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‘Proud’ Biden says Dem candidates did well in first debate

Both Sanders and Clinton were looking to build Wednesday on their strong Democratic presidential debate performances as the rest of the field struggled to gain traction.

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“Last night’s debate could blunt whatever growing support Sanders was getting”, said Wayne Lesperance, a professor of political science at New England College in Henniker, N.H., which hosts candidate forums.

Emerging from their first presidential debate, Clinton signaled that she would make gun laws a key distinction with Sanders, who has voted against a few gun control measures as a senator representing rural Vermont. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).

The big moment came when he asked during the debate to comment on the unfolding saga over Clinton’s use of a private email server during her time as secretary of state.

David Axelrod, an unaligned Democratic strategist who helped mastermind Obama’s 2008 campaign, said on Wednesday Clinton emerged stronger with a “very self-assured, powerful performance” that should give Biden pause, while Sanders had a solid performance but fell short of projecting the persona of a nominee.

“We are not Denmark”.

Earlier, asked about the speculation about Castro in an appearance with the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, she praised him and said, “I am going to really look hard at him for anything because that’s how good he is”.

A decision appears to be imminent from Vice President Biden on whether to enter the 2016 White House race. She is an NPR contributor and has contributed to USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, National Review Online, Politico and more, and has myriad television and radio credits as a commentator.

Even with Sanders’ dismissal of the email issue, Clinton faces a slow drip of email news, a result of a court order mandating monthly releases of her correspondence right up to three days before the Iowa caucuses. “So he’s got to decide, ‘Am I going to enter the race?”

Even conservatives, many of whom likely cherished the prospect of a protracted Clinton-Biden face-off, were down on the vice-president’s prospects. And after a summer in which she seldom seemed able to keep the focus where she wanted it, the debate largely seemed to go her way. Pressed specifically on her newly announced opposition to a Pacific Rim trade deal she touted while serving in the Obama administration, Clinton said she had hoped to support it but ultimately decided it did not meet her standards.

Sanders has surged in Democratic polls by appealing to voters concerned about economic inequality.

Clinton, meanwhile, already is widely known to the electorate. “Considering the weak caliber of Clinton’s competition, it speaks volumes that she continues to flip-flop and change positions in an attempt to save her faltering campaign”, RNC chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement. “I never took a position on Keystone until I took a position on Keystone”. Oddly enough, though, given his repeated calls for Democratic Party Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz to schedule more debates, O’Malley didn’t stand out in the format.

This story has been corrected to show that Sanders’ campaign says that he raised more than $1.3 million since the start of the debate, not $4 million. “It wasn’t that complicated to me”. Her poll numbers had stabilized and she got a big break when House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., tied her falling numbers to work of the Republican-led House Benghazi committee.

The Democrats presented a far more unified front, arguing more about their personal pasts than the direction they’d each take the country.

“Judging from tonight, it’s clear why the Democrat National Committee limited the number of debates – their bench of candidates for the most powerful office in the world is laughable at best”, Priebus added.

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“Well, I am in the middle here, and lots of things coming from all directions”, Clinton said under barbs and questions Tuesday night. “I’ve been standing over here for ten minutes trying”.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks in Des Moines Iowa