Debate Night

This time, I developed a scorecard.  There were two categories.  The first category was for policy.  I scored answers on a scale of 1 to 3, and gave credit for responses to specific topics.  Honestly, I listened for what made sense to me.  My focus was on substance, not style.  I've noticed online that some commentators didn't like the way that Mike Bloomberg looked in answering questions, but I thought that his answers were straightforward and made sense.  He also had a lot of answers, which meant that he made sure that he got the opportunity to respond.  In the end, he got 34 points, with the most responses.  It turns out that he spoke for 13.3 minutes, giving him 2.6 points/minute speaking.  I thought that he did the most with his time.  On substance, I think that he stayed focused on what he could do, and avoided attacking others, though he responded when he needed to (I'll get to that later). I believe that Bloomberg completely turned around his previous debate performance.

Second in scoring was Pete Buttigieg.  Once again, he was smart and sharp in his policy responses.  He also was more disciplined in not getting pulled into fights.  He got 27 points, which translated to 2.2 points/minute for his 12.3 minutes of speaking time.  He also had a few really good sound bites.  I continue to like him.  Third in scoring was Amy  Klobuchar, with 24 points, although she only scored 1.8 points/minute for her 13.5 minutes, telling me that she didn't fully take advantage of her opportunities.  Ironically, the person with the next highest policy score was Tom Steyer, who got 17 points, but managed 2.4 points/minute in his debate low 7 minutes of speaking time.  He was almost a non-entity, but when he spoke, he was articulate and made good points.

Now we get to the lower tier.  Bernie Sanders managed 16 points, but that was primarily because he ended up with the most minutes of speaking time, thus 1 point per minute.  I was completely unimpressed with his platitude at this point.  He can articulate what's wrong, I get that, but I'm less than impressed with his solutions.  He also took a ton of hits tonight.  Rounding out the bottom were Biden and Warren, both with 10 points and 0.8 points per minute in their 12.5 and 13 minutes of speaking respectively.  My daughter made a great comment about Biden.  He seemed to be yelling all night.  Some of the commentators seem to take this as his being engaged and passionate, honestly, I felt like my daughter did, that he was yelling at us.

And now for the second part of my scorecard, the fight card.  This was fascinating.  I gave positive points (from 1 to 3) for direct hits by one candidate on another, and I gave negative points if the candidate either effectively deflected the hit or the hit didn't connect.  The person who got the most points for landing direct hits or effectively deflecting them was Buttigieg, who garnered 14 points, mostly for absolutely battering Sanders.  He even got a couple of hits in on Bloomberg.  Klobuchar also effectively landed hits on Bloomberg, Biden, Warren and Sanders.  Steyer landed hits on Bloomberg, Biden and Sanders.  Bloomberg weighed into the fight and landed hits or effectively parried Warrens attempts.  He also did the same with Sanders.  I felt that Warren's attempts at fighting were all off the mark, as were Bernie's.

One really interesting thing about having a scorecard is that I could look at how many hits were landed on specific candidates.  It wasn't even close.  Sanders took a net of 24 points worth of hits.  The next was Warren who had 5 point, most of which came from her hits being off the mark (mostly on Bloomberg).  I really thought that Warren continues to focus on being nasty, rather than focusing on effectively laying out policy ideas.  I know that her brothers were in the military and that she comes from a family of teachers.   There were multiple attempts to hit Bloomberg, but I felt that he parried them all effectively, and ended up with the most negative points in the fight (which would actually be a positive for him overall).  Almost no one tried to take on Steyer or Klobuchar, in fact the only person who tried, and didn't succeed, was Biden.  Also, no one really took on Buttigieg, though Sanders tried to fight back a couple of times.

In the aggregate, adding the policy scores to the fighting scores, Bloomberg and Buttigieg were tied at 41 points.  If I use policy as the tiebreaker, Bloomberg wins.  Third was Klobuchar with 32 points and fourth was Steyer with 23.  Bringing up the rear were Sanders, Biden and Warren.

The interesting thing about keeping a scorecard was that I was focused on what they said, not how they looked or acted.  I was listening to their responses to the questions and to each others critiques.  Bloomberg make up for his prior debate performance.  Buttigieg shows he belongs, as does Klobuchar.  It's time for Warren, Biden and Steyer to drop out.  I'll read and listen to the pundits over the next few days to see if any of their comments change my mind.  I'm still on the fence for who to vote for on Super Tuesday.