Debatable: In the effort to make splashy news in the Democratic candidate debate last night in Houston, Beto O’Rourke promised he would take assault rifles away from gun owners and Andrew Yang said he would run a lottery to give money to members of the middle class. 

  O’Rourke got possibly the biggest audience response of the night when he said, “Hell yes, we’re going to take your AR-15, your AK-47. We’re not going to allow it to be used against a fellow American anymore.” 

  Yang stunned even his opponents when he said he would give 10 Americans $1,000 a month out of his campaign fund as a pilot program for his promise of a guaranteed national income. Like a game show host, Yang promised that “If you believe that you can solve your own problems better than any politician, go to yang2020.com and tell us how $1,000 a month will help you do just that.”

  Bernie shouted and Elizabeth Warren dissembled on whether “Medicare for all” would raise middle class taxes. The answer she wouldn’t give is that it would.

  The primary target, other than Donald Trump, was the frontrunner Joe Biden. Bernie sanders attacked Biden for his vote for the Iraq war. “The truth is, the huge mistake, and one of the differences between you and me is that I never believed what Cheney and Bush said,” Sanders said. “I voted against the war in Iraq and led the opposition to it.”

  Julian Castro jumped Biden on immigration because the Obama administration deported three million people while Biden was vice president. In a not-so-subtle attack on Biden’s age — he’s 76 — Castro also accused Biden of forgetting something the former vice president had said only two minutes earlier.

  Elizabeth Warren, as always, showed a firm grasp of facts and plans. She’s the one Joe Biden has to worry about.

Watered Down:The Trump administration announced it is repealing Obama-era clean water regulations that limited the use of polluting chemicals near streams, wetlands and other bodies of water. 

 The rollback joins a list of environmental regulations eliminated by President Trump, including restrictions on fossil fuel pollution, asbestos, and chemical hazards.  

  An immediate effect of the clean water repeal is that polluters will no longer need a permit to discharge harmful chemicals into streams and wetlands. 

Asleep on Watch:All six crew members of the scuba diving boat Conception were asleep — contrary to regulations — when a fire started that killed 34 people, according to a federal report. The boat’s licensing agreement required having a crew member on watch at all times.

  Five of six crew members were the only survivors.

  The burned hulk has been raised from the bottom of the Pacific off California’s Santa Cruz Island. Investigators are still trying to find the cause of the fire.

The News Roundup:Fired FBI official Andrew McCabe is a little closer to facing criminal charges after the Justice Department turned down a request by his lawyers not to prosecute him on accusations that he lied about whether he authorized a leak to the press in 2016. — Former presidential candidate and current US senator from Utah Mitt Romney says he will not endorse Donald Trump or anyone else for president. — Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson has been cleared of charges that he acted improperly when he tried to buy a $31,000 dining room set for his office in 2017. — Virginia’s Democratic Lieutenant Gov. Justin Fairfax has filed a $400 million defamation lawsuit against CBS Newsaccusing the network of reporting sexual assault claims that he says are “false, defamatory and politically-motivated.” — Gregory Cheadle, the man Donald Trump referred to as “My African American” at a 2016 rally, says he’s leaving the Republican party because he believes it is pursuing a “pro-white” agenda and using black people like him as “political pawns.”What was his first clue?

Funny Business:NBC’s Saturday Night Live has added three new cast members, one of whom, Bowen Yang, is the troupe’s first Asian. One of the three, Shane Gillis, is already in hot water after someone dug up an old podcast in which he referred to Chinese people as “Chinks” and “Chinee.” 

French Kiss:A French court ruled that a man who died from a heart attack after having sex during a business trip had suffered a work-related accident and that his employer was liable.

  This may be the first occasion on which the employee and the company got screwed at the same time.

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