There was a moment early in Sunday night's Democratic debate which illustrated Bernie Sanders' political purity problem: Like the tea party ideologues that have, from the right, helped reduce the political system to gridlocked dysfunction, the independent Vermont senator tends to make the perfect the enemy of the good.



Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had pivoted from a discussion of trade deals to the 2009 auto bailout, which helped save the Wolverine State's mainstay industry.

"I'll tell you something else that Senator Sanders was against. He was against the auto bailout," Clinton said. She added:

So when I talk about Senator Sanders being a one-issue candidate, I mean very clearly – you have to make hard choices when you're in positions of responsibility. The two senators from Michigan stood on the floor and said, "we have to get this money released." I went with them, and I went with Barack Obama. You did not. If everybody had voted the way he did, I believe the auto industry would have collapsed, taking four million jobs with it.

Sanders' response was that the auto bailout was part of the larger Troubled Asset Relief Program, which he opposed. "If you are talking about the Wall Street bailout, where some of your friends destroyed this economy," he said. "When billionaires on Wall Street destroyed this economy, they went to Congress and they said, 'please, we'll be good boys, bail us out.' You know what I said? I said, 'let the billionaires themselves bail out Wall Street.'"

He added: "In terms of the auto bailout, of course, that made sense."

Put aside what one thinks of the TARP program – Clinton makes the important point that, on a key piece of legislation, which helped save millions of jobs, Sanders voted no. Yes, he supported other bailout bills, but this one was where the rubber was meeting the road. The unhappy fact of politics is that legislation is often imperfect and often has unpalatable provisions. As the Detroit Free Press explains: "In short, a Senator or congressman could not vote to rescue GM and Chrysler without voting to provide the money to keep the nation's largest investment banks from failing."

As Clinton put it later in the debate: "As we all know, there are bills in congress that have bad stuff, there are bills in congress that have good stuff. Good stuff and bad stuff in the same bill." And that's why you sometimes have to vote for bills with bad stuff – to get the good stuff. No wait, I'm sorry – Clinton didn't say that. Sanders did. And it's not the first time either. He has in the past ascribed votes benefiting the gun industry to the fact that he comes from a rural, pro-gun state. So the politics of practicality are fine, except for when they're not.

And that's what makes his purity politics all the more aggravating: He knows perfectly well the give and take required to get things done legislatively, but ignores it on his narrow issue set.

There was another telling moment during the exchange on the auto bailouts. Clinton interrupted Sanders as he started his rebuttal of her criticism. "Excuse me, I'm talking," he said severely. It was the first of two times he shushed her.

As a technical matter of etiquette he might have had the right of it – he should be afforded the opportunity to make his points uninterrupted – but there are risky political optics which didn't go unnoticed on Twitter.

Bernie once again shushing the woman. #DemDebate — Matthew Dickinson (@MattDickinson44) March 7, 2016

And Clinton's supporters made sure to point out the politics as well.

The point every woman watching cringed: Bernie Sanders "I am talking" https://t.co/7FylNx2rGz via @YouTube — Brad Woodhouse (@woodhouseb) March 7, 2016

Bernie Sanders should call Rick Lazio some time. — Neera Tanden (@neeratanden) March 7, 2016

Lazio was Clinton's opponent in the 2000 New York Senate race and is best remembered for invading her personal space during a debate, a moment seen as a sexist attempt at intimidation.

Is Donald Trump paying attention? If Sanders makes stumbles like this, imagine what the general election debates will be like.

More broadly, I would be remiss if I failed to point out that having the debate in Flint set up an important and substantive conversation about the horrific poison water problem there. And that illustrates the night-and-day difference between the Democratic and Republican debates, which Sanders quipped demonstrates the need for quality mental health care.