So far in this past year we have seen three rounds of Republican debates full of nothing but feeble attempts to make statements on any of the serious issues America is facing aside from illegal immigration and why Donald Trump’s hair resembles a wisp of discolored cotton candy. The Republicans have offered to the American people stacks of resumé builders that hold little to no weight, and more jokes about Marco Rubio’s thirst problem than we’d like to see. Who’s the top dog, who is the only person on this stage that has ever done this or that, and Donald Trump insulting his way around every “difficult” question is just about all we can get from that party’s three rounds of debates. Many people did not expect any less to come from the long awaited first CNN Democratic Debate that took place October, 13 in Las Vegas. With an exceptionally lower number of candidates running for the Democratic Party, however - a measly five Democrats to a whopping sixteen Republicans - it was not the furious ping pong ball match as seen on the Republican stage, but a fully focused debate that related to the issues Americans wanted to hear.
The differences between the Democrat and Republican debate are few but wide. Candidates in the Democratic debate were allowed two minutes to deliver an opening statement, whereas the Republicans were allowed one minute. It did make the opening draw on, and as Republican candidate, Donald Trump tweeted after the debate, “It all sounded very scripted.” What topics did they cover? On the issue of gun control, Senator Sanders offered a plan on shielding gun companies and shops from being held responsible for mass shootings, and instead, the U.S. should issue background checks and “mental testing should be taken care of.” Secretary Clinton stated that Sanders was “too soft on gun control,” and proposed that they take on the National Rifle Association (NRA) head on. Mayor O’Malley argued against Sanders, saying that gun shops should be accountable if “a man had sold 4,000 rounds of military ammunition to the man who had killed people in Aurora without inquiring where it was going.” Senator Chafee argued against Clinton, saying there is no way to pass gun law safety measures because “the NRA comes in and says they are going to take away their guns. Find even ground.” The topic on Russia and the war in Syria took up a large portion of the debate. The candidates mentioned Russian President Vladimir Putin, Clinton specifically addressing the nation for a call to action, saying “We need to stand up to his bullying [and] make it very clear to Putin it is not acceptable for him to be in Syria.” Clinton had voted for American troops to be involved in Syria, a decision, many of the candidates agree, was a bad one. Senator Chafee labeled it as “the worst decision in American history,” and questioned Clinton’s judgement if she were to be in office. Senator Sanders described the decision as “a quagmire in a quagmire,” and expressed his disapproval for American ground troops in Syria, though he defended that he was not a Pacifist - he thinks military force should be a last resort. Mayor O’Malley agreed with Sanders, saying “Military Action should not be taken off the table.” A topic that was expected to arise sooner or later was Hillary Clinton’s email scandal, to which the candidates all felt was an irrelevant topic, and that they would rather move on to the important issues. Senator Sanders went as far to say to Clinton, “The American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails.” To which Clinton replied, “Me too, me too,” and thanked the Senator for speaking up. The only candidate who expressed an issue on the topic was Senator Chafee, who stated that he had a “clean record” and “we need to repair American credibility; credibility is an issue and we need someone who has the best in ethical standards as our next president.” The Black Lives Matter campaign was brought up with a direct question from a Facebook user to Senator Sanders - “Do black lives matter or do all lives matter?” Sanders replied, “Black lives matter. We need to combat institutional racism from top to bottom.” Mayor O’Malley supported Sanders in improving the lives of African Americans, saying, “BLM is making a legitimate point. We have lessened the value of black lives and the lives of people of color.”
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