Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
Remember when Debbie Wasserman Schultz refused to have more than 6 Democratic debates? Even when prominent Democrats and the Bernie Sanders campaign accused her of limiting the debate schedule to protect Hillary Clinton, she insisted:
“We’re going to have six debates,” Wasserman Schultz told reporters flatly at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast. “Period.”
Now, the tables have turned. Hillary Clinton is no longer the presumptive nominee. She finds herself in a dead heat with Bernie Sanders for the Democratic nomination. Clinton needs to work for every vote she can get, and she needs more airtime on network television to get it done.
So what happens now? The DNC abruptly reversed its strict debate policy, and approved more prime time debates, of course!
Clinton and Bernie Sanders faced off in a PBS debate in Milwaukee last night, this after an MSNBC debate and CNN town hall on back-to-back nights last week. The MSNBC event was one of four hastily added sessions to augment the original slate of six.
That initial schedule was something of a joke, given that so many of the faceoffs were on Saturday nights or, in one case, over Martin Luther King weekend. Clearly, the DNC was protecting Hillary, who hoped to coast to the nomination without the inconvenience of having to do verbal combat with her rivals, at least not at a time when many Americans were watching.
But then came the Sanders surge, and Clinton, who is very skilled in these formats, decided it was in her interest to take on her opponent more directly. And Debbie Wasserman Schultz made it happen.
What a coincidence!
Debbie Wasserman Schultz and the DNC have obviously been in the tank for Hillary Clinton since the beginning, but what’s really appalling is how blatantly they tried to protect her all along. They have manipulated the primary debate schedule to Clinton’s benefit, and lied shamelessly about it every step of the way.
Democrats have already complained about Wasserman Schultz’s conflicts of interest and numerous embarrassing gaffes in the media. There has also been some chatter of progressive groups petitioning to clean house in the DNC.
Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised to see some shakeups in the DNC leadership after the 2016 election.