The road to 2020 began in earnest this week! Here’s who won and lost from the two-day first debate. 

WINNERS:

Marianne Williamson: Never in my lifetime did I think I’d see a walking embodiment of a trance music voiceover run for president

Elizabeth Warren: Really nice of NBC to give her the rest of the night off after her spectacular opening 30 minutes

Bernie Sanders: Filled the audience with hope for a better future where someone younger and more eloquent is running for President on this sort of platform

Amy Klobuchar: Everyone seems to be saying she’s a winner for some reason, so I guess I should too

Julián Castro: In a star-making turn on Wednesday night, literally sucked out Beto O’Rourke’s charismatic, exciting public image and took it for himself

Cory Booker: An outstanding showing on Wednesday cemented him as America’s favorite fourth-choice candidate

Kamala Harris: Making a presidential candidate on a national debate stage respect time limits rather than keep going is an astonishing feat, and to do it to the frontrunner? my God

Eric Swalwell: Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg look, disbelieving, at the blood on their hands, and then down again at their wounds. The blows were not mortal, but the realization might be. Yes, it’s clear, terribly clear. The mediocre moderate white men have a traitor in their midst.

LOSERS: 

Pete Buttigieg: Displayed incredible poise and eloquence as he explained policies that honestly kinda suck a lil bit

Beto O’Rourke: It’s not surprising that he struggled to convey any energy or presence, given that he was forced to perform outside of his natural habitat, the restaurant countertop

Jay Inslee: Absolutely shone for the mere six minutes that were given to talking about climate change on his night, but you know, that’s okay, it’s not like climate change is the single greatest existential threat to our world today and an issue with ramifications for the economy, immigration, foreign policy, national security, and pretty much every other issue that was at the forefront of the debates

Kirsten Gillibrand: Irrespective of her showing last night, she’s somehow polling worse than Tim freaking Ryan

Joe Biden: It’ll be interesting to see whether Biden can become the first smoking crater to win the presidency

Johntimichael Debennenlooperyan: There were too many anonymous, mediocre white male moderates with no chance on stage, so I’m compressing some of them into a single entity to save on memory

Bill de Blasio: Pointed out that he’s the only person in the race with a Black son, a shocking display of shaming Kamala Harris and Cory Booker for not having kids

Andrew Yang: I’m starting to see why he’s so popular with people who lack any social skills

Tulsi Gabbard: Crap, I knew I was forgetting somebody

 

Image: DonkeyHotey under the Creative Commons license.