Let's See How Hard CNN F*cks This Thing Up: Your Democratic Debate Liveblog!

Last exit before hell!

OH HEYYYYYYYY EVERYONE, are you happy to be here? Trick question, you can't leave now!

Anyway, tonight, in like 10 minutes, is night one of the Democratic debates on CNN, and because CNN is a common "CNN," you have to watch it at their website if you don't want to watch it on TV. (No linky for the stinky, you know where "CNN" is.)

So what will happen tonight? Will one of the Tim Ryans eat one of the other Tim Ryans? Will Marianne Williamson pull a total Marianne Williamson and chakra the living fuck out of the entire auditorium? Will Elizabeth Warren and Bernie FIGHT? Will Beto go on a road trip by himself to the dentist? STAY TUNED!

Shall we liveblog? We shall.

8: 00:Anderson Cooper reassures us that after this bullshit is over (10 PM ET) they will stay on air until TWO FUCKING AM, because apparently this is a big deal or something. We will be turning it off and finishing "Orange Is The New Black," thank yew muchly.

8: 02:Jesus Christ, this is the most melodramatic debate opening in the history of debate openings. Apparently this is a "moment" for John Delaney, because everybody gets to have a "moment" on CNN, the official network of "moments."

Who is John Delaney, you are asking? Not even CNN knows.

8: 05:They are spending half the debate introducing the candidates. These are the candidates.

Elizabeth Warren is motioning for security probably, because other people keep coming onto the stage.

OK, so here are the rules for tonight's debate:

1. All candidates get a minute opening statement.

2. Candidates are allowed to say "CNN sucks" or "I wish Rachel Maddow was asking the questions," but they can pick just ONE, and they can only say it once.

8: 08:National anthem time! Let's see who remembers what to do:

Marianne Williamson and Tim Ryan, HEART FORGETTERS.

To be fair, Marianne Williamson remembered to put her hand on her heart, because she is smarter than a common Tim Ryan.

8: 10:Oh cool, now that the opening ceremonies of the goddamned Olympics are over, it is time for a commercial break. We assume the CNN anchors have only just realized they should have written some questions, and will now do that during the commercial. DOH, FUCK!

8: 15:Opening statements start now, and will end tomorrow afternoon.

First up, Steve Bullock!

"I am from Montana! They voted for Trump! I didn't like the last debate because I WUDDN'T IN IT! I like to bitch about stuff a lot and I should run for Senate. But DUN'T WUNNA! I am going to say REVOLUTION is dumb now, because I don't like Bernie Sanders right now."

Marianne Williamson!

"In the beginning was the Marianne, and the word was Marianne, and the word was Marianne. All things were made by Marianne, and without Marianne was not anything made that was made. In Marianne was life, and the life was the light of men. I'm Marianne Williamson, and I approve this Bible."

John Delaney!

"Shut up, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, shut up all the time so much."

8: 17:Tim Ryan!

"Tim Ryan Tim Ryan Tim Ryan Tim Ryan Tim Ryan Tim Ryan this is my last chance probably but at least I'm not Seth Moulton Tim Ryan Ryan Ryan Ryan. In summary and in conclusion, Tim Ryan."

John Hickenlooper!

"Flickinbooger. Pinkinpooper. Stinkinflopper. One of these is my name. OR IS IT?"

8: 19:Klobuchar!

"Can we all focus on fucking Donald Trump up? Cool, that would be great. Also, my ideas are realistic, unlike THESE CHAMPS UP HERE."

Beto!

"If you could all remember how pretty I am, that would be great . OK, here are some hopeful words, something something more perfect union."

Pete!

"Ask yourself how Donald Trump even gets within cheating distance of the Oval Office in the first place." (OH THAT WAS AN EXACT QUOTE, Y'ALL. THE REST ARE JOKES. HE SAID "CHEATING DISTANCE.")

Anyway, it is a nice opening statement.

Warren!

"Donald Trump is hoooooooot garbage, and we are all better and smarter than he is. I don't care who the nominee is (actually factcheck I do) I will fight like hell to elect the Democrat. Now let's see if Bernie says the same thing."

Sanders!

"Healthcare companies are robbing you blind! Amazon is the devil! The fossil fuel companies are trash! Fuck Trump!"

OK, that took a long time, let's talk about healthcare, specifically Medicare For All!

8: 25:JAKE TAPPER: Bernie Sanders, John Delaney says your Medicare For All plan sucks. Draw a picture of how much he sucks.

SANDERS: Has John Delaney ever heard of Canada? Because I have! They do not get a bill at the hospital! It is five minute from here! (They are in Detroit, he's not lying.)

DELANEY: Nuh uh.

WARREN: My turn!

TAPPER: After Sanders is done yelling at what's his name.

Elizabeth Warren is ready to beat the shit out of "him," and by "him" we mean John Delaney.

8: 28:Annnnnnd Elizabeth Warren beat the shit out of all of them, by pointing out that we are Democrats, and none of us want to take healthcare away, so can we PLEASE not use Republican talking points please? Thanks, love ya lots (except you, John Delaney).

8: 29:Warren said "billionaire" before Sanders had a chance to say "billionaire," DRINK.

Warren also says that, unlike the Sanders plan, she will not raise taxes on the middle class to pay for her Medicare For All plan.

Steve Bullock chimes in to say that healthcare is "personal."

8: 32:Pete Buttigieg is more in the neighborhood of doing a public option and making sure the public plan is really really good and that people want to be on it and choose it for themselves. Beto O'Rourke says his "Medicare For America" plan is the best, and that Steve Bullock is full of shit. Jake Tapper is so deadfuckingset on the time limits, he apparently doesn't want the candidates to say anything.

JESUS CHRIST, JAKE.

8: 35:MODERATOR: Hey Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren says your ideas are small. Throw a plate at her.

KLOBUCHAR: Elizabeth Warren is great, I just think my public option plan is better.

SANDERS: "Jake Tapper, your question is a Republican talking point." (Actual quote.) By the way, the healthcare industry is paying for some CNN commercials tonight. Ooh, Jake you gonna get mad at me for saying that?

JESUS CHRIST, JAKE.

8: 38:DELANEY: None of my opponents even understand the healthcare "business." I know the "business."

SANDERS: It's not a goddamn business! (Wonkette realtime factcheck: It actually is right now . But we take Bernie's point.)

HICKENLOOPER: Spankinflopper. Merkinwrangler. Purplenurple.

8: 39:MODERATOR: Marianne Williamson, did you know Elizabeth Warren talked shit about you?

WILLIAMSON: I don't think she talked shit about me. But I DOOOOOO have concerns about this Medicare For All, because the Republicans will be mean?

BUTTIGIEG: Can we stop doing policy based on what Republicans will say? We could do basic milquetoast shit and they will call it socialism. We can do mandatory gay space communism, and they will call it mandatory gay space communism. Fuck 'em.

RYAN: Extremely milquetoast thing.

JAKE TAPPER: Bernie Sanders, I have another Republican talking point for you.

SANDERS: Christ.

Hahahaha, Sanders just shut Tim Ryan the fuck down. Tim Ryan said Sanders "does not know" that his Medicare For All bill would cover dental and things like that. Bernie countered that he DOES know that, because "I wrote the damn bill!"

8: 45:And now we switch gears to immigration! (The end of the healthcare discussion was Bernie Sanders dropkicking John Delaney into the sun. It was pretty funny.)

8: 47:MODERATOR: Pete, you raised your hand in the last debate about decriminalizing border crossings.

BUTTIGIEG: That handraising thing was some bullshit.

MODERATOR: OK, we won't do that.

BETO: I still think we should NOT decriminalize border crossings, so I have not learned anything in the last month.

WARREN: You decriminalize it because the criminalization is the very tool Trump is using to rip babies apart, you dicks. God.

HICKENLOOPER: Flapjack. Dinglehopper. Big bucks no whammies!

8: 50:DANA BASH: You want to give free healthcare and free colleges to illegal immigrants. Why won't this naturally lead to MEXICAN INVASION?

SANDERS: Stupid question, let's talk about what the hell this border crisis is actually about. Mommies and babies are literally walking to this country. Maybe we should look at why .

STEVE BULLOCK: I'm just happy to be here! I am going to take a vague shot at Elizabeth Warren now, because I think we should keep border crossers criminals without healthcare!

WARREN: Can we stop playing into Donald Trump's hands with this shit? That would be AWESOME.

8: 54:DANA BASH: Tim Ryan, tell us how Bernie Sanders's immigration policies of free healthcare are just like inviting an entire MEXICAN INVASION to a pizza party.

RYAN: You gotta ring the doorbell first! Bernie Sanders gonna throw away the doorbell!

MARIANNE WILLIAMSON: Everything in this debate is what is wrong with politics. Let's talk about crystals!

8: 56:Oh boy, we hope CNN takes a break soon.

Next, guns!

What will Pete Buttiigeg do to end gun violence, asks Don Lemon?

BUTTIGIEG: It'd be cool if we could tell the NRA to eat it and go ahead and pass all this gun control that literally all Americans support, including banning the kinds of weapons I used to carry in Afghanistan while Donald Trump was grabbing pussies on the "Celebrity Apprentice."

KLOBUCHAR: I'd like to talk.

DON LEMON: No.

HICKENLOOPER: Says thing.

KLOBUCHAR: OK my turn, great. Unviersal background checks. Asasult weapon ban. Ban these dumb huge magazines that nobody needs.

BUTTIGIEG: Wow. I may be young, but this is literally the exact conversation we were having about gun violence when I was in high school, which was either last week or maybe in the 1990s.

KLOBUCHAR: The people are with us. Fuck the NRA.

Hardly anybody on this stage disagrees on any of this.

Oh yeah, except Steve Bullock, who Don Lemon points out didn't change his mind on an assault weapons ban until last summer. And Bernie Sanders, who is li'l bit weird on gun issues. But let's see what he says.

9: 03:OK, it is time for Bernie Sanders to answer some gun questions. He said after Sandy Hook that there wasn't a magic bullet to solve this problem, basically, pun intended. Does he want to defend that? He is defending his record, and also says fuck the NRA.

Our verdict so far on this debate is that Bernie Sanders had a RED BULL just before the debate.

9: 04:Pete Buttigieg is tired of hearing lame fuckers say we can't make big changes like overturning Citizens United and getting rid of the Electoral College. This is a country that BANNED DRINKING, he says. And then they realized how stupid that was and they FIXED IT. And that is why President Pete will get the money out of politics and use it to host Beer Pong competitions on the White House lawn.

(VERY MAJOR PARAPHRASE THERE. HE DID NOT EVEN MENTION BEER PONG.)

9: 11:And we are back from commercial! And we start with Jake Tapper asking John Hickenlooper why Bernie Sanders is a dumb socialist and why that means he can't beat Trump. Hickenlooper is mostly not accepting the question, but says socialism is more like STUPID-lism, amirite?

Bernie Sanders says every poll shows him kicking Trump's ass, so YOLO.

Volleyed back to Hickenlooper, who goes way more directly for Sanders, saying some kind of yammering stuff, we don't know. There was a "funny" moment when they both threw their hands in the air, which made people "laugh," oh God it's time for Tim Ryan to talk some more. He does not like the topics we have talked about so far tonight. He wants to talk about white people in Ohio, we think.

9: 15:Beto says we're gonna win Texas. THIS TIME. If you pick him. THIS TIME. (We are being mean, Beto came fucking closer and improved on Hillary Clinton's 2016 numbers wildly in Texas. And he's right, it has 38 electoral votes and it should not be written off.)

Anyway, next question!

JAKE TAPPER: You say you're a capitalist, Elizabeth Warren. Is this your way of saying you're not a Socialism McDUMB like Bernie Sanders?

WARREN: No I say that because I am capitalist, but also I know how to kick big business ass and hold fuckers accountable.

Holy Jesus, did the CNN anchors let Chris Cillizza write these questions?

9: 18: ELIZABETH WARREN WITH THE LINE OF THE NIGHT, DIRECTED AT DUMB FUCKING JOHN DELANEY:

"I don't know why people go to the trouble of running for president if all they want to do is spend their time talking about what we SHOULDN'T fight for." (Slight paraphrase, just a tiny.)

Crowd went WILD.

We were thinking this was Bernie Sanders's debate, but now we're not so sure.

9: 21:JAKE TAPPER: Amy Klobuchar, we have not let you talk tonight. Who on this stage would you like to call a liar?

KLOBUCHAR: Bad question, you are bad.

She says it would be cool if everybody would stop focusing on winning ARGUMENTS and focus instead on winning THIS ELECTION. Also she has never lost an election. She is just saying.

9: 23:DANA BASH: John Delaney, why is the Green New Deal bad, and should we even fight for the climate, or just say fuck it?

DELANEY: Answer that includes words, y'all down there in the comments need to get a betting pool going on when in August this dick finally gets out of the race. We've got "August 22nd."

WARREN: Green New Deal = cool. My climate plan = badass. Gonna create jobs, gonna force the whole world to Buy American green products ...

DANA BASH: Stop talking, we here at CNN are interested in time limits, not answers to our questions.

HICKENLOOPER: Partypooper.

9: 26:If Pete Buttigieg and John Hickenlooper got married (RELAX, CHASTEN, WE ARE SETTING UP A JOKE), know what their celebrity name would be?

Bootylooper.

9: 29:Aw nuts, Bernie just said he's tired of Democrats who don't like big ideas, did his Red Bull expire and he forgot Elizabeth Warren literally just delivered that line better than he did?

Also Tim Ryan just told Bernie not to yell. FAT CHANCE, SON.

9: 31:Steve Bullock is talking. Wonder if he realizes that in 29 minutes, the part of his life that involves participating in "Democratic debate" will have ended.

9: 33:LOL, we are pretty sure Steve Bullock just tried to accuse Bernie Sanders of being anti-worker, and we personally have an issue or three with Bernie, but, um, that is not a good attack to say to Bernie Sanders, we are just saying, OK thx.

BETO: He went to Flint. He has climate thoughts.

PETE: All of this is imaginary if we don't beat that fucker Trump. If you nominate me, you'll get to see a war veteran debating a chickenshit would cried "bone spurs!" to get out of Vietnam. Also I will be cool in other ways.

KLOBUCHAR: I also too went to Flint. I would do infrastructure. My Red Bull has not expired like Bernie Sanders's Red Bull has expired, because I did not have any Red Bull before the debate.

9: 36:Marianne Williamson, what would YOU do to make Flint never happen again?

WILLIAMSON: Oh, you want to talk about racism and how that shit happens everywhere in underprivileged minority communities, and it woudn't have happened in Grosse Pointe?

AND. THE. CROWD. WENT. WILD.

FOR. MARIANNE. WILLIAMSON.

(Because she was right.)

9: 38:You want an instant replay of Elizabeth murdering John Delaney with words?

Extremely rude of Elizabeth Warren to murder John Delaney on national television like this. #DemDebate https: //t.co/9OO6F6T0Mw

— Erick Fernandez (@Erick Fernandez) 1564536251.0 

Now they are talking about why they are each the best white person on the stage to solve racism.

9: 40:LEMON: Let's talk about white supremacy.

WARREN: White supremacy is domestic terrorism. The president is a goddamn white supremacist. I have a plan for all of it, and all of my plans address how racism has permeated literally every problem we have. And I would say more, but DADDY TIMECLOCK just told me to shut up.

9: 42:Pete Buttigieg also has many plans for racism to address redlining and police violence and UH OH DADDY TIMECLOCK AGAIN!

Want to hear the coolest statistic we have heard all day? Only seven people have qualified for the next debate so far. Google the seven, and do your part to save Wonkette some fuckin' grief by making sure to ONLY DONATE TO THOSE SEVEN.

ALL TIM RYANS MUST GO.

Beto O'Rourke just endorsed Sheila Jackson Lee's reparations bill. That is very good. And Marianne Williamson says reprations are a payment "for debt owed." All of these are facts.

And what qualifies Marianne Williamson to say it should be a $200 to $500 billion program, which is what she says it should be? Because she can do MATH. On her SPIRIT CALCULATOR that runs on GHOST POWER.

9: 51:Please let it be closing statements please let it be closing statements ...

: (

ONE OF THE BOY MODERATORS: Tim Ryan, are you going to continue Trump's steel tariffs?

TIM RYAN: Trump was "on to something," and here are lots of words that don't answer the question, because I secretly am sexxxy for Trump's tariffs.

JOHN DELANEY: Trump wants to build the Mexican wall! All these Democrats want to build socialism walls! I only want to build a wall between myself and America's ability to like me! Now I will try to shit on Elizabeth Warren again, because it hurt when she slapped me the first time.

WARREN: *slaps Delaney*

9: 55:While we are bored right now, we'd like to take this moment to let y'all know how much we 'ppreciate y'all comin' to sit a spell with our liveblog, and remind y'all that Wonkette is 100 percent funded by YOU. That's right, no Soros money, no big ads, no pop-ups that say "please whitelist us now so you can read this one article you ever wanted to read in the Bumblefuck Tribune."

So please hit the donation and subscription buttons below and FUND THE FUCK OUT OF GOOD POLITICAL ANALYSIS THAT INCLUDES FILTHY JOKES THAT WOULD MAKE YOUR DUMB REPUBLICAN UNCLE JUST HAVE A FIT.

Thank you, we love you, back to our regularly scheduled programming of Bernie Sanders just now yelling "damn" on TV and John Lumpystooler saying "John Delaney has a point" and Elizabeth Warren winning this debate.

10: 00:It is 10 PM, CNN. If you are going to be such schoolmarms about your fucking time limits for the candidate, we are going to tell you the debate is over because YOU SAID.

Oh cool, Don Lemon is asking a new question.

10: 03:Pete Buttigieg got a question about "economy" and took the opportunity to note that conservative Christian senators right now are refusing to raise the minimum wage, even though it says clearly in the Bible that if you don't raise the minimum wage, Jesus will Lord-Punch you right in your dick (it's in Matthew).

Next question, for John Delaney: You are worth 65 million dollars, GO GIVE ELIZABETH WARREN YOUR WEALTH TAX RIGHT NOW.

He didn't.

10: 05:DANA BASH: Pete Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders wants to take all your debt away, why won't you let him?

BUTTIGIEG: Because it's not all about me and other people will still get fucked? Lemme tell you where I'd start, I'd start with those bullshit predatory lender for-profit colleges like Trump University.

SANDERS: If we are going to talk about canceling all the debt, we should talk about income inequality, which means I am going to say "MILLIONAIRES AND BILLIONAIRES" and "REVOLUTION," and those things are probably on your drinking game, so DRINK!

DANA BASH: Marianne Williamson, you want to make college free, should we pay for MILLIONAIRES AND BILLIONAIRES to go to college?

WILLIAMSON: Sure fuck it. Also half the people up here, I wonder why they're even Democrats!

WONKETTE: Now, now.

BETO: I support a more milquetoast version of free college.

KLOBUCHAR: Srsly? Free college for MILLIONIARES AND BILLIONAIRES? Let me tell you about my plan.

Oh Christ, here comes foreign policy.

10: 11:JAKE TAPPER: Bernie, you said a marginally similar isolationist thing to a thing Donald Trump says, how does this not make you literally the same person?

BERNIE: I am not a pathological liar like he is?

HICKENLOOPER: I am saying good ideas right now and Bernie is nodding!

JAKE TAPPER: Tim Ryan, say North Korea things.

RYAN: I gotta go to my shift at Chick-fil-A in a minute, but Amy Klobuchar is an idiot when she says it's OK to meet with Kim Jong Un under certain circumstances.

KLOBUCHAR: I don't think you foreclose all possibilities of talking to people, but you don't fuck it up like Donald Trump, Jesus Christ.

JAKE TAPPER: I am never ending this debate.

10: 16:Buttigieg makes a good point, that we're not far off in Afghanistan from the day when somebody's gonna die over there who wasn't even born on 9/11 . Says he's gonna bring 'em the fuck home, and also make a new rule that Congress has to do new authorizations for military force every three years, instead of this neverending blank check horseshit.

Beto agrees, Afghanistan over during his first term.

Hickenlooper says we can't end that war, because ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.

Did Jake Tapper honest to God just take issue with Elizabeth Warren saying she'd never use a nuclear weapon unless another country used it first? Did we ... hear that correctly? Yes, yes we did.

And Steve Bullock does not agree with her, GO THE FUCK AWAY, STEVE BULLOCK. Montana is   THAT-A-WAY .

10: 22:JAKE TAPPER: You have to be 35 to be president. Pete Buttigieg, are you suuuuuure you are that many?

BUTTIGIEG: Leader of New Zealand's pretty badass. She's younger than I am.

WILLIAMSON: And I am gonna call her and say "GIRL YOU ARE WRONG FOR THAT!"

(Just kidding, that was the last debate.)

10: 25:Buttigieg just said another good and smart thing about garbage racist Republicans in Congress who prop up Donald Trump's garbage racism. Asked to respond, Bernie is talking about taking money from healthcare companies. And everybody wants to respond right now too, but UH OH PISKETTI OH, the neverending debate has just spawned another commercial break.

10: 30:CLOSING STATEMENTS, THANK GOD.

BULLOCK: I have only traveled four blocks in my life. I am running for president because I think there may be a fifth block out there somewhere, in Washington.

WILLIAMSON: We cannot defeat Trump with wonky tonky talky. Gotta find out why we are sick in our hearts! Also some normal lucid thoughts, I have them! I am the only one who can manifest the love and understanding and defeat the hate and um, we forget.

DELANEY: sTeAl mArRiAnNe's aNsEr

TIM RYAN: Tim Calhoun.

 
 Giphy 

10: 36:HICKENLOOPER: Poopydonkler. Punky Brewster. DroppingOutSoon-er.

KLOBUCHAR: Well, this didn't really go the way I planned.

BETO: Hope! Change! Worship an awesome God in the blue states and love our gay friends in the Red States! Dunno, not listening, don't know if he's Melania-ing Barack Obama's 2004 DNC speech or not.

10: 40:BUTTIGIEG: When the real bad things happen with climate change, I am going to be 40-MANY-YEARS OLD! I will still be so hot! Anyway, I will fix it all, as Kamala Harris's vice president.

WARREN: Very good Warren-y statement about actually making opportunities happen for people, successfully again deploying the words "billionaire" and "millionaire" and "rich and powerful" before Bernie Sanders can say them, NEENER.

SANDERS: ILLIONAIRES-BAY AND ILLIONAIRES-MAY!

IF-AY OU-YAY OW-KNAY AT-WHAY I'M-AY AYING-SAY!

EVOLUTION-RAY!

10: 44:And that is it, and only 44 minutes behind schedule! Remember to tip your bartenders, and we will do this tomorrow night, because this hell is only half over.

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