Tonight could mark the last time Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders meet head to head in a debate. The candidates met at Brooklyn’s Navy Yard this evening for a debate sponsored by CNN. As the debate kicked off, there were several underlying themes in play. According to a new NBC 4 New York/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll released today, Hillary has increased her lead over Sanders and now leads Bernie 57% to 40% among likely Democratic primary voters in the Empire State.

The campaign has been marked in recent days by increasingly harsh rhetoric from the Sanders camp. Yesterday a Sanders surrogate, when talking about Clinton’s health care proposals, referred to “corporate Democratic whores.” Many took that as an insult directed at Hillary Clinton and while Bernie Sanders later disavowed the remark there is little doubt that the root cause is the increasingly negative campaign style that Sanders has adopted.

Here’s the comment that was made by Dr. Paul Song at a large rally in Manhattan Wednesday night:

Now Secretary Clinton has said that Medicare-for-all will never happen. Well, I agree with Secretary Clinton that Medicare-for-all will never happen if we have a president who never aspires for something greater than the status quo. Medicare-for-all will never happen if we continue to elect corporate Democratic whores who are beholden to big pharma and the private insurance industry instead of us.

As Slate observed it’s hard to believe that the insult was directed at anyone but Clinton, although Dr. Song attempted to say later that he was referring to Congress, In any case, the tone for tonight’s debate was set.

Now, for the debate:

Hillary seems clearly happy to be in New York and is enjoying the moment. She is respectful but polite to Sanders when she refers to an interview in the Daily News where Sanders seemed at a loss to define the role of President. Hillary says, “I think you need to have the judgment on Day 1 to be both president and commander in chief.”

Bernie’s response was his increasingly outdated stump line that Hillary voted for the Iraq war back in 2002. It seems hard to believe that Bernie thinks that bringing up a vote some fourteen years ago that was widely supported by the American people, is going to win him any undecided votes.

Sanders again tried to make an issue out of Hillary’s speeches to Wall Street firms, but that seems to be an issue that doesn’t attract much interest. One of the moderators asked Bernie a pointed question of how he would promote American businesses around the world when he is so critical of them.

The issue of guns and violence was raised. Hillary questioned Sanders commitment to controlling guns. She noted that on a per capita basis Vermont is leading supplier of guns used in crimes in New York.  Clinton says that Sanders caved to the NRA to get elected to Congress in 1990 and asked if he will make apologies to the families of the victims at Sandy Hook.

In talking about energy policies Hillary says that will support legislation that stands a real chance of being passed, highlighting that some of Sanders proposal have zero chance of ever passing Congress. It provides a sharp contrast between the pragmatic  policies of Hillary vs. the idealistic but unrealistic  approach of Sanders.

On foreign policy, there was a discussion of Libya and Israel. Sanders said that Hillary pushed for regime change in Libya while Hillary pointed out that Sanders voted for the action in the Senate. On Israel, Bernie cited his experience of living in Israel but says that Israel has been too harsh in its response to terrorist attacks from Hamas. Hillary talks about her experience in negotiating peace between Israel and Hamas as Secretary of State. Hillary tells Sanders that “describing a problem is a lot easier than solving it.”

There will be the usual debate about who won the debate. Fortune put it this way:

Overall, the debate was probably, like many of these have been, a draw, with both candidates winning the issues where the frequently shine. This late in the contest, that draw is a win for Clinton.

The Washington Post noted that the debate highlighted two candidates “who have reached the limit of their patience with each other.” Hillary appeared more energized this evening than she has in recent debates and is clearly ready to move past Bernie Sanders and focus on the general election. It may well be time to bring an end to these primary debates and focus on the fall campaign.

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