[PJmedia] A confident, smiling and laughing Hillary Clinton delivered a top-notch performance at last night's Democratic debate. The optics were great for her, which she had no doubt anticipated as her only real opponent -- Bernie Sanders -- stood next to her scowling and looking old and angry as he repeatedly denounced Wall Street. Bernie's routine might work wonders for him on the campaign trail, but on TV, not so much.Hillary Clinton outmaneuvered the senator from Vermont, who refused to attack her where she was vulnerable. When Anderson Cooper asked her about her private e-mail server, Clinton again admitted she make a mistake, but said: "What I did was allowed by the State Department." Just who allowed it she never did say. Hillary is masterfully using tools from her old kit: just as the vast right-wing conspiracy was out to get her and her husband so many years ago, the hullabaloo over her emails is only about Republicans trying to destroy her. To cheers, she said: "I'm still standing."
Then Sanders piped up:
I think the secretary is right. The American people are sick and tired of hearing about e-mails.
Anderson Cooper replied:
Secretary Clinton, Secretary Clinton, with all due respect, it's a little hard -- I mean, isn't it a little bit hard to call this just a partisan issue? There's an FBI investigation, and President Obama himself just two days ago said this is a legitimate issue.
None of the other candidates dared take up the opening he had given them, which would have raised the question of Hillary's credibility, trustworthiness, and vulnerability on the question of the e-mails and on so many other things.
Instead of returning Sanders' favor, Hillary went after him for consistently voting against gun control, including voting five different times against the Brady Bill, which required a federal background check and a five-day waiting period until one can purchase a gun.
Clinton also got Sanders on his claim to be for democratic socialism. Someone forgot to inform Bernie that even in 2015, when asked, Americans overwhelmingly choose capitalism over socialism. Hillary knows it, and said she would take the steps to once again save the capitalist system from itself.