February 6th Debate - Viewer's Guide

I do not recommend watching the February 6th debate unless you have a guide open to tell you who is talking. The moderator mumbles as he calls people by their first names, and about one third of the candidates on the stage are old white men who are hard to tell apart by face, voice, or policies.

For that reason, I am putting together a viewer’s guide to the debate. You can pause the video each time a candidate stands, to look up their name in this post, or you can use this post as a reference to only listen to the candidates or the issues which most interest you.

Video 1 of 3

First speaker, Lori Trahan, 44 seconds: Would you be in favor of overturning Citizens United by either statute or constitutional amendment? Which methodology would you prefer?

Alexandra Chandler, 1:50: Do you favor retention, modification, or repeal of the electoral college? What is your reasoning?

Keith St. John, 3:23: Do you align more with the efforts to legalize medical marijuana, [with efforts to] approve recreational marijuana, or with strict adherence to federal guidelines and enforcement procedures?

Abhijit “Beej” Das, 4:45: Would you be in favor or against the reauthorization of the Patriot Act? Why or why not?

Steve Kerrigan, 6:12: Would you be in favor or against the reauthorization of the Patriot Act? Why or why not?

Rufus Gifford, 6:55: What do you think about the marijuana [question]?

Bopha Malone, 8:21: Are you in favor of continuing the issuance of FISA warrants? (Bopha admits that she does not know what FISA is, and promises to learn.

Lori Trahan, 9:56: Are you in favor of continuing the issuance of FISA warrants?

Dan Koh, 10:55: What do you think about the marijuana [question]?

Dan Koh, 11:41: Would you vote to mandate Net Neutrality?

Juana Matias, 12:25: Would you vote to mandate Net Neutrality?

Barbara L’Italien, 13:08: Would you vote to shut down the government for an extended period of time to get a “clean” DREAMers bill passed?

Patrick Littlefield, 14:22: Would you vote to shut down the government for an extended period of time to get a “clean” DREAMers bill passed?

Juana Matias, 15:52: Would you support reauthorization of the Patriot Act?

Leonard Golder, 16:30: Would you support reauthorization of the Patriot Act

Alexandra Chandler, 17:28: Would you support reauthorization of the Patriot Act

Alexandra Chandler, 18:36: What are your feelings on Citizens United?

Terry Ryan, 19:58: Do you support Citizens United or its repeal?

Barbara L’Italien, 20:54: What are your feelings on the retention, modification, or repeal of the electoral college?

Rufus Gifford, 22:27: In ten years, when you look back at your first bill, what will that bill have achieved?

Abhijit “Beej” Das, 24:04: What bill will they name after you?

Video 2 of 3

Bopha Malone, 0:36: What will your first bill achieve?

Keith St. John, 1:48: What is your feeling about FISA warrants?

Lori Trahan, 3:03: What are your feelings on the electoral college?

Would you support indexing the minimum wage to inflation?
• Patrick Littlefield, 4:45
• Alexandra Chandler, 6:39
• Abhijit “Beej” Das, 7:49
• Rufus Gifford, 8:50
• Leonard Golder, 9:50
• Steve Kerrigan, 11:07
• Dan Koh, 12:15
• Barbara L’Italien, 13:09
• Patrick Littlefield answered a different question, see below.
• Bopha Malone, 15:43
• Juana Matias, 16:44
• Terry Ryan, 17:50
• Keith St. John, 18:58
• Lori Trahan, 20:09

Patrick Littlefield, 15:00: Do you believe that the president should be prevented by law from discharging anyone within the Attorney General’s office while they are under investigation?

Final Question before summary statements

There are only two nations in the world that have a debt limit ceiling: The US and Denmark. The Danish debt ceiling is astronomically high, and is intended to be used only in the event of natural catastrophes and war. The US debt ceiling was contrived as a budget control during the First World War, and recently has come into some disrepute. Do you favor repeal of the national debt limit ceiling?

(This vote was taken by a show of hands, and the camera did not show the entire stage before the hands went down, so the positions of Lori Trahan, Keith St. John, Terry Ryan, Juana Matias, and Bopha Malone are not shown.)

Yes	Chandler	Das	Gifford	Golder	L’Italien
No	Kerrigan	Koh	Littlefield
Not Shown	Trahan	St. John	Ryan	Matias	Malone

Summary Statements
• Alexandra Chandler, 22:17
• Abhijit “Beej” Das, 23:25
• Rufus Gifford, 24:31
Rufus is cut off in the middle of his summary statement, and Video 3 starts with a question about climate change.

Video 3 of 3

Assuming all democratic candidates in the third believe that climate change is not a myth, what steps would you take to encourage federal, state, and local governments to reduce their respective carbon footprints?
• Keith St. John, 0:28
• Abhijit “Beej” Das, 2:44
• Barbara L’Italien, 4:59
• Rufus Gifford, 6: 58

The transition to video three is pretty jarring, and video 3 ends with the moderator saying “Next Question”, so if someone is aware of more videos somewhere, I would love to know about them.

Next week, I will talk about minimum wage. I will tackle this by first stating the general position of all the candidates, and then going through each individual candidate and addressing what they said which was different.