MANCHESTER, NH -- Comity turned to tragedy for Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and for the dream of a harmonious Democratic party during the 2016 primaries.

After a series of low-wattage, three-person debates that were the pride of party-unity Democrats, Clinton and Sanders dropped the gloves and went after each other in a GOP-style confrontation that underscored the bitterness of a campaign that was supposed to underscore the broad agreements of progressives on major issues.


Both candidates had a lot to lose, and it showed. Clinton’s team was stunned by Sanders’ near-victory in Iowa – their polls had predicted a much easier win than her fractional, disputed victory; And Sanders, up by as many as 30 points in recent polls in his near home state, found himself, for the first time, on the wrong end of the expectations game against an aggressive challenger.

All in all, the last debate before Tuesday’s primary was the first Democratic debate Donald Trump might not have slept through. Here are five takeaways:

1. Her answer on paid speeches is still lame-o. It is one of the great puzzles of 2016 that Clinton, who can be so hard-headed tactically, is simply incapable of formulating a straightforward, sympathetic explanation for her speaking-circuit cash-grab that included the infamous $675,000 bump from the universally-reviled Goldman Sachs.

On Wednesday, a fumbling answer on the subject (“That’s what they offered") overshadowed an otherwise excellent showing at a candidate forum – a glib, disingenuous response that evoked a group ugh from the audience at MSNBC’s debate in Dunham, NH. It seemed to reflect the same sort of self-protective self-destructiveness of her too-cute response to a shouted question about scrubbing her private server a few months back (”Like with a cloth or something”).

Clinton’s response to Chuck Todd’s spot-on query about the existence of transcripts of her talks to bank execs (She couldn’t remember and would look into it) was almost comically unconvincing – for a woman who prides herself on memory and attention to detail.

There’s a simple solution, one top Democrat suggested recently: Give the cash to charity, issue a quick mea culpa and spend the rest of the campaign buying anti-big-bank crusader Elizabeth Warren flowers.

2. Bernie and Hillary really don’t like each other. Clinton aides and donors I talked to Thursday were in burnt umbrage mode – complaining about the perceived dishonesty and dirty tricks of the Sanders campaign (especially the misrepresentation of newspaper endorsements in a recent TV spot. And the candidate, for a change, didn’t leave her most caustic criticism of Sanders to cable surrogates, unloading on his implication that her Wall Street connections made her a pawn of the financial services. “If you've got something to say, say it, directly," said Clinton – who has told confidants she’s tired of accusations she’s on the attack when Sander’s entire campaign is predicated on a negative assessment of her “establishment” loyalties.

"It's time to end the very artful smear that you and your campaign have been carrying out,” she growled, coining a phrase that’s likely to join “vast right wing conspiracy” in the pantheon of cutting Clinton aphorisms.

In attacking him, the dignified former secretary of state abandoned much of the ambassadorial high ground she held in earlier, more successful outings; And her pique found expression in an angry alto monotone of a prosecutor making a closing argument in a hit-and-run case – contradicted her own compassionate-and –cuddly Hillary PR push. But Sanders didn’t look so great himself. He has an endearing habit of lowering his voice and slowing his elocution when things get too testy – as if to say “I may be a revolutionary, but I won’t break the good china” -- lost it a few times too, reddening and executing an Al Gore eye roll when she suggested he was treating her differently because of her gender. "Whoa, whoa, whoa...wow,” was all he could get out at first.

3. She doesn’t care about her damn emails. Clinton scoffed at the notion that the months-long controversy over her email server was valid – or that a federal investigation will turn up anything damaging, as the GOP is cheering for.

"This is an absurdity. I think the American people will know it’s an absurdity," she said – adding that other secretaries of state had qualms about aides using their private email addresses, "I have absolutely no concerns about it whatsoever. And she took the high road: Grousing about the "retroactive classification" of emails deemed too sensitive to be revealed – in retrospect. "This just beggars the imagination," she said.

It was probably the best defense possible – because (in her view) it puts the news outlets that have been most aggressive in investigating her (i.e. The New York Times) in the position of having to explain why they rail against over-classification of government documents in every article they write except for the ones that include the words “Hillary Clinton.”

4. They are both looking past New Hampshire. Reporters love New Hampshire a teensy bit less than they love Iowa, but it’s still a weeklong of kibitzing, carousing and expense accounted IPAs. Despite the big build-up, this year’s rendition, however is different, diminished, like one of those bad Super Bowls. For all those white TV tents covering the front greensward of the Manchester Radisson – and the coffee-shop sightings of Morning Joe on Elm Street -- the primary just doesn’t mean as much on the Democratic side and lacks the high drama of 2008 when Clinton pulled off the most stirring win of her political career.

There was the Clinton near-tear episode. (The author of this article, then working for a rival publication, slept through Clinton’s emotional coffee-shop appearance and sent the intern instead -- because who really needed to see another boring event?). Even the pre-primary debate eight years ago was more memorable, featuring Barack Obama’s gloriously dismissive “You’re likeable enough, Hillary.”

This time, both Clinton and Sanders know that it’s not quite as important, and are trying to use the week of media focus to refine messages that will be useful up the road in other contests. In Sanders’ case, it’s about shoring up his relationship with black voters after representing a snow white states in the Senate. That’s one of the reasons he called for Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder – who has apologized for the massive contamination of families (many African-American) – to resign "I don't go around asking for governors' resignations every day," Sanders said. "What we are talking about are children being poisoned. That's what we're talking about."

For Clinton it’s about doing what she’s done here before: reasserting her role as gender pioneer – as a way to push back against Sanders claim that she’s the establishment. And in her best moment of the debate, she made that point pithily: "Honestly, Sen. Sanders is the only person who I think would characterize me, a woman running to be the first woman president, as exemplifying the establishment,” Clinton said. “It’s really quite amusing to me.”

5. Martin O’Malley was missed. The former Maryland governor, whose national popularity was roughly that of expired milk, played a critical, third-wheel role, serving as a (mostly) polite buffer between the two big-shot antagonists. (Without him, there was often more light than heat.)

Gone too, was the campaign’s most passionate advocate for immigration reform, a valuable goad for the other two.

