Somehow, in Clinton's sheltered and totally politicized view of the world, Wal-Mart is bad for low- and middle-income Americans. Who does she think that Wal-Mart generates billions in sales by serving?
While Clinton is dreaming about having a chance to re-introduce her once-rejected plans for universal health care, Investors Business Daily reported this week the following about Wal-Mart:
"The retail colossus announced this week that it will open as many as 400 in-store medical clinics in the next two to three years. By 2014, it said, clinics could be in as many as half its 4000 stores ... While others whine about America's health-care 'crisis' and back monstrous government programs to solve it, Wal-Mart is actually making health care more affordable.
"Already, Wal-Mart has brought low-cost health care by selling 30-day supplies of more than 300 generic prescriptions at some stores for $4. Almost a third of those $4 prescriptions are bought by the uninsured. Customers have saved $290 million ... since September."
If this is a mixed blessing, we need more.
Regarding Iraq, all the Democratic candidates are capitalizing on the luxury of easy criticism of a difficult situation. It's so simple to say we shouldn't have gone in there. Is there anyone who thinks the world would be better today if we could put Saddam Hussein back in power?
Arab scholar Fouad Ajami tells of an Iraqi "professional woman who declared that under Saddam Iraqis lived in a big prison and now they are in the wilderness _ and that she prefers the wilderness."
If Clinton was the loser of this debate, then Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois was the winner. He's the clear alternative, whose challenge is simply to not screw up. He didn't, and I predict that the gap between him and Clinton, already close, will continue to narrow.
Let's hope that the MSNBC crew will be more organized for the first GOP debate. And that the Republicans will bring substance to the table that the Democrats clearly lack.