Democrats “debate” and agree to spend more money

I tried to watch the Dems Iowa debate today but, much like Chris Lawrence, “every time I switched it on I almost immediately felt like throwing something at the screen.”

The purpose of a candidates’ debate is to differentiate opinions and clarify positions so that a voter can make a choice. According to this crowd, there’s nary an issue that could not be solved by more spending. A real Hobbsian choice of solutions: we’ll try anything to solve America’s problems as long as it requires more money.

Another distraction: please stop prefacing every answer by saying that you wouldn’t do what Bush did. That is obvious. Tell me what you’d do. At one point, Kerry was asked what he’d do to save Social Security and he responded (working from memory): not privitize it, not raise the retirement age, and guarantee benefits for everyone. I think that leaves “ignore it” or “raise payroll taxes.”

Follow up (1/5) – William Saletan has a review of the Iowa Debate in Slate today including this quote:

Most surprising candor. Edwards: "Everybody on this stage is talking about spending money. They're talking about spending money on education. They're talking, in varying degrees, about spending money on health care. … There is a tension between spending money and reducing the federal deficit."

Here come the taxes.