Winners and losers from the 5th Democratic presidential debate (Cillizza)

[SunSeeker]

12. I love his points about Bernie's public financing hypocrisy and Bernie being a one-issue candidate:

Also, kudos to the duo for asking thoughtful questions that haven't been asked of the candidates a thousand times before; Todd's question to Sanders about why he wasn't taking public financing for the primary campaign was an A+.

Losers

* Bernie Sanders: I hesitate to put the Vermont socialist in the "loser" category because he did very little in the debate that will slow his momentum heading into a near-certain New Hampshire win. But I also hate when analysts and reporters take the easy way out when picking winners and losers. It was a two-person debate; if Clinton won then Sanders, by definition, didn't win. (This is the problem with using the binary choice of "winner" and "loser" to grade debates. But I digress.)

I thought Sanders was forceful and effective, as always, when talking about economic inequality and campaign finance reform. I thought he may have allowed himself to be put in a box as a single- or double-issue candidate down the line by Clinton, however.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/02/04/winners-and-losers-from-the-5th-democratic-presidential-debate/?tid=a_inl