Tag: Presidential Debate

The First 2024 Presidential Debate

I’m getting ready to live-spout the #PresidentialDebate. I previously spouted two Republican Debates.

I haven’t turned those into blog posts yet, but that’s okay. They were a distraction from the real story like the rodeo clowns who distract the crowd while the paramedics carry the grievously injured from the arena (I stole that joke from someone, maybe PJ O’Rourke). Mainly they demonstrated that the Republicans are no longer a serious political party.

Every 4 years they say “This is the most important election of our lifetime.” It keeps being true because some things keep getting worse.

It’s especially true this time if you care about democracy; there’s an authoritarian trend in the world today and America cannot succumb to it.

I’m not on the fence here and I not going to pretend to be.

That authoritarian trend has been building in the US for a while now; the first symptom I noticed was the whole “We’re a republic, not a democracy” refrain. Two things about that. First, we’re both. It’s possible to be both. Representative democracies are democracies and we’ve spent the better part of a quarter millennium becoming more democratic.

Secondly, I can translate what “We’re a republic, not a democracy” actually means. Whoever says that really means “I don’t care about fairness, my vote should count more than everyone else’s. That’s not American.

Meanwhile, I’m going to enjoy the preshow.

Here we go. Lawrence O’Donnell claims no debate has ever been determinative. Counterpoint: 1960 and 1980.

Let’s go!

9:01 pm

I have to admit I’m nervous.

This one could make a big difference. I don’t get it, but Biden needs to change the narrative. 538 has this thing as a tie but it looks like Trump leads to me.

Please welcome President Biden and convicted felon Donald Trump.

Biden is on point right out of the gate. Four years ago was a dystopia created by Trump he reminds us. I wish his voice were stronger.

9:05 pm

Trump’s voice is better, but his answer here only works if you ignore a hell of a lot.

And Trump doesn’t understand Tariffs. They absolutely would spike prices.

But so far Trump’s performance is better than I expected.

Trump: “Social Security, he’s destroying it because millions of people are pouring into our country, and they’re putting them onto Social Security…” We are not putting immigrants on Social Security. That’s a lie.

9:14 pm

“Everybody wanted the abortion issue sent back to the States” is a lie.

9:15 pm

After birth abortions are not a thing. That’s insane. And it’s murder.

I like Biden’s comparison to sending Civil Rights back to the states.

“Immigrants are raping and killing women” needs a fact check. “Biden threw open the borders” is a lie. [It looks like there are a couple of stories in the news right now but according to factcheck.org: “FBI data show a downward trend in violent crime in the U.S., and there’s no evidence to support the claim that there’s been a crime wave driven by immigrants.”]

Biden’s getting more animated and he’s right about the Republicans wanting a national abortion ban. Lots of them anyway.

9:21 pm

“In the final couple of months of my presidency we had the safest border…” says Trump. During a pandemic and a collapsed economy. Lie.

This is a pretty good format for Trump.

Okay. Trump is starting to rant and he’s seething. People can see through his nonsense, right?

9:31 pm

The decision to mute Trump’s mic is making him seem more reasonable. That was a strategic mistake.

On January 6th Trump said, “You have to fight or they will take our country.” He never said any of this “peacefully and patriotically” stuff. [Note: okay, he may have actually said that once in a speech filled with exhortations like “fighting like hell” and “we’re going to take it back.” This is disingenuous at best.]

9:44 pm

I have no idea what Trump is talking about here. Someone destroyed documents because Trump was right? [Note: Maybe this? There were certainly a lot of baseless claims about Biden setting up Trump or manufacturing these charges.]

But Biden is taking it to Trump on the felonies.

And Trump spins his counter-narratives with conviction.

I don’t know what happened to the Charlotteville story but Biden is right here; the “debunking” doesn’t match what I saw from the time.

9:53 pm

Trump: “I’m the one that got the insulin down for the people.” That’s another lie. This is getting tedious.

Raising the cap on the income subject to FICA is a good idea.

The “Losers and Suckers” story was documented at the time.

10:15 pm

It’s exhausting to keep up with everything that’s being said. This seems like a good resource.

www.cbsnews.com/news/first-presidential-debate-2024-fact-check/

Trump keeps turning up the temperature. Where did all this World War III stuff come from?

Trump tried really hard to avoid the ‘will you accept the election results’ question. He answers with a conditional: “If it’s a fair election…” before segueing into the tired old lies about 2020.

10:32 pm

Biden’s take “You’ll never accept the results because you’re a whiner” was funny and probably closer to the truth.

10:37

Closing Statements:

Biden starts off with “I was left a mess to clean up…” and that’s a good start, but diving into Tax policy isn’t great here. Although I suspect that all of this is on point, it’s a rational argument and Biden needs to connect emotionally.

Trump’s trotting out the same disinformation that he’s spewed for the entire debate. But he sounds confident which contrasts with Biden’s presentation. If you just listen to the tone this is an entirely different debate.

Analysis (Quick Takeaway):

The story of the 1960 debate was that Kennedy won because of his presentation. Nixon came across as a shifty sweaty liar and suddenly the unknown Senator from Massachusttes was a contender for President.

Biden won this one on truth and points, but he seemed feeble. The pundits are saying that people are scared.

Trump certainly wins on presentation even though his narrative was mostly false.

What is the conversation that moves forward? I’m afraid I know.

Afterthoughts:

And, yeah. Now it’s Friday and the prevailing winds of the news cyclone are clear. The Democrats are in panic mode and some think they should replace Biden on the ticket. In my mind that’s premature.

Biden had a bad night, there’s no doubt of that. There were some dubious decisions on the part of the campaign for sure. Not the least of which was failing to get the news of Biden’s cold into the public consciousness. That was a mistake and it was avoidable. “Don’t mind my voice, I have a cold” would have blunted the damage. Joanne wonders if Biden had been given cold medicine, which we all know can knock you on your ass. That would have been political malpractice.

This is an important election and I understand that people have anxiety. The stakes are high. Still, I think this is the correct response to Biden’s performance last night.

Both Gavin Newsom and Kamala Harris have grown in my estimation in the last 24 hours.

I admit that I was disheartened after the debate last night. I feel much better today. Why? Biden had a rally in North Carolina today. I recommend that you watch his whole speech, but if you don’t have the time, check out this clip. The Biden campaign should play this on a loop and get it in front of as many eyes as possible before today’s narrative calcifies.

I don’t know what, exactly was up with President Biden last night but clearly, he’s fine now. It’s time to change the conversation to convicted felon Donald Trump’s flagrant firehose of falsehoods. For my money, THAT’s the most disqualifying thing we saw in the debate last night. And you know what? If President Biden has a cold, he’ll be better in a day or two. Convicted felon Trump on the other hand has either lost all contact with reality or is a compulsive liar. That, sadly, shows no sign of changing. Donald Trump isn’t going to get better.

Image Credits:

  • Featured Image: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds Getty Images Fair Use

Biden v. Trump Round 1

If I don’t force the issue from time to time there will be nothing new on this blog for months at a time. Most of my energy at the moment goes into preparing to teach, teaching, recuperating from teaching, grading, and tech support as we adapt again to our new online environment. Now I’m relearning stuff I had figured out back in May.

But I’d set the precedent of live blogging the debates and this one seems important enough that it’s worth a later night than usual. I probably won’t have the chance to make this one look pretty for a few days. So far I know that the debate was going to be at Notre Dame but it isn’t because COVID. Now it’s in Cleveland. Moderated by Chris Wallace of Fox News Sunday.

Leading into the debate, it seems to me that things aren’t going too well for President Trump. The NYT released his taxes over the weekend and it does not look good. That followed revelations about the President making some unfortunate comments about the military and the comments about possibly refusing to respect the results of the election are not a good look.

At this moment, the election looks like it’s Vice President Biden’s to lose. But I think he’s lost a step or two in the last few years. I think he needs to perform the way he did in the debate against Paul Ryan in 2012, but I wonder if he still has that in him. In any event, it’s a mistake to underestimate Donald Trump. He did nothing but exceed expectations in the 2016 election.

8:45

Hillary Clinton is on MSNBC giving advice. I’m having second thoughts already.

9:06

We start with SCOTUS, the elephant in the room. This is more reserved than I’m used to. Trump’s arguments here are already disingenuous.

9:08

Biden is sedate this evening, but the argument he’s making about the SCOTUS nomination is the right one.

9:11

This is an interesting exchange.

9:15

Trump is fighting with the moderator which is an interesting strategy. He rails against the individual mandate which is the thing that makes the ACA work.

9:18

Biden calls out Trump’s lies. Good line about getting lucky.

9:20

Trump is repeating things he said in 2016 that never played out. Biden: “Will you shut up man” and “This is so unpresidential.”

9:25

Trump is claiming that he saved thousands of lives and is blaming the “Fake News.”

H1N1 was a disaster??

9:33

Trump is claiming that Biden isn’t smart.

9:38

Trump seems to be especially transparent tonight. I think Biden’s hitting the right tone by just laughing at the President.

9:42

“I brought back football.” Hilarious.

9:44

Trump claims he paid millions in taxes in 2016.

Biden: “You’re the worst president this country has ever had.” My money’s still on Bush, but that made me laugh really hard.

9:50

I think the only way we could have a real debate between these two is to put them in separate rooms.

9:55

Decency. Yes. More of that, please.

9:57

Right at the racism. Nice. And the puzzled look on Biden’s face is priceless.

10:04

I need to train for these. One hour in and I’m fried.

10:11

“There has never been a president who has done more than I’ve done.” Is it because of the number of Judges? That ignores the obstruction under McConnell.

10:26

“Stand back and stand by” is easily the most chilling moment of this debate.

10:29

Biden’s been good on election security. But “We’ve caught them all?” Trump is incoherent on election security.

10:36

Trump refuses to ask his supporters to stay calm during an extended count. That’s troubling. Biden is strong here again.

Analysis:

I don’t think this will change anyone’s mind. It was a mess. Just watching it was exhausting. At best I think Trump was playing to his base which isn’t going to be enough.

I was going to say that this was a draw, but now I think the more we unpack what Trump said here the better Biden is going to look.

The 2020 Democratic Debate Round 3

This isn’t a live reaction to the third debate. Life happened. But I do want to look at the debate and have my own reactions before I really dive into the coverage. Thanks to the magic of TiVo, I can watch this debate today, or any day. Now where’s that damn remote? Here we go!

This debate was sponsored by ABC News and the moderators are George Stephanopoulos, Linsey Davis, David Muir and Jorge Ramos.

Who was in round 3? The contestants… er… candidates on the stage are:

  • Former Vice-President Joe Biden
  • Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren
  • Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders
  • California Senator Kamala Harris
  • South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigeig
  • Entrepreneur Andrew Yang
  • Former Representative Beto O’Rourke
  • New Jersey Senator Cory Booker
  • Former Cabinet Secretary Julián Castro, and
  • Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar.

That should be close to ABC’s (or the DNC’s?) perceived ranking of the candidates with the more prominent candidates taking center stage. We know that the “big ticket” tonight is Warren vs. Biden. Biden is the ostensible front runner while Warren seems to be the challenger who is gaining ground the quickest. Those two haven’t been on a stage together yet and folks are curious how the encounter will play out.

Booker came out strong and Yang is going to give $1000/month to 12 families for 12 months. Buttigeig seemed taken aback by that before regaining his footing. I can’t put my finger on why, but I’m not impressed by Harris. Bernie sounds like Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, at the end of the famous filibuster. He must be working hard; he’s lost his voice. Warren’s opening was excellent and got a good response from the audience. Biden is in good form, but the “we refuse to postpone” riff was a little flat.

Early on, Warren is better on the will-you-raise-taxes question this time. The only relevant question is: taxes + premiums, will the total be more? Will the average family be paying less? Biden is doing well so far, but I don’t know if he will be able to stand up to the tag team of Sanders and Warren. Klobuchar gets the first word aside from the Biden/Sanders/Warren center stage. I don’t feel like she’d playing at the same level. Warren is making the argument that people will keep their current doctors in a more efficient system.

Buttigeig weighs in. “I trust the American People to choose what’s best for them.” He’s got a progressive idea expressed in terms that should ring true for conservatives. He does that alot and it’s pretty good.

And here’s the sort of thing that makes me uncomfortable about Harris. A Medicare-For-All Plan that’s part public and part private fundamentally isn’t Medicare-For-All. She either doesn’t understand that or she wants to have her cake and eat it too.

Biden’s definitely doing better this time around, but he looks like a muppet nodding along with O’Rourke.

Castro’s going after Biden pretty hard. It seems desperate and the crowd doesn’t like it. And Buttigeig is right; Castro’s coming across like a jackass and its going to turn people off.

Yang: “I am asian, so I know a lot of doctors.” Hilarious.

Booker’s pretty good making the “don’t let the best be the enemy of the good” argument and later on racism. He’d clearly thought that through. Buttigeig is strong there as well; I want to know more about his Douglas Plan. Castro, Harris, O’Rourke all pretty good here.

But unlike in his Senate run, Beto always seems to be trying too hard.

This debate seems pretty friendly; there are some squabbles and there are folks promoting themselves, but it’s cordial.

I would have expected these guys to be reflexively anti-tariff but it’s more nuanced than that. Buttigeig is again performing much better than you’d expect based on his office.

Wait! Did Harris just make a dick joke? Backing up… well, no but “that guy in the Wizard of Oz” who turned out to be “a really small dude” was the actual Wizard of Oz. If you’re going to evoke the movie, watch the damn thing. Also, turning the moment into an implied short joke aimed at the moderator is not smart. Also also, that’s kind of a Trump move and he’s much better at that than she is.

OTOH, if you’re going to sneak in a dick joke, trade policy might be the safest spot.

Everybody sounded pretty good on Trade, National Security, Education. Nothing seemed particularly surprising.

Biden got a question on reparations. It sounded pretty tone deaf to me. Using social workers “to confront the problems that come from home.” Might have been meant innocently, but doesn’t come across that way in context. It reminds me of when he called Barack Obama an “African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy .”

Protesters. What are they yelling about? I want to know!

Boy, hearing Biden talk about losing family members was both gut wrenching and compelling.

Analysis:

This was, for the most part another respectful cordial debate. It was palpable from the audience and the other candidates that wanted it that way when Castro tried to go after Biden. That did not go the way Castro thought it would.

So, no real fireworks and I think, again, this debate is unlikely to shake things up much. The “top 5” in the polling, Biden, Warren, Sanders, Harris and Buttigeig, will probably remain the top five. If anyone is likely to drop in the polls based on this debate, I think it would be Harris; this might have been her weakest performance so far. Of the remaining five candidates on the stage, I think Booker is the most likely to break out of the pack.

I might have more to add after I absorb some of the coverage.

Picture Credits:

  • Featured Image: TampaBay.com
  • Biden and Warren: LA Times