It’s both perfect and way too much to handle that we’re capping off six hours’ worth of the most consequential impeachment inquiry testimony yet with another Democratic debate. Earlier today Ambassador/rich guy Gordon Sondland testified that yes, Trump’s pressure of Ukrainian President Zelensky to investigate Hunter Biden was quid pro quo; in doing so, Sondland also took out anyone else he possibly could, painting the dealings of people like Rude Rudy Giuliani and Mike “The Snausage” Pompeo as akin to mob behavior in a B-movie set in 1980s New York, only dumber (who on earth would TEXT this shit!).
Against this rather explosive political backdrop, a slowly thinning crop of Democratic candidates hit the Oprah Winfrey Soundstage at Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta, fielding questions from the debates’ first panel of all-women moderators: Rachel Maddow and Andrea Mitchell of MSNBC, Kristen Welker of NBC, and Ashley Parker of the Washington Post. This will mean, one hopes, more questions about reproductive justice, which has seemed an afterthought in prior debates, but the increasing stakes and fewer candidates on the stage also implies it might get a little feisty: Buttigieg, for one is expected to go hard on Warren, and Harris released a tough new campaign video this evening. Speaking of campaign videos, it is a goddamn travesty that crappy Buttigieg was allowed to ruin my life with his church-retreat-ass dance and yet Julián Castro, one of the most substantial people running, has to sit this one out. The rules are bullshit!
As ever, we’re liveblogging this whole shebang, which is suspiciously only two hours rather than three now that four women are moderating! Stick with us, if we all hold hands maybe we can fly.