During the second night of debates, (as in the first) candidates had to answer questions about criminal justice reform. I thought for sure the biggest tangle on that topic would come between former V.P. Joe Biden and Senator Kamala Harris. I was wrong. Instead he turned his fire onto Senator Cory Booker, former Mayor of Newark, N.J., and criticized his handling of the police department in his city. At the same time, he tried to position himself as a criminal justice reform trailblazer because he was "tryin to get rid of the crack cocaine disparity."
Let's just say it did not go well for Biden.
Now the crowd just roared, ROARED with laughter, and someone who was mic'd up was also heard laughing pretty hard. I'm gonna go ahead and guess it was either Don Lemon or Julián Castro. Maybe I'm being presumptuous...but it sounded like a man, and I can't quite see Jay Inslee or Jake Tapper getting that joke. (Here's the Urban Dictionary explanation of the phrase, for those, like me, who need it.) In other words, "You don't even KNOW what the hell you're talking about."
Booker continued.
Biden just looked so uncomfortable, being the white front-running former Senator/voter for the 1994 Crime Bill trying to call out the Black former mayor of Newark on his police force. And he should look uncomfortable. That is just not a dynamic you want if you're Biden.
How hard is it, how hard? is it to say, "I did the best I could, given what I knew, or thought I knew. The more information I got, the better I tried to make it. When I learned things I did hurt, I tried to fix it. And I'm sorry for the things I did that hurt people." How hard are those words?
I'll tell you. The bigger your ego, the less pure your motives then, the less pure your motives now, and the lower your level of intellectual honesty, the harder it is to say.
At least the tweets will be fun...and they've already begun.