, they applaud it as socially useful (not in those exact words), but I am pretty certain I would produce a higher ‘social surplus’ if I worked as a derivatives trader instead. I think the more indirect a profession’s contribution to the economy becomes the harder it is to comprehend its value and the more suspicious people are that it is somehow parasitic in nature.
Tom Jackson
Feb 21 2020 at 11:25am
I assume Bloomberg was booed after the “communism” remark because many thought he was exaggerating in his reference to Sanders. In fact, Sanders was an elector in 1980 for the Socialist Workers Party, which can fairly be described as a communist party. It split off from the Communist Party USA.
Mike Turn
Feb 21 2020 at 3:25pm
So when Obama stated “I do think that at a certain point, you have made enough money”, the left and media generally agreed with him, including Bernie (I surmise). So when Obama goes out and buys his mansions and Bernie has his 3 homes, have they still not made enough money? Or are they like most, if not all, socialists, in that the restrictive (and often oppressive) laws and morals they proscribe for others are not applicable to them in their personal lives?
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