It is indisputable: Bernie Sanders had every right to shut down Hillary Clinton’s interruption during the discussion of the auto bailout in last night’s debate.
Sure, some people are accusing Bernie of sexism for doing so, but the fact is that they’re wrong. Completely, totally, unequivocally wrong. What’s more, the fact that they even accused him of sexism in the first place proves that they are actually sexist themselves.
Here, gender identifiers omitted, is what happened: Candidate One was talking, Candidate Two interrupted, and Candidate One said, “Excuse me, I’m talking.”
Does this sound shocking? Brutal? Unruly?
Nope.
In fact, anyone who has ever seen a debate can recognize that what Candidate One did was completely normal, acceptable debate behavior. Saying that it wasn’t okay is simply saying that the normal, acceptable rules just don’t apply when Candidate Two is a woman.
She interrupted him! Bernie asserting his right to talk was not sexism; it was him standing up for himself — and anyone who really believes that male and female candidates should be treated equally must fully support him for doing so.
Now, that’s not to say that I thought Bernie’s performace was perfect. In fact, I did have a major problem with it: He should have shushed Hillary more.
Yes: Bernie Sanders should have told Hillary Clinton to stop talking more often during last night’s debate.
#share#Other than during the auto-bailout discussion, Bernie asked Hillary to stop interrupting him only one other time — despite the fact that she interrupted him many more times.
And it was more than just the interruptions. Bernie also allowed Hillary to give laughably unacceptable answers to debate questions so many times that I was practically screaming in my living room for him to do something.
At one point, Hillary even decided to “answer” Don Lemon’s tough question about her “racial blind spots” by saying that she actually wanted to answer the question that Bernie had just been asked. Of course, everyone knows that that’s not how it works. Everyone knows that you’re supposed to answer the questions that you’re asked, and not just whichever ones you feel like answering.
But no one called her on it.
#related#No one — not even that rabidly sexist Bernie — stopped her as she gave a rambling, nearly 300-word response to a completely different question instead of replying to the one she had been given. It was one of the most asinine things I have ever seen during a debate . . . but she wasn’t even criticized for it. Everyone waited patiently until she was done, and then (and only then) did Lemon re-ask her to answer the original question — after assuring her that Bernie would have to answer it as well.
Hillary was not treated unfairly. In fact, it was the other way around — and Hillary’s unwavering commitment to portraying herself as a victim while everyone coddles her is about as unbecoming a quality in a potential leader as I can possibly imagine.