Bernie Sanders may have had the line of the night, but it went downhill from there when he started talking about actual political issues facing the nation.
LAS VEGAS — During the Democratic debate earlier in October, Bernie Sanders held what many call the moment of the night, telling Hillary Clinton that “The American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails.” He went on to talk about other issues, saying, “The middle class in this country is collapsing. We have 27 million people living in poverty. We have massive wealth and income inequality. Our trade policies have cost us millions of decent jobs.” He then had the worst moment of the night, going from great to bad in just one line.
“He was on such a roll,” CNN’s Anderson Cooper said in an interview after the debate. “He had one of the greatest one-liners of the night, and then he ruined it by talking about all this boring stuff. What are we supposed to do with that? You know? ‘The middle class is disappearing’ isn’t an article headline. ‘Your damn emails’ is.”
Despite the fact that Sanders has received praise for his blatant support of Clinton, he has also received widespread criticism for his awkward discussion of inappropriate subjects such as income inequality.
“It’s like, when you’re having a great discussion at the dinner table and then someone brings up politics, you know?” Brooke Baldwin, CNN Newsroom anchor, told reporters. “It’s just not the time and place. That stage was a great place to him to voice his support for Hillary, sure, but you could really feel the awkwardness as soon as he started talking about politics. He definitely blew any potential he previously had at being the Democratic presidential nominee by ruining his line with discussion about jobs and trade policies and whatever else.”
“Bernie should have realized that Americans are sick and tired of hearing about his damn wealth and income inequality rants,” Eugene Scott, a CNN reporter, wrote in a recent article. “It’s great that he wanted to voice his support for Hillary and help her win the debate, but enough of the poverty and jobs. Why can’t we just have a happier discussion instead of talking about boring, sad things all the time?”
Even the Republican candidates have had a few words to say on the subject.
“It was very smart, very smart of Bernie Sanders to support Hillary. It really was,” Donald Trump told reporters. “Americans do want to hear about how Americans don’t want to hear about Hillary’s emails. And I love Bernie Sanders, I really do, but what Americans don’t want to hear about is everything else he talks about. Boring debate, really.”
Despite the criticism of Sanders’ boring discussion about issues facing the middle class, the Internet has still gone wild over his “damn emails” quote, making posters, T-shirts and remixes of his voice over dubstep.
Marco Omta is a freshman studying music production. What do you think of Bernie Sanders interaction with Hillary Clinton? Email him at mo183714@ohio.edu.
