Well, unfortunately, my wife, a normie, wanted to watch the debate. We watched it together. Here’s my frank take:
- Biden looked terrible. Bronzer!
- The moderation was awful. An 8th grader could have done as well by watching the clock and reeling off questions. This is especially true when you have a liar like Trump involved.
- Biden perked up towards the end but overall I think he missed the mark. He tried to pack too much into every question and that worked against him.
- Trump did his best to lose by circling back on things that pricked his ego. He also spouted a bunch of nonsense that might turn off people who have a clue.
- Biden’s closing statement didn’t mention the word “abortion”. That was a miss.
Overall, I think debates don’t matter that much, and this one matters less since we’re a long way from the election. But, we all should steel ourselves for a negative turn in the polls and bad media reactions. This was not a good debate for Joe Biden. He stumbled at the start and recovered pretty well. This was not a good debate for CNN. They allowed Trump to platform lies with basically zero pushback. If it wasn’t a good debate for Biden, and it wasn’t a good debate for CNN, we have to recognize that it was a good debate for the other person on the stage. I don’t think debates matter that much, but here we are.
cmorenc
The CNN commetariat post-debate is: Biden’s performance was a disaster, and failed to parry Trump’s numerous lies. And Democrats are post-debate in panic mode – and Biden should consider stepping aside.
Ugh.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Usual greatness from Driftglass on Twitter:
Some pissed off dude like most of us here: CNN is giving free airtime to a torrent of lies, unchecked.
Driftglass: It’s not a glitch, it’s a business model.
debit
At the end of the day, I think no one had their minds changed. I am going to vote for Biden no matter what. Trumpers are going to vote for Trump no matter what. Undecided voters don’t even know there was a debate.
No kidding, I was hoping for a West Wing moment where Biden came in like a very nice shark and ripped Trump apart. But Sorkin didn’t script this and we have to accept it wasn’t great and move on.
Archon
The beginning looked like the debate would be a catastrophe but I thought Biden found his footing and got some zingers in.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
My two cents this will be the keep, since it makes for good comedy routine fooder.
Soprano2
I think the problem was that Biden tried to answer the questions. He should have just attacked TCFG.
FastEdD
Yup, that was awful. Silly me, I had confidence going in. Good night.
Chris
That’s the main thing. It’s less the debates and more the coverage of them that ends up making the difference. (IIRC, a furious media blitz in 2000 essentially turned a Bush v. Gore debate that most people thought Gore won into an “everybody knows Gore lost” in an especially egregious example).
Fingers crossed that it doesn’t make a critical difference. Also that Biden, like Obama, is able to bounce back, although the fact that the next debate is in September is one hell of a gap to let narratives form in.
Ohio Mom
@cmorenc: How the hell could a candidate step aside after the primaries? Not exactly how democracies work — the people have spoken, who cares what they said?
Obviously too much to ask that the talking heads analyzing tne debate have any analytic chops.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
I didn’t see the debate, but let me add a historical perspective:
Obama lost the first debate against Romney and there was general panic, yet things work out well.
In 1984 Reagan lost the first debate badly to Mondale. It’s sparked strong scrutiny about his age, his supporters even panicked. But he recovered for the second debate and received the second term.
Hillary beat Dump decisively in the first 2016 debate. Outside events had a larger effect than any of the debates.
Another Scott
People who are persuaded by a Gish Gallop of lies aren’t the people we’re attempting to persuade to vote with us.
It’s early. Joe did fine. He made a strong case that he’s working on good policies and more good policies are coming.
“You’re a whiner” is a great line, and it’s accurate.
Don’t panic.
Cheers,
Scott.
Grover Gardner
I’m very, very sorry to say that I was shocked. Biden really looked and sounded awful, 110 years old, and he struggled to cram in all this “good stuff” he’s doing and is going to do–if you could make it out between his stuttering and stumbling. Anyone who questioned his health and acuity surely came away with a decisive answer to both. Won’t change my vote–I’m confident he can run the country–but…Oy! In contrast, Trump sounded strong and crisp–nutty as always–but in control of himself. That surprised me too.
cain
What Biden has missed is that Trump creates his own reality (as all the other GOP) it’s how every GOP presidential candidate have debated. They lie their ass off, and the moderators are not there to correct them because rightly, that’s your problem not theirs.
What Joe needed to do is not even answer the questions – just keep attacking Trump and Trump’s ego. Just keep pushing him on his 34 convictions – when he lies. Just keep pushing “yeah, that’s exactly what would a 34 count convicted felon would say” and you keep repeating that over and over again. You don’t have to say anything else. Repeatedly.
The media is going to say something negative regardless – but who gives a shit. Just keep repeating the same answers.
That is the “debate” Biden’s team should have prepped him for.
cain
@Grover Gardner:
Apparently, he got a bad cold. It’s too bad that he got sick right before his big night.
Avalune
@Soprano2: Trump sure didn’t seem bothered about answering the questions :)
@Soprano2:
EarthWindFire
@Chris: A lot will happen between now and September that can overshadow that narrative. Trump’s sentencing, for instance.
In the meantime, best thing Democrats can do is stop panicking and move on. Joe Biden is not the only winning presidential candidate who had a bad debate.
Lyrebird
@cmorenc: In memory of our late great commenter efgoldman,
fk ’em…
I don’t know, I figure the work ahead is not changed by much. Volume of crap from the horse-race loving media will get cranked up for a while, but now the Biden Harris campaign and Vote Vets and all have some more clips of the other guy’s lunacy and shilling for white supremacists to put in some more ads.
Ohio Mom
@Chris: As my currently totally despondent husband is insisting, Why would Trump agree to a second debate? By most people’s measure, Trump won. Why risk a loss?
Michael Bersin
“…we have to recognize that it was a good debate for the other person on the stage.”
Only if we concede that incessant lying and gaslighting are a win for the attendee (never graduated) of The Nathan Thurm School of Discourse.
“…Listen. Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony…”
SenyorDave
The only way Biden could step aside is if there is a true health emergency or family health emergency.
Grover Gardner
@cain: I’m sorry to hear that. I had no idea–neither do most of the other voters.
cmorenc
Trump thinks he got what he needed out of tonight’s debate – and will probably back out of the second debate because he doesn’t need it. And he may be right in terms of political judgment. Expect GOP ads highlighting Biden’s most halting moments tonight.
catclub
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: I think a lot of ads about how great the US is and how Trump thinks its terrible would work. Unemployment – lowest ever,
inflation – down, Stock market highest ever.
Where is Trump living?
Barbara
@Chris: My feeling at this point is that most people tune out political coverage. I know I do. They are mostly talking to each other. I didn’t watch because I just loathe every modern debate format I have ever seen and watching Trump and hearing his voice makes me ill.
$8 blue check mistermix
@Ohio Mom:
Tell your husband that he definitely will agree because his ego will demand it. He thinks he won and he’ll want to wipe the floor with Biden at the next debate.
Noskilz
I think Biden did well on substance, but on appearances left a lot to be desired – the big line of attack the trumpalos push is “sleepy joe” and he did come across as kind of old and tired rather than old and feisty.
Biden frequently had an air of loathing about him when he was listening to Trump blather, and I kind of wish he channeled that kind of energy into his responses, but whatever.
For people who care about what is said, Biden did well, for people who just care about how something is said, not so great.
Trump just pitched obvious nonsense, but for those who don’t know or don’t care about that, he did do it a bit more energetically.
Splitting Image
My two takeaways are that Trump didn’t care what questions he was being asked and CNN didn’t care that he wasn’t answering them.
$8 blue check mistermix
@cmorenc: Naah, the guy who won two golf championships will want to win another debate…
Michael Bersin
@Another Scott:
“…People who are persuaded by a Gish Gallop of lies aren’t the people we’re attempting to persuade to vote with us…”
Bingo!
gene108
Biden’s old and his stutter got the better of him.
His voice has been getting weaker throughout this term in office.
Trump will always be loud.
Joe really needed a “will you shut up, man” moment. He couldn’t do it.
My solace is Obama performed badly during the first debate with Romney and the other debates Obama clearly did better than Romney.
I think this will matter somewhat. Trump didn’t seem old. Biden seemed old. With EC, and close margins in Georiga, Arizona, etc. we need every vote.
Also, can we sue the SCOTUS and Judge Cannon for election interference? If those cases had gone to trial already, and Trump was found guilty – as he has been in all his other trials – it’d have an impact on this election.
Trump is a brash showman. That’s his strongest skill. Get in front of people and sound supremely confident, even is what he’s saying is bullshit. CNN let him do it without any interruption.
I am bummed that this will be a close election because of the fucking Electoral College. Fucking EC didn’t work as intended and the 12th Amendment just lets it lie dormant for most of the time before the monster wakens like it did in 2000, 2016, and might have in 2020 if Pence did what Trump wanted.
The worship of the Founding Fathers as infallible men is one of the biggest reasons we’re stuck with shit like the EC.
catclub
With any luck someone in media will mention “trump never addressed any of the questions asked.”
Ohio Mom
I gotta turn in. I have to be up early to feed my vacationing neighbor’s neurotic dog. And let her out in the back yard where she will hide behind the bushes until the mid-day walker shows up.
Anne Laurie
Looks like nobody’s gonna change their minds after this debate… which was exactly what all the smart people (and also me) predicted.
Biden came armed with (rather too many) facts, never the best message against a congenital liar like TFG. Joe *did* loosen up quite a bit as the debate went forward, and there will be some great clips from his social media team using his facial expressions, too.
Trump spent his time lying & bragging — none of it was new, but all of it can be weaponized by Democratic operatives.
My hope is that President Biden and his team learn from this, and that he shows up for the second debate prepped to do nothing but mock TFG’s bottomless neediness and dishonesty.
Avalune
@Noskilz:
“Biden frequently had an air of loathing about him when he was listening to Trump blather, and I kind of wish he channeled that kind of energy into his responses, but whatever.”
I dunno how else anyone could look at that blowhard.
Ivan X
@debit: haven’t seen you in a long time here or on the points blogs. Where’s credit?
debit
@Ivan X: LOL
Soprano2
@Splitting Image: That’s right, I’m sure TCFG prepared to get his talking points out no matter what the questions were.
$8 blue check mistermix
@gene108:
All true, but if the numbers went the other way for the current Republicans (i.e., all R’s lived in cities and D’s were rural), they’d be yelling about how the founders wanted a “living document” and would be proposing tons of amendments.
Quinerly
Biden sounding very strong at the watch party in Atlanta. MSNBC.
Mai Naem mobile
AI would have done a better job moderating than Tapper and Bash. Honestly what was the point of having them there.
debit
Listening to Biden speak to a crowd and he sounds great. Maybe not having an audience hurt him more than Trump.
Chris
@Ohio Mom:
I very much saw the same logic myself, but my understanding is they already agreed to two debates?
Lyrebird
@Anne Laurie: So glad we have you on BJ and on Team Democracy generally!
mrmoshpotato
GO FUCK YOURSELF, JON STEWART!
catclub
Biden did a terrible job with numbers. He nearly had a great zinger on 6-4 and 225 pounds and then got it confused. gaah
zhena gogolia
@debit: That’s so weird.
zhena gogolia
@mrmoshpotato: Oh, god, I think I don’t want to know what prompted that.
Quinerly
@debit: I just heard that too. His voice was strong.
Honestly, Biden’s debate performance is a mystery.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
the narrative about the candidates is Biden old and Trump lives in bullshitland, and that wasn’t changed.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@$8 blue check mistermix:
That makes me think about how the GOP would be reacting now to a 5-4 liberal majority court now if Obama had successfully appointed Garland and Hillary had won in 2016. Trump would’ve played sore loser then, just as he did in 2020. I can’t help but think they’d have followed as similar path to now and outright tried to ignore SCOTUS decisions
cmorenc
@Ohio Mom:
The point is: that Biden did not present himself well enough tonight to counter the spin that he’s too old – he had too many moments when he lost his train of thought and stumbled to complete thoughts, whereas Trump coherently spun out his lies. And there is post-debate a media chorus reinforcing this impression.
We were hoping for a performance like Biden did crushing Paul Ryan, but honestly, he had a bad night.
SW
This doesn’t change much if anything but I think it revealed that Biden’s advisors and prep people are not very good. The combination of incompetence and confidence is often lethal.
mrmoshpotato
@Splitting Image:
Surprised CNN didn’t ask about Hillary’s emails.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
By the way, I know I haven’t been as present as I used to be, but whatever happened to commenter Jim, Foolish Literalist? I haven’t seem him lately when I’ve lurked
Frankensteinbeck
I watched big chunks of it. I don’t like debates and I don’t like listening to Trump, but I figured I should see what’s happening rather than listening to reviews.
The media is going to scream about how Democrats are losing, panic panic panic. They’ve been doing that nonstop since I started paying attention decades ago.
We’re hyper-fixated on wanting Biden to sound firm and powerful and make zingers. We’re terrified of him sounding old, and if things go bad even briefly, we stop taking things in and panic. This misses a lot else that went on. Trump got to lie, but his lies were nutso. It doesn’t help you if you get to lie but your lies are so obvious they still hurt you. His ranting about immigrants is going to sound creepy as fuck to anybody not in his base. He repeatedly denied Jan 6th, and that doesn’t go over well with people who remember it happening. Sounding strong and dynamic as you talk about how you aced cognitive tests isn’t a great look. Sorry, it isn’t.
Biden sounded old. Trump sounded like a deranged asshole.
My takeaway is that despite media attempts to assure us Democrats are dooooomed, the only long term result will be Democrats hitting Trump on claiming that everyone wanted Roe vs Wade ended. Trump gave almost the worst possible answer on the biggest issue of the election, and that’s not going to disappear.
gene108
@Another Scott:
I disagree.
All the fund raising Ballon-Juice is doing this cycle and did in earlier cycles is to get the irregular voter who makes their decisions on god knows what criteria to turn out to vote.
A talking head on CNN immediately said Biden stepping aside might be an option Democrats should consider.
Biden’s greatest weakness is the fact he’s old and age has caught up to him physically. His voice weaker than in 2020. His gait is more shambling. I don’t think there’s any real way to cover it up.
Plus, with age President Biden might not have the control he needs over his stutter. His stutter really kicked in at the start of the debate and throughout the debate. That’s what tripped him up at first.
Media’s already set the narrative that Biden is clearly too old and should step aside, if my brief take of the CNN post-debate coverage is anything to go on.
The real problem is if the narrative sets in that Biden’s too old, rather than Trump’s a convicted felon.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@cmorenc:
What about the second half? He improved as time went on. And Obama had a bad first debate with Romney too
oldgold
It was a horrible night for our Republic.
The terrible truth is that at this time in his life Biden is a very poor candidate. Believe your eyes.
I fear we need a black swan to land in our political pond. Otherwise, the future appears damn grim.
cmorenc
@Anne Laurie:
There won’t be a second debate. Trump’s take from tonight is that there is no advantage for him to a 2nd debate, he accomlplished what he needed to tonight.
TeezySkeezy
@Grover Gardner: I’m not confident he could run the country for another 4 years, but I am confident Kamala and the dem party can run it better than Trump or any maga Republican. I’m voting for the dem party and it’s policies and the sanity of Biden and his VP.
However, the election is going to be close and we needed to shave a few more points to our side by any means available. This debate sure isn’t gonna do that. People like to say, “debates don’t matter,” this doesn’t matter, that doesn’t matter…however, when talking about a margin of a few percentage points in a few swing states…actually all the things that “don’t matter” kind of do matter (because they all always did matter a little bit and now the little bit is the margin).
dimmsdale
I’m watching Biden on MSNBC at the post-debate watch party, and THAT’s the guy I wanted to see in the debate: energetic, fiery, enthusiastic. I’m putting his debate performance down to ABYSMAL prep by staffers (there’s no excuse for his not being prepped to handle Trump’s Gish Gallops), the somewhat confusing structure of the debate, Joe trying to honestly respond to a festoon of lies (in the Trump attacks/Biden responds dynamic always disadvantages the responder) and the absolutely scandalous lack of any obligation whatever on the part of Bash and Tapper to act like journalists, instead of a couple of ciphers standing on the sidewalk watching the traffic go by. Biden should have been prepped to present in the debate, the way he did in the watch party.
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
@Chris:
You have the RNC and DNC over the summer, those also craft the narrative.
gene108
I wish someone with a platform would point out that America’s been running presidential elections every four years, since 1788.
Trump is implying by saying there’s massive fraud in 2020 that after 230+ years, our fellow Americans are stupid or corrupt or incompetent to run a fair election. That should be an insult to this country, but so many people are fascist curious now, I’m not sure it’d matter.
Soprano2
Biden’s problem was that he thought facts and being truthful mattered. Turns out that to the press and some “top Democrats” all that mattered was how he looked and sounded. I wish he had preceded every response to TCFG with “for someone who was convicted of 34 felonies” or “as someone who is still facing felony charges in three different cases”. He should have said it over and over.
Splitting Image
On reflection, I think the GOP figured out how to square the circle we were wondering about last week: would Trump show up to the debate or would he chicken out?
Here’s our answer: they figured out a way to do both. Trump showed up to the place where the debate was being held and spoke when his microphone was on, but he didn’t actually debate. You could cut out Biden and the moderators from the footage and what you’d be left with is a televised Trump rally. By answering the moderators’ questions, Biden was more or less debating against himself.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@cmorenc:
No, his huge ego will compel him to agree to second debate
hrprogressive
“On the substance, Biden won the debate” – Gavin Newsome.
Will that fix one less than stellar performance? No.
But that’s more of what we need to hear.
catclub
dmsilev caught it:
That was when Trump said he is probably better now than 20 years ago.
w_seattle
While I wish that Biden had started off a bit better, he was overall OK. And a poor initial debate performance for an incumbent is actually expected regardless (see James Fallows talking about this for Obama). Will be curious to see if there’s a second debate — Trump dropped seeds a couple of times that there shouldn’t even be a debate.
Chief Oshkosh
@SW: yep. They apparently prepped him like it’s 2016. We often comment that Trump is incapable of learning. What I see is that Democratic campaigns cannot learn. There was not a reason in the world for Biden to prep on policy and numbers. None. Yet per reports, that’s all they did.
ah well.
BellyCat
@Grover Gardner: Hate to agree with your assessment but it’s spot-on. Will vote for Biden, but with renewed interest in Kamala’s abilities.
Starfish
@zhena gogolia: Any day ending with a -y of listening to Jon Stewart? He is so yell-y, and it is not cute.
mrmoshpotato
@zhena gogolia: At my parents’ – we watched Dump’s CNN shitshow. Now The Daily Show.
I really hate Stewart’s both sider bullshit for the sake of “comedy.”
I hated it on The Daily Show – like letting John McCain lie to Jon’s face – and I still hate it now.
Right now – “Both of these men should be using performance enhancing drugs.”
GET FUCKED, JON STEWART!
hrprogressive
Biden Camp needs Gavin Newsome everywhere. He’s coming across really well, and pushing back on the “but both sides” nonsense from Alex Wagner.
gene108
@cain:
Some people, even on this here almost 10,000 blog, want the Biden campaign and Biden to highlight all his accomplishments and not just attack Trump.
I think it’s a stupid idea. Get people to remember all the negative feelings they had about Trump and means going negative almost all the fucking time.
I think his campaign people were hearing about people wanted to know what Biden’s done for them.
Save that for the glossy TV ads in September.
SenyorDave
@hrprogressive: He won on substance by default. Trump always loses on substance, but Biden needed to hit it out of the ballpark on substance and he didn’t. Missed opportunities, time wasted on golf, he could have mentioned how much time Trump spent playing golf
He might have mentioned that Trump faces time in the slammer just to get his goat.
catclub
Biden got better responding when trump kept saying that the US is in a terrible place now. I can think of better responses… now, at home.
Betty
On MSNBC Gavin Newsome telling everyone to get a grip. The guy has been a great President. Substance. Understanding the stakes. Alex is annoying.
Ksmiami
Why didn’t the debate prep ppl listen to Rick Wilson? They did an incompetent job.
cain
@Grover Gardner:
Well, Biden could have said something.
Patricia Kayden
@cmorenc: This is the problem with the left. We’re quick to throw our people off the cliff if they don’t perform perfectly. The right embraces their trolls no matter what.
I didn’t watch the debate. I will be voting for President Biden. Period.
PJ
@oldgold: Better stock up on Depends between now and the election.
Quinerly
@hrprogressive:
Newsome is awesome. He perked me up.
Frankensteinbeck
@gene108:
I hear a lot, here on BJ and on the news, people saying that Biden needs to let people know about his accomplishments. It particularly comes up in regard to black voters. Well, if anyone watched that debate and that was what they were wondering, Biden knocked it out of the fucking park.
hrprogressive
@Quinerly:
He is doing a great job of selling the big picture here.
Which, again, the big picture is far more important.
Biden may not have been on fire, but he’s the only thing standing between us and The Trump Reich.
different-church-lady
We needed like sixteen home runs to feel better, and we didn’t get them.
I won’t get much sleep tonight, but I’m still not slitting my wrists.
Juju
I figured Biden stressed his vocal cords or something like that. The cold makes more sense. Biden is doing better at his appearance at the watch party. He improved through the debate and his replies were for the most part accurate and coherent. I’m glad I got to see more typical Joe, with the sly grin and occasional snort when something was a knee deep lie. Trump started out well but devolved to his typical me, me, me, I did everything better, in fact perfectly. Also lie, lie, lie, and lie some more. Trump started well, for him, Biden did not. Biden ended better, Trump just sounded borderline nuts at the end. When one uses the “I didn’t sleep with a porn star”, line in a debate, that’s not a good moment
I just donated $25 to Biden. I’m taking Gaven Newsome’s advice and doing more, worrying less.
Juju
I’m still voting for Biden.
Soprano2
One guy on CNN said TCFG sounded strong, but he has terrible policies and all he did was lie, and that Biden told the truth and had good policies but sounded weak. I wish Biden had pointed out that TCFG wants to deport 11 million people, and I wish he had mentioned Project 2025.
Quinerly
@Juju: 💜
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Hmm, the conspiratorial minded could be forgiven for thinking maybe the plan along was give Trump enough rope to hang himself? Figure, the Maga hats are unreachable, Biden wants the wafflers, and now everyone is want to see Trump “crushing” Biden and hear the kind of BS Trumps spews.
different-church-lady
@Patricia Kayden:
Hell, half of us are embracing the right-wing trolls at this point.
Mike E
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Frankensteinbeck:
I’m kinda confused as to why this is. Maybe I’m wrong, but my impression is that African Americans as a group are generally very plugged in to politics, because it affects them broadly more than white people, for obvious reasons. Black Dem voters were and are vital to Dem successes. Why wouldn’t they know about Biden’s accomplishments?
dimmsdale
@Chief Oshkosh: There are messaging experts (as opposed to the same tired band of ‘consultants’, who have shat the messaging bed for decades) who could have prepped Joe MUCH more effectively, to avoid what you’re talking about: Anat Shenker-Osorio being one. I also think CNN should never be trusted with another debate EVER, for reasons I mentioned earlier
The other thing a ‘bad night for Biden’ does is knock any sense of complacency out of our heads. If I was going to write postcards to voters, I’m gonna write BEAUCOUP postcards now.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
The man speaks truth here.
catclub
CNN did try to ask about that. That was one they did NOT follow up on. Others – accepting the election, and ‘what will you do on climate change’ They did ask a second time – and still got no answer to the question.
Skippy-san
@gene108: We didn’t always get it right. 1800, 1877, near miss with Nixon in 1960, And since 2000 we have candidates who lost the popular vote win the EC.
Soprano2
@dimmsdale: I’ve heard her on Pod Save America, she’s really good.
Ivan X
@Quinerly: I mean, the thing is, I know people, and perhaps you do too, in their later years, who can be quite acute. The problem is, it’s not consistent, and once that uncertainty is in your mind, you consider that person’s reliability.
This outcome was not at all what I was hoping for, but is why I didn’t watch the debate. I always find myself holding my breath when I hear Biden speak and have for years, despite my happiness with his presidency.
Biden, regardless of his actual competence and abilities, projects being really old, even back in 2020, which invites doubt into his competence and abilities. Trump sounds insane, and hateful, but vigorous.
I’ve had people angry at me for saying this, but it’s only what my dad and father in law, no spring chickens and no Republicans, have said for years, and they’re not stupid. I’m sad and scared to hear that Biden had a bad night, because, even if he has a good followup debate (if one even happens), the age-related unreliability narrative may persist, which wasn’t a factor for Obama. Obama was “he didn’t do well once but I can now reassess” whereas Biden invites “oh he might not *be* well, at least dependably.”
I am far from a doomer, and I genuinely don’t think anything is known about the election. but I can’t help but finding myself in a defensive crouch.
Geminid
@different-church-lady: I’m just glad so many Jackals live in one- or two-story houses.
Mallard Filmore
@cmorenc:
I do with that Biden had said, “Was anything Trump just said true? I don’t have time to argue against all his lies, so I will answer the moderators’ question instead.”
gene108
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
The Obama-Romney debates were only a few weeks apart in the fall of 2012. This risk here is Biden’s old and feeble gets cemented into people’s minds. There are people worried about, whether they are right or not, I don’t know.
One big reason Obama won in 2012 is that Mitt Romney came off as a rich fuckwad who was disconnected from ordinary people. The negatives about how he made his money and his car elevators set the narrative in 2012 that helped Obama.
Trump’s negatives are really high. People need to be reminded and reminded about it.
No one really cares what Presidents do, except for political junkies, because most people’s lives don’t change that much from one administration to the next.
Almost Retired
@gene108: I agree (and love) this framing. I’m not going to pretend there was much of a silver lining in this evening, but you’re right that BJs efforts to turnout the irregular voter is an important offset. Onward!
Barbara
@dimmsdale:
If Biden had given back to Trump in kind the reaction would be that they traded insults and were just the same. No doubt there is some pitch perfect style or attitude out there but it doesn’t matter. The media needs its horse race. We are being used. It’s annoying as fuck.
dimmsdale
@Soprano2: Anat Shenker-Osorio? She IS really good, and scandalously under-utilized in Democratic politics.
Richard Fox
I actually was pleased with Biden’s answers to that disgraceful orange man. He was substantive and actually answered questions put to him. Listening to talking heads bemoaning optics is truly a waste of time. That’s my take. Thanks all.
cain
@dimmsdale:
He needs to get preppers who actually understand Trump. It’s not even rocket science! He was entire predictable. It’s fucking stupid that they prepped him for a ‘debate’. Goddam.
SenyorDave
I was surprised about one thing, at no point did Trump have one of his “magnets in the ocean” type moments. I honestly did not think he could go an hour and a half without some truly incoherent rant. He lies all the time, but that has never really hurt him too much. I assumed he would say some completely inane shit at some point and it would hurt him, but he never really did.
Frankensteinbeck
@cmorenc:
Actually, I think Biden did that just fine. Time and again, Trump would come out with bizarre bullshit, and Biden’s answer would be in three parts. A) Trump is lying. B) Here is what actually happened, in detail. C) Here are a bunch of awesome things that I accomplished.
I think the actual problem is that everyone politically tuned in was hoping for Biden to swagger out on stage and spend the evening beating Trump up with powerful witticisms. No, we didn’t get that, although Biden did get some hits like that in. But we didn’t get what we were looking for, so we jump to thinking we got nothing.
cain
@Soprano2:
That’s EXACTLY what i’ve been saying. All he needed to do to prep for this debate was 3-4 canned responses to Trump when he answers a question. Keep hitting him the same way, over and over again.Hit him with his ego – I don’t know why this wasn’t obvious.
Eolirin
@SenyorDave: We’ll see if “everyone wanted Roe v Wade overturned” has legs, because that may be more significant than anything else if it gets picked up.
hrprogressive
So msnbc is now running some voting folks that, apparently, we’re described as “double haters” who don’t like either candidate.
Allegedly they thought, independent of talking heads, about Biden not being fit for the job. But they also didn’t like Trump.
These sound like super soft voters either way.
But like, these are the types of people who may well decide the election.
dimmsdale
@Barbara: Agree about not trading insults, and I don’t *think* that’s what I was saying. I suppose I would have preferred Biden to articulate more of a soaring vision of what America STILL needs to have done, rather than trying to bat back Trump’s wiffle balls of lies. I’m not saying this very well, but descending into Trump’s well of grievance, even to correct his lies, is a losing proposition.
Another Scott
@Barbara:
Bingo. The media wants a horse race and panicked clicking to see what’s new.
Eyes on the prizes.
Cheers,
Scott.
BellyCat
Biden, weakly, pursued good faith argument.
Trump, vigorously, pursued bad faith argument.
The results are TBD.
dimmsdale
@cain: Mehdi Hasan wrote a whole book about how to do that. Biden’s preppers evidently don’t read, though.
Chris
@TeezySkeezy:
Yeah, the “well this didn’t change anyone’s mind” comments have big rationalizing energy. Of course the debates matter. Everything matters. Voters at the margin are influenced by this kind of thing; it’s why the Valley Forge and State of the Union speeches mattered in the other direction.
Leto
@hrprogressive: listening to these people, I’m surprised they can breathe without aid. Much less get dressed, or walk, or…
cain
@Chief Oshkosh:
They needed to prep him like “PeeWee Herman” “I know you are, but what am I?” – the whole thing should be around being entertaining – you’re going against an entertainer.
I have a strong belief that the preppers are people over the age of 55.
Frankensteinbeck
@Eolirin:
YUP. It’s the giant issue that the national press really wants to pretend doesn’t exist and has no power, and yet their attempts to wish Dobbs into the memory hole have been failing hard. I’ll be surprised if you hear much about what a gigantic blunder that was for Trump on the news, but it was.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
My parents apparently don’t think Biden finished up strong towards the end.
When I said I thought this, I just got a long silence from them. Then I get this:
“It’s CNN! Most of the people on the panel are for Biden and they said somebody should go and talk to him about stepping down”.
“They’re talking head idiots who only focus on the “optics”. CNN isn’t trustworthy anymore since being bought by a right-winger.”
“Well, we’ll see how it shakes out in the morning”
Gah! It pisses me off
Soprano2
@catclub: That’s why I wish Biden had pointed out what he says he wants to do.
cain
@gene108: We’ll agree to disagree. Look at your 24 hour news show, all they care about is the optics. Nobody gives a shit about the accomplishments – it’s certainly not being explained by the media.
These debates are about optics. The entire threads on this debate this evening on this blog has only been about optics.
hrprogressive
@Leto:
Yeah, honestly, these four people are a microcosm of what’s wrong with this country.
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
@Geminid: Probably wouldn’t be any left if they didn’t.
RaflW
@SenyorDave: To Eolirin’s point below yours, “everyone wanted Roe v Wade overturned” is some pretty weird and crazy shit.
Not ‘shark or electrocution’ weird, but pulled out of some fantasy view of the United States that is utterly at odds with reality. Like, not a lie. Not even a whopper. Totally ungrounded
And we cannot expect the press to care. So every talking hed that wants Biden to win should be hammering Trump for it. Use paid ads to clip Trump saying this.
dnfree
@Grover Gardner: That’s what we thought. Biden looked like someone who might not make it through the rest of this term, let alone another four years. He looked frail and feeble. Not of the time his mouth was hanging open a little and that made him look not quite with it. I would like to be wrong, but I expected Trump to be the more feeble-looking, and he was not.
The panel afterwards was describing candidates in downballot races as being concerned about coattails.
Afterwards they were saying Joe had a cold but not Covid; I think they may have overmedicated him.
Heck, I’m Trump’s age, and if I’m thinking Joe doesn’t look like someone who could do another term, what are younger voters thinking?
YES I’ll still vote for him, but this was discouraging. Very much so.
cmorenc
Honestly, at best Biden did not help himself tonight. Trump lied his ass off, and Biden too often stumbled trying to call Trump on it. Trump did not grow his voter base tonight – but honestly, neither did Biden’s performance likely tip many stil-persuadable voters. The election is going to be decided by whether enough still-persuadable voters are more concerned which is the worse of two problematic choices – Biden the shaky grandpa vs Trump the crazy uncle, and that enough of them choose Biden over Trump’s repulsiveness rather than staying home vs a 3p candidate. Just enough of them chose 3p in 2000 and 2016 to tip close elections to the GOP.
Captain C
From this article on Digby comes a good ad with a theme that should be hammered home, that TCFG is a “convicted criminal who’s only out for himself.” Straight from the campaign.
Soprano2
I wish, when they were talking about why they were running, that Biden had said “You’re running to stay out of jail and so you can pardon yourself.” Make him deny it. Biden was too nice.
gene108
@Skippy-san:
The only time the EC ever worked as intended were in the elections of 1788 and 1792, when Washington won unanimously won the EC.
In 1796, Adams and Jefferson were running against each other. They tried to organized their voters so Jefferson and Adams respective choices for VP, Aaron Burr and Thomas Pinckney, would be second, ie Jefferson wanted the most EC votes and wanted Burr to have the second most. Same with Adams and Pinckney.
The end result was Adams winning the EC and Jefferson finishing second.
As VP, Jefferson left Washington for Virginia, where he spent the latter of half of his term in office assiduously writing articles for pro-Jefferson news papers he controlled under pseudonyms and generally undermining President Adams, so Jefferson could win in 1800.
The 12th Amendment sort of settled things down a bit until the election of 1824. Neither John Quincy Adams nor Andrew Jackson received the majority of electoral votes, so the election was decided by the House of Representatives.
This made the Jackson people very angry, as more people voted for Jackson than Adams.
There’s also 1880, when Benjamin Harrison lost the popular but beat incumbent President Grover Cleveland in the EC.
Than the EC lay dormant throughout the 20th century, only waking up at the start of the new millennium to make a mess of things.
Jackie
I have a feeling I’m going to be staying off BJ and the internets a few days for my sanity’s sake.
The adage that Democrats always wring their hands in despair is front and center here tonight.
Archon
@cain: In representative forms of government optics matter and its been that way for 2500 years.
After the terrible beginning Biden was ok but he looked and sounded like a very old man, even older then his age.
I wish it didn’t matter, especially in an election where American democracy is on the line, but it does.
cain
I would like to leave you all with this thought.
The person who won the first debate has never won the presidency in the past 10 years.
Damien
Wow, I pop in here and find everybody crying in their beer. Look, Biden is old and had a worse debate performance than we were all hoping.
Okay?
He’s still the best president of my lifetime, and I’m still gonna wake up tomorrow and get back in the fight.
munira
I just gave Biden some money. To the media, this is just a game. They don’t care about content. I think it would be interesting if Biden had a good fund-raising night.
cain
@Archon:
The American public have short memories. Honestly by Nov I couldn’t remember anything that happened in the debates prior.
O. Felix Culpa
I honestly expected Joe to come out strong and swinging. Looking and acting confident and presidential. When Ms.O expressed concern before the debate, I said he’s got this. Which is why I was so shocked during the opening. His performance was the opposite of what I expected. He came across weak, flustered and rambling. His prep team did a shit job with their strategy for dealing with the predictable firehose of lies. And sorry, optics do matter, whether we think they should or not.
I’m glad to hear that Biden got stronger as the not-a-debate event went on. It sounds like the Felon provided some choice clips for future attack ads. All is not lost. We can still win this thing, and I’ll do my best to aid in that effort. But I’m not going to pretend this was a triumph for our side. It wasn’t. And tomorrow we rise to fight again.
hrprogressive
VP Harris making a good case about the strength of what Biden has done and the damage the stolen scotus has done.
She talked about “Trump Abortion Bans” and noted that Biden “has been clear where he stands and that was reinforced tonight”.
Not as good as Newsome IMO, but it’s good.
It’d help if msnbc would stop running shitty chryons about all the panicking dem consultant class claiming “Biden can’t win”.
MobiusKlein
My dad says Biden did well, so I’ll take that as my answer.
West of the Rockies
Mediaite is a shitstorm of supposed (and some real) Democratic panic & Joe Must Go stories. Almost nothing about Trump’s lies.
F them.
Soprano2
@hrprogressive: I can’t believe they can’t keep that to themselves. I think it’s all the people who didn’t want Biden in the first place. It’s dumb to sabotage yourself. Talk about how almost everything TCFG said was a lie.
Another Scott
https://nitter.poast.org/bidenhq has some good clips up already.
Cheers,
Scott.
Quinerly
@Ivan X:
well said. I have nothing to add.
Watch out for Jackel Bobby Thomson. He’ll call you “Ivan.” 😎
Geminid
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Jim Foolish Literalist has been scarce here lately. He wasn’t commenting much last year either. I wonder about James E. Powell too. Roger Moore hasn’t been around either, at keast not since October.
hrprogressive
@Soprano2:
I think, msnbc like every other media outlet not already 100% in the tank for Fascism, has to have their “horse race” like it’s oxygen. So of course spinning the bad news is gonna drive clicks and eyeballs, unfortunately.
Quinerly
@O. Felix Culpa: 🧡💛💚💙
Quinerly
@Geminid:
A lot of the old nyms are MIA.
Chris
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, this, more than anything else in American politics, is what’s killing liberals. The fact that anybody believes, even after 2016, that anybody on a mainstream media panel is “for” a Democrat is absolutely batshit insane, but it leads to precisely this result: CNN, NPR, the New York Times, can say absolutely anything negative about any Democrat and the response even from most liberals is “wow, this must be really bad if even CNN is saying it!” Meanwhile, on the rare occasions they say anything bad about Republicans, it’s dismissed as “well, of course they’re going to say that. They’re The Liberal Media.”
I have no idea how to kill the myth of The Liberal Media. I really don’t. The myth of The Liberal Courts seems to have finally died after Dobbs, but I can’t even fathom what kind of equivalent would be required to pull people’s heads out of their asses (if only liberals‘ heads, FFS).
wjca
Quick summary from reading these threads:
There were a few voices of sanity, but they were pretty much drowned out.
I’m new around here. But I gotta ask: is it routinely like this? Because I shudder to think what election nights must be like, with any and every less than perfect early returns causing total freak out.
Jay
So here, in BC, we are going into another election year, probably.
For decades, it was always the NDP vs the Social Credit Party.
The Social Credit Party eventually became the BC Liberal Party, (hint, not Liberal with25% more crazy than the Socreds).
After the Libs blew up, they were split between the BC Conservatives and BC United.
The NDP were first out of the gate with an attack ad, targeting both Leaders of both Parties. They simply pointed out that both were Minister’s in Christie Clark’s Liberal Government and what they had trashed and burned.
In the Debate, The Felon just wrote 1,000 attack ads against himself.
Quinerly
Claire McCaskill on Biden in the debate: “people feel like we are confronting a crisis.”
gene108
@cain:
Re-read my comment. I’m agreeing with you. I think pounding Trump’s innumerable negatives so the populace does not forget is the way to win.
I think some people really want the Biden campaign to highlight all the great things he’s done, and too much negativity can turn off our voters or something like that. I don’t agree with them.
It hit me just now, during this thread, why negative partisanship is so effective over talk on policy. Most people’s lives really do not change that much from one election to the next.
The USA has set up a system where things still run smoothly, even though the people in charge change every few years.
Getting people emotionally invested against a candidate is the only real way to get them to understand the stakes in an election.
Odie Hugh Manatee
Biden has my vote as long as he is breathing and on the ballot. That’s all I have to say about it.
Chris
@wjca:
Oh, this isn’t bad. You should go to LGM if you wanna see bad. The big cheese literally just put up a new post on how Biden should have been a one termer because he’s old.
Martin
I think the 2 second analysis is this: Biden needed to not look like an 81 year old man and absolutely looked like an 81 year old man.
That was the lens through which everyone observed this, whether his answers were good or not.
gsp
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch:
I don’t know, that wasn’t losing a debate, that was an aging grandpa who we’d be taking the keys away from and yet he is the person with the nuclear codes.
There is no spin doctoring this one.
Glyph2112
I just don’t get it. Everyone knows both of these guys. In what world does someone say that a bad debate performance by Joe Biden sinks him but a felony conviction for Trump is ok? Of the 81 million people who voted for Biden how many will now vote for Trump because Biden looked old tonight? How many women will give up their rights annd vote for Trump because Biden looked pale? Anyone who follows politics knows what is at stake and this doesn’t change anyone’s mind. And the low information voter is not paying attention in June and probably doesn’t listen to talking heads so this won’t change any minds.
Tazj
@debit: Yes, I saw a clip from his rally after the debate and he looked and sounded a lot better.Either it’s the crowd or as some are saying his was given bad advice before the debate to not be too aggressive. For example, no spiking the ball about the economy. Maybe too much prep about numbers and being calm and to not appear too angry. It looks like he just needs to be himself.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Geminid:
James E Powell, that’s another regular I haven’t seen in awhile and had been wondering about. I actually couldn’t recall the nym until you mentioned it. I didn’t noticed tbh that JFL had been posting less last year. Nor Roger Moore.
It saddens me to see regulars, who often had a fairly positive outlook, disappear
It is normal though to see people dip out after awhile. They move on and just lose interest. I remember when Mnemosyne was a regular too until I think 2020 or so. She popped back in briefly in 2022 and then disappeared again. I remember a lot of these people from when I began lurking here back in like 2011 or 2012
Geminid
@Quinerly: That was weird. Thompson’s an occasional commenter. From what I remember of him, his slams at you were uncharacteristic. But some people really got rattled by this debate, especially the beginning; it was like there was a double full moon or something. That’s no excuse for lashing out at you though.
Eolirin
@wjca: It wasn’t like this here until after 2016.
strange visitor (from another planet)
THIS (but it’s 34…so far).
(and nominated for tag!)
gene108
@Glyph2112:
Most voters don’t follow politics.
They follow the “thing(s)” that interest them like sports, knitting, Taylor Swift, etc.
gsp
@O. Felix Culpa:
OFC, it wasn’t a prep thing. He’s 81 and clearly in cognitive decline. It is simply to the point where he should not be the president in my opinion. I have no plan B but he shouldn’t be running the country. It’s unfair to ask him to.
Philbert
I wonder if the microphone cutoff backfired and kept T from babbling nonsense on and on.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Chris:
I tried to communicate that with them, basically. Didn’t get through, I think
piratedan
This debate will, in the minds of the political media, be all about optics. The part the political media fails to understand is that THIS election is about how to govern ourselves. NOT about their perceptions, their feels, their takes.
Trump – felon, rapist, liar, cheat, nazi
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@gsp:
No, he’s not. Dude got rattled by Trump’s gish gallop, has a cold, but came back stronger as the debate went. But Trump isn’t in cognitive decline?
Tazj
@Glyph2112: Agree.
gene108
@gsp:
Biden’s not in cognitive decline.
He’s had a life long problem with stuttering. His problems in this debate were his stutter getting the better of him.
His debate performance was bad, in large part due to his trouble with stuttering.
oldgold
What are the chances Biden steps aside? 33%?
If so, what are the chances Harris replaces him? 50%.
If not Harris, who?
O. Felix Culpa
@Eolirin: Interesting observation. Although I recall roller-coaster discussions and high emotions as the ACA was in the sausage-making stage. Still, 2016 was a unique shock, and the ensuing four years traumatic.
There’s a lot at stake in the upcoming election, so it’s not surprising that people are on edge.
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
I’ve seen the coverage of these “debates” since Ford/Carter in 1976, and the thing that is consistent over the years is that the post debate hot takes are usually wrong. It takes a few days for things to sort out.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@O. Felix Culpa:
Do you remember what the 2012 election night was like here? I was lurking then, but I don’t generally remember that particular night well
Tazj
Well there is this. Univision ‘s survey of undecided Latino voters went overwhelmingly for Biden.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Tazj:
Well, that’s something I guess
gene108
@piratedan:
Every presidential debate in my lifetime has always been about optics. No one cares about substance. Things don’t change that much for most people from one administration to the next.
The difference in what might’ve been only pops out during a crisis like 9/11 or COVID.
Running for President is a popularity contest.
Juju
@Damien: 💜
strange visitor (from another planet)
@oldgold: barring a serious health complication, the percentage is zero.
O. Felix Culpa
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): To be honest, I don’t remember the tone of 2012 election night discussions here. We won, though. :)
wjca
Glad you acknowledge that there’s no plan B. Because even if Biden were in cognitive decline (for which there is no evidence, let alone it being “clear”) the only options today are Trump and Biden.
If you persist in talking up “Biden in cognitive decline” you are just helping Trump. Whether you can admit it to yourself or not.
Quinerly
@Geminid: bizarre.
If I recall correctly, he lives in Florida. I think he had (still has???) a blog.
3Sice
@Tazj:
CNNs flash poll was a push.
Elizabelle
@wjca: I know. I cannot be more pleased to have missed the whole debate.
Also want to point out: folks: you know how some of you (used to) look in on Red State and some of the protoMAGA blogs, and laugh at any hysteria over a bad turn of events there?
Well, you sure have put out a lovely meal for them with this thread.
Eyes on the prize. (Who says that here? Is it Another Scott?)
But you guys be you.
Barbara
@wjca: I don’t recall seeing this nym previously. Like a few others this evening.
Chris
@oldgold:
Hopefully, the chances are zero. It would be a disaster, and the media knows it, which is why they’ve been pushing so hard for four years to make it happen.
O. Felix Culpa
@Quinerly: I think you might mean Bobby Mustang. He still pops in occasionally.
3Sice
@Barbara:
They are out in force tonight pushing narrative.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@gsp:
Awful loud, arentcha? Emphasis on “awful”, mind you. Now who are you and why should I care about your opinion?
Elizabelle
@Barbara: Truly. Looked at gsp’s comment and thought “thank you, Senator McConnell. How nice of you to look in on us.”
cain
@wjca: Yep. You should have seen 2012 – same threads, same shit.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Yes.
wjca
@oldgold:
You’re saying that you think there’s 1 chance in 3 that Biden suffers a major negative (but non-fatal) health event? Seriously? Because that’s the only way he steps aside. I am not a medical professional, but that number is way high.
You honestly think anybody else could put together a viable campaign at this point? If Biden is no longer the candidate, the chances of Harris being the candidate (even if she hasn’t step into the office already) are basically 100%.
EDT strange visitor (from another planet) got there first.
cain
Tom NIchols had the best comment:
“If there’s a lesson coming out of this #debate, it’s let Biden be Biden and don’t try to turn him into a policy wonk.”
also from “Jasmine Crockett’s Anger Translator”
“Twitter is not real life. Otherwise, Jamaal Bowman would have won his primary on Tuesday.”
“
ArchTeryx
@Barbara: Every bad night for Democrats you will get new nyms – mostly right wing trolls and other assorted peanut gallery frauds – trying their best to fan the flames of despair. It never fails, and it always gets more intense the closer to a major election we get.
Despairing people don’t volunteer or vote. And that’s the entire point – deflate the most dedicated supporters. During a night like this, it’s all too easy to do.
Dog Dawg Damn
This was a disaster for Biden.
Trump pulling out would have been better for us. Just watching it and seeing Biden hand him the mic every time. Abortion! Biden talks about an illegal immigrant raping a girl. Wtaf? Just bizarre.
Chris
@wjca:
Jumping off of this, the biggest damage after tonight won’t be the debate. (There was no “please proceed, Governor” zinger on either side). It’ll be from various Democrats telling their contacts in the media how freaked out they are and how maybe Biden should step down. Rich “Democrats in disarray” fodder, even though most will just be former staffers and the like and not elected politicians.
Hopefully, not enough to matter.
eclare
@cain:
Mee-ouch!
wjca
@Barbara: Wandered in earlier this year.
cain
Newsom had a great response:
https://twitter.com/AdamParkhomenko/status/1806534564002607570
Elizabelle
Gotta turn in, really early morning, but putting up this twitter link to a Magdi Jacobs comment. Uncle Ebeneezer linked to it on the previous thread (comment 12).
cain
@Chris:
I agree, the biggest danger is from our own side.
Ruckus
@EarthWindFire:
In the meantime, best thing Democrats can do is stop panicking and move on. Joe Biden is not the only winning presidential candidate who has had a bad debate.
I believe that Joe Biden will still be a good president and he has someone behind him that can help and support him reasonably – VP Kamala Harris. And besides my dog would be a better president than SFB and the dog has been dead for nearly a decade. SFB is, and has been going downhill with senioritis for some time and his accelerator is stuck, his decline is not going to get better, only worse and faster. Joe Biden is old, yes. But his decline is a hell of a lot less and a hell of a lot slower and a hell of a lot less of a bumpy road than SFB’s. And who would be SFB’S VP? Any one actually able to do the job if necessary? Yeah I didn’t think so, because that would show up SFB. (That’s Shit For Brains if anyone is questioning)
And if anyone asks me how I really know any of this, I will be 75 yrs old rather soon. I’m not far behind either of them in age. And I know people a fair bit older than Joe Biden who are all there. He is good, he knows the job, has a very strong backup. FDR did the presidency in a wheel chair and did a pretty good job. I say, ask yourself how are YOU doing financially? OK, pretty good, bad, great, horribly? I’m retired and not doing bad. Yes I worked into my 70s and that helped quite a bit. There will always be people in a better financial position and people in a worse financial position.
Juju
@Jay: Trump created an attack ad against himself just about every time he opened his mouth
Aussie Sheila
@hrprogressive:
Exactly. Eyes on the prize. It’s your summer holidays now. People won’t remember this come Autumn. In the meantime flog the local (county/district) organising.
CNN played this for clicks. The moderators performance was terrible, but honestly it’s not their job to fact check. It was Biden’s advisors’ jobs to properly analyse the terrain. They failed.
I’m still very bullish about the November election, because I’m certain there’s a lot more organising under the bonnet than anyone knows.
Soprano2
@gene108: Sadly I agree with this.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@Aussie Sheila: no. the “moderators” didn’t moderate. it’s not their job to say, “bullshit, it’s not fucking raining out!”?!? then what the fuck is the job? doormat?
Ruckus
@catclub:
Where is Trump living?
In his own twisted, shitty head. He always has been and that ain’t changing any time soon, as in – not getting any better whatsoever.
SFB’s world is in that shitty head, likely sounds like 27 angry cats having a fight and nothing is normal in any way, shape or form in there.
Glyph2112
@gene108. Exactly, most people don’t follow politics so this debate won’t even register. Not to mention the Trump clown show has been going on for almost 10 years. There was nothing new in the “optics” tonight. I believe this election will come down to policies like Roe vs Wade, actual real life consequences of one’s vote. Republicans are telling everyone what they are going to do with women’s rights, punishing doctors, deporting millions, mandating bibles in school, etc. I say again, who is willing to give up their rights because Biden looked tired. I am an old and can’t remember a starker contrast in the direction this country will take depending on who wins.
Cole had it right years ago with his asbestos analogy.
Quinerly
@O. Felix Culpa: I guess I am confusing the Bobbys. Thanks!
Unrelated…now that you are in Albuquerque, have you been to Scarpa’s on Academy? I am totally hooked on that hot bacon bleu salad.
Cacti
Biden looked and sounded like a doddering old fossil.
O. Felix Culpa
@strange visitor (from another planet): CNN announced before the “debate” that the moderators would not fact check.
O. Felix Culpa
@Quinerly: Thanks for the reminder! Haven’t been there yet.
cain
I disagree, it’s not the moderator’s job to call out Trump’s lies. The debate is between Joe and Trump. It’s Biden’s job to call it out – he wasn’t prepped for that. That’s not how debate works.
Biden was not prepped for this. But it’s fine. We’re going to keep going.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@O. Felix Culpa: yah. then seriously, they’re not “moderating’. if not factchecking was a constraint that tapper and bash were put under by cnn, they should fucking resign tomorrow
@cain: bullshit. sooo if derp furor told them that marge’s jew space lasers will end the war in ukraine the day after he becomes the day one dictator, they shouldn’t fucking CHALLENGE that?!?!
Jay
@Aussie Sheila:
Absent having actual Moderators and a large team of fact checkers, with the Moderator commenting 3rd, there is no counter to the gish gallop in a debate in real time.
All that can be done, is disassembly afterwards, which various bloggers will do tomorrow, but the Media won’t touch it with a 12 foot pole.
Ruckus
@Anne Laurie:
that he shows up for the second debate prepped to do nothing but mock TFG’s bottomless neediness and dishonesty
I think Joe Biden is better than that and even if it is what SFB deserves Joe shouldn’t do it. I’ve always felt that staying above the shit level (a shit level is a playground for political adults when dealing with shitty humans looking to screw over an entire nation).
Chet Murthy
@Aussie Sheila:
Two thoughts:
If the CNN moderators aren’t going to fact-check, then they’ve set up a spectacle: for *entertainment* and not for education or informing people. Now a fair point is that if this was the only debate on offer, then Biden accepted it, full well knowing that he’d be facing this onslaught of lies.
But we shouldn’t absolve the Constitutionally Protected Fourth Estate when they decide that they’re not going to actually perform their function — the function for which they were given special protections in our founding document.
Chris
@wjca:
The thing everybody’s dancing around is that there is simply no way for a president, certainly not a Democratic president, to step down after only one term, and not have it read everywhere as an admission that their presidency has been a failure and they’re so scared of defending their record that they’re not even willing to run again. None. People can fantasize all the Aaron Sorkin crap they want about noble politicians patriotically serving and then retiring with honor and like Cincinnatus. Politics don’t work that way in the real world. Not when low information voters see the entire thing in pro wrestling terms, and not when the media relentlessly pushes every narrative they can find that they think will hurt the Democrats.
And that means whoever has to step up and run in their place is instantly stuck with an even bigger problem. Every single question they’re asked, every time they go out in public, from now until election day is going to be about Joe Biden’s Failed Presidency. And there’s simply no good way to answer them. If you try to embrace Joe Biden’s record, you’re simply tarred with the loser stink by association of a man who shouldn’t have run for office. If you try to distance yourself from Joe Biden’s record, you’re going to end up pissing off various Democrats. And no matter what you do, you’re stuck with the fact that the average low-info is thinking, man, if Biden had to step down, why should I want Biden lite? I’m going to go for the real change, the other guy over there.
There’s no way to do this that isn’t a disaster. If Biden were assassinated, and/or so severely damaged by an attempt that he could reasonably not run, that might actually boost the party’s chances. Anything short of that, and it’s a disaster.
Jay
@strange visitor (from another planet):
Their only job was to ask the questions and control the mikes. That was the agreed terms.
Juju
@Quinerly: I made the same mistake you did, and he wasn’t even criticizing me.
Aussie Sheila
@strange visitor (from another planet):
He and his team agreed to CNN hosting the debate. First bad decision. CNN is a business. It’s not a public service, unfortunately. I can’t stand either of the two moderators. Like most US TV ‘journalists’, they are stuffed to the gills with their own self importance.
Biden will be fine in the campaign, as will the surrogates and Harris. TV debates are highly overrated, except as a means of giving Dem partisans heart attacks and strokes.
I’m not worried about Biden, but I do think his advisors need changing. They misjudged what was required. They knew he would be facing a gish gallop of lies and that CNN moderators wouldn’t pause to correct them. They should have planned accordingly.
They didn’t .
Glyph2112
@Cacti: ok, so are you voting for Trump now? Apparently he came across as the strong leader we need?
It is amazing that Trump can toss the word salad and lie to no end but somehow he gets a pass.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@Jay: and yet they didn’t control the mikes. they let fiberache off the hook over and over again. every time they got a non-answer, a tirade, a lie-fest, they should’ve asked the same question, over and over and over again.
for the most part, they let him steamroll them.
Gloria DryGarden
@Ruckus: they go low, we go high.
I agree.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@Aussie Sheila: yes. the debates never should’ve been taken out of the hands of the league of women voters.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Yes, this, the rest of you don’t get that all Biden had to do was get Trump to just get talking like and idiot, which he did.
Prometheus Shrugged
I had to turn it off–couldn’t take it any longer–but I do have to wonder about the debate prep team. The totally obvious answer on abortion is to point to Trump and say that he is exhibit 1 A for why the government and even ordinary voting citizens can’t have anything to do with a woman’s basic right to bodily autonomy. The idea that Trump–adjudicated rapist, serial adulterer, and “grab ’em by the privates” guy–would have any vote, in any capacity, on women’s health issues, should be galling to everyone.
Dog Dawg Damn
Donald Trump looked nice tonight. He looked magnanimous. He wasn’t mean to the old man. That’s how bad this was. Joe Biden made Trump look decent.
cain
@strange visitor (from another planet):
Nope. But realize that there is a thinking audience out there – black twitter has already grabbed on the “black jobs” quip. Spouting bullshit has consequences. He’s pissed off black and women voters – but CNN is only going to focus on the “Joe looks weak” because you all are still playing by an old playbook.
If moderators got in on everything Trump said, there would be no debate, it would be the moderators vs Trump. It’s Joe’s job to deal with Trump’s lies. He failed at it. That’s ok. We will carry on -and we will win.
Quinerly
@Juju: I don’t recall this Bobby T. I was just assuming it was the Bobby who lived in Florida…and that had driven him off his rocker.
I don’t know about the later threads but on that thread Watergirl mentioned that she had not approved anyone with a first post. So everyone had commented at some point prior. Not a huge rush of trolls.
You still in Pitt County? I miss my old stomping grounds.
cain
Yes, that worked really well for Hillary didn’t it? When we they go low, we show no mercy and fuck their shit up and show who really knows how to grapple in the dirt.
Ruckus
I used to work in professional sports and one of the things that is part of that is rules enforcement. A presidential debate is just a different kind of competition and the rules are you do your best and let the other guy do his worst.
Would the “debate” be better if there were stronger rules, because for sure one side of this one does not play by the rules, really in most ways. SFB is not trying to win, he is trying to eliminate his opponent. That’s not playing by the rules. But then rules are not made for him, he is above the rules, just ask him….
strange visitor (from another planet)
@cain: fine. then don’t call them “moderators”, bc that’s not what they did.
i feel that their job maybe SHOULD’VE been to get donny nappleseed to answer their questions. if he didn’t answer, ask again. and again. otherwise, why were they there? why have highly paid “journalists” instead of cue cards?
eta- he’s lying to THEM, right to their fucking faces!! don’t they have any goddamn pride?!?
cain
@Prometheus Shrugged:
Yes! Exactly!
Quinerly
@O. Felix Culpa: very good pizza. It’s been my go to place when I go into Albuquerque for Costco. I also like a neat lunch place named Coffee and Cheese.
And, of course, Padilla’s. Love Padilla’s.
Aussie Sheila
@strange visitor (from another planet):
Well I’m not sure about the LoWVs, but I sure as hell would never have agreed to CNN hosting it. However his advisors did agree to CNN and they badly misjudged what needed to be done on the night.
Biden wasn’t very good imo during the primaries. I thought he was too old then, with a tendency to stutter and blather.
He’s older now.
But he won in 2020 and I like his chances in 2024. Provided everyone stops panicking and puts in the work.
ColoradoGuy
Remember the “Dean Scream” that sank his campaign? Turned out his mic was turned way up to drown out the crowd. The network TV mic was not the same as the local PA mic, which was NOT turned all the way up. So a technical error (if it was an error) became a campaign-ending event.
I suspect (but do not know) the reverse happened tonight. The high frequencies on Biden’s mic was turned down relative to Trump’s mic (making it sound softer and duller), and the overall level was also down about 1~2 dB. I wouldn’t put it past CNN to pull a stunt like this, since we know the networks dearly love a horserace.
Note how the sound quality was radically different at the viewing party, with Biden’s voice, although quieter, was more clearly audible.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@Aussie Sheila: wait, the primaries in 2020?!? where he was the best debater on a crowded stage?
@cain: ok, so we agree that the “moderators” failed?
cain
@strange visitor (from another planet):
Their job is to give each candidate their fair share of time. The other job is to make sure they answer the question reasonably. That’s where they failed because Trump didn’t bother answering anything – GOP candidates just do whatever they want – the man is a narcissist. Of course, he’s going to do whatever he wants.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Dog Dawg Damn:
Got hold of some bad acid, eh? Don’t worry, the hallucinations will stop soon and you’ll be back to your ol’ Trumphumping self in no time!
You did make me laugh though so thanks for that.
Citizen Alan
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
I will literally vote for dead Biden manipulated on wires like in Weekend at Bernies over Trump or indeed any Republican alive.
janesays
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: Along those lines, Dubya was widely viewed to have lost the first debate to Kerry quite badly, and he did. But it didn’t cost him the election (unfortunately).
This whole night was kind of infuriating and pointless, but I’m not sure how much impact it will have on the election, because I’m not sure debates really matter at all in the end.
Steve Crickmore
The Democrats with maybe the best of intentions- to cosset an aging Biden- particularly their insistence on muting Trump’s microphone, resulted in the worst of all outcomes that doomed Biden’s performance and perhaps now his campaign, since perception is all in American politics. He really needs a live audience- he used to do well in town halls, and this format eliminated Trump’s propensity to constantly interrupt Biden, which cost Trump heavily in the first debate in Cleveland in 2020 with Chris Wallace as moderator. Tonight with no threat of Trump interrupting him, Biden kept losing his train of thought and had trouble finishing sentences properly on his own. He has trouble articulating memorized phrases. He is much better and authentic at the quick short sincere rebuttal.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@Citizen Alan: remember, iirc, mel carnahan beat the odious john aschcroft despite having been dead for quite some time.
…and biden ain’t dead yet.
Citizen Alan
@cain: We really should just let AI moderate the next debate. I feel certain we could have told an AI to (1) generate a list of about 30-40 questions about political current events appropriate to a presidential debate and (2) if the answer does seem to be responsive to the question, have it say “I’m sorry, that doesn’t seem to answer the question. I’ll repeat it.” that would have been better than any person presently working in the MSM.
Ruckus
Look folks, Joe Biden is an old.
Look folks, donald jack shit is an old
Joe Biden is in far better mental health than sfb.
djt is 3 yrs younger than JB and is a shitty, nasty, useless mass of human shit.
This is who we have, Joe Biden with Kamala Harris as VP or SFB and some absolute nobody for VP.
Joe Biden has been a not bad president. FAR, FAR, FAR better than SFB ever did in his term.
IOW we could do far worse than Joe Biden. He’s here, he knows the job, he’s done a decent job and his VP is good and could fill in for him without a missed step. Now I know that I’m not all that far behind him in age so I’m not jumping up and down that we NEED him but the reality is that this is where we are. It’s Joe Biden with Harris as VP or ShitForBrains and someone far likely worse than him as VP.
I’ll mark that box for Joe and Kamala without any hesitation.
cain
@ColoradoGuy:
If so, Biden and the Democratic Party can simply refuse to participate in any CNN event and encourage the rest of not to watch if it turns out that is what they did.
Fuck around and find out. CNN thrives on both parties showing up. Happy not to show up, but also threaten any Democratic person who shows up on CNN that they will lose access.
Omnes Omnibus
Christ, what a mistake I made reading through this thread.
cain
@Ruckus:
I think one thing we need to also come to grips with is that is Don really mentally on the decline? He seems to be his usual self here.
It would not surprise me that while he has accused Biden of taking drugs – that he’s done it himself. Every accusation is a confession. The man probably has taken something.
cain
@Omnes Omnibus:
lol – we’ll recover. A lot of folks need therapy right now.
cain
@Citizen Alan:
We’d never get past the first question and everyone would turn the whole thing off. I mean, that’s fine with me – I did not watch the debate to begin with.
Glyph2112
I think too many people are trying to analyze tonight like it was the Kennedy Nixon debate. The thing is, campaigning and messaging has completely changed in the last 15 or so years. Does anyone think a large amount of 20ish year olds watched this live? A lot of people will get their information from social media clips. Will Biden look bad? Probably, but there will be a ton of clips with Trump looking stupid. I would say old and tired beats racist and bat shit crazy any day. (Is bat shit one word or two?)
Jay
@strange visitor (from another planet):
Agreed rules were:
-ask question
-2 minutes
No requirement to actually answer the question or use of a mic drop to cut the gish gallop.
The “debate” wasn’t a debate, it was clickbait.
Aussie Sheila
@strange visitor (from another planet):
My mistake. It was 2019 of course. Biden wasn’t the best debater on that stage. At all.
However he won the Primary votes, and that’s what counts. He won the general election in 2020 and that’s what counts.
I’m certain he and Harris will win in November and that’s what will count. Not 90 minutes with a couple of self important TV journalists four months before the election.
Odie Hugh Manatee
Seeing some new nyms proclaiming that it’s over and that Biden was a disaster. Keep spreading that opinion and I’m sure that the news will pick up and run with it. Nobody can kneecap a Democrat like another Democrat (or the ratfucker equivalent). Like I’ve said before, the party needs to ask Tonya Harding if she would like to represent the party by allowing them to use her likeness in place of the donkey.
I never would have debated the fucker. I would never be able to shake his hand nor do I respect him in any way because he’s a major piece of shit in every single possible way. I would have laughed at the idea, dismissed it as an insult to the office to debate a criminal serial liar and philanderer. Then follow that up with ridiculing the MAGA party for going all in for a racist, misogynistic serial liar who’s also a convicted felon.
As it is Biden wasted his time and it’s time to get back to winning this fall. For those in a panic about this, consider voting Trump or shut up and vote this fall, Stop being whiny bitches.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@Aussie Sheila: i disagree. i was on team kamala. she eviscerated barr and sessions in congressional hearings and was just disarmed by biden. i didn’t think warren (who gutted bloomberg) or mayor pete landed a glove on him either and sanders was in blowhard, finger-point, shouty-grandpa mode.
i thought biden proved his mettle (again) in those primary debates.
wjca
Assumes facts not in evidence. Like that those hysterics are, or ever were, Democrats.
Chet Murthy
@strange visitor (from another planet): @Aussie Sheila: I thought it might be worth noting that there’s an important difference between the Dem primary debates, and debates with TCFG: in the former, nobody is spouting a nonstop stream of lies, whereas in the latter, ….
prostratedragon
@Gloria DryGarden: So, when they dive for our ankles we meet with a knee to their head, right?
prostratedragon
VP Harris:
Jay
@prostratedragon:
No, you go high,………..
Throat punch or open palm uppercut to the nose.
wjca
Well, there is something to be said for just stepping firmly on the backs of their heads. Let the ground do the dirty work,
YY_Sima Qian
The way to “debate” Trump is to mock & ridicule him at every turn, at his crimes, his lies, his incompetence, his weaknesses, his vanity, his crassness, & his vulgarity, emasculate him in the eyes of his supporters, much like how Obama skewered him during that WHCD skid.
Biden could be comatose & I would still crawl over broken glass to vote for him & the Ds over Trump & the Rs, just to keep the reactionaries out of power. I don’t need to see the debate tape to know that age is catching up to Biden, that he now often comes off as lethargic & confused, & he was never the most articulate orator (unlike Bill Clinton or Obama). That the two parties’ political machineries served up 2 octogenarians retreads does not bode well of the health of liberal democracy in America, not something I am thrilled about. However, no matter what happens in the debate(s) & through the rest of the campaign season, the choices remain that stark, the stakes remain that high, & the consequences remain that dire.
& I said that as a strong critic of the Biden Administration’s foreign policy & national security agenda across the board, & deeply dismayed that his & his team’s deeply engrained US exceptionalism/primacy thinking has inflamed the Great Power Competition in ways that create fertile domestic soil for nativist/fascist/reactionaries to thrive on, spur on the reactionaries everywhere, undermine the effectiveness of the productive aspects of his domestic agenda (IRA & CHIPS+), & has already slowed the desperate needed green transition to fight AGW.
LadySuzy
@Quinerly: So it was the nerves ?
@gene108: Since he sounded pretty good in the post-debate, I think the stutter problem is because of the intense stress. And if he struggles more with his stutter, it becomes a big obstacle to his expressing his ideas strongly and easily. It can make him lose focus on the content because he is struggling with the delivery. And what about the voice ? People are speculating that it could be a cold, but his voice was much better in the post-debate reunion. So, again, was it stress ? Acid reflux or asthma??
Debates with high stakes must be a nightmare for him. They are extremely stressful for ordinary politicians, but for him it his two times, three times worse because of his handicap. Years ago, he struggled in the beginning of the democratic primaries remember ? Because for the first time in his life he was the front-runner and ALL EYES were on him. I was worried sick for tonight because I just knew that he had to be under a tremendous amount of stress. Extremely high stakes for a specific exercise for which he is specifically weakened by an handicap.
I am not worried though about his stress behind the scenes, while “presidenting”. Not the same kind of stress, not continuous like in a debate, not the same parameters. He certainly has to be careful and pace himself because he is not young, but doing the job of President doesn’t require the very specific type of skill that a debater must exhibit.
That being said, I wish he hadn’t felt the need to run again, but I suspect he did because he didn’t see any other solution. Putting Kamala at the top of the ticket is a hell of a risk because Americans are very probably not ready to elect a black woman ( so frustrating). On the other hand, if Kamala ran , not putting her at the top of the ticket and nominating a white man humiliates, and breaks the heart of a good portion of the democratic base.
Pretty unfortunate circumstances.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@wjca: Thus the mention of ratfuckers! I covered my ass there as I’m sure the ratfuckers are out in force. This blog is effective so it’s going to be a target for takedown by trolls.
wjca
For those looking for a little bright spot, consider:
So, betting on that movement imploding might not be a bad bet. Certainly his track record is remarkably consistent.
Speed the day!
cain
@YY_Sima Qian: ❤️❤️
prostratedragon
@Jay: But if they’re going low, you’d have to reach down for that.
This is not legal in an officiated fight. But not every fight has rules.
Aussie Sheila
@Chet Murthy:
Sure, but that’s my point. His advisors picked the wrong strategy for a debate with a sociopathic convicted felon.
It’s their job to analyse and advise. They failed.
And the Dem primary electorate didn’t select Biden on his debating chops in 2019. They correctly divined he would be the best to beat trump.
They were right.
OGLiberal
I have not been here in a while and I did not watch but my very liberal wife, very liberal best friend and socialist teenage son said it was a shitshow and mostly for Biden. They all acknowledged that Trunp lied his ass off and sounded like shit as well, but Biden seemed old and incomprehensible in comparison. I fear for this nation because a) the media will focus on “old Joe” and, b) voters are stupid. I know debates aren’t supposed to matter much but when the media narrative is mostly “Biden is old” v. “Trump is criminal and insane” (and they spend most of their time on the former) don’t think this helps. Again, did not watch but trust my sources.
I know way too many idiots who will sacrifice freedom and democracy for a few decimal points – if that – off their taxes. That’s how China got their folks to shut up – “yeah, I can’t speak out against this. oppressive government but I have a car.”
In the US, outside of the titans of industry the biggest whiners are “small businesses”. Sorry if I offend some folks but in blue NJ and kind of blue PA the roaling coal, Let’s Go Brandon dicks are almost all electricians, plumbers, carpenters, general contractors, etc. who cheat on their taxes every year using “business expense” loopholes and then bitch about taxes. My tax loopholes are dependents, mortgage and property tax. Can’t lie about that. And most of the idiot Brandon crowd get those as well
This fucking country.
Jay
@LadySuzy:
President Joe Biden wisely decided to run for his second term because:
– incumbents who don’t run basically disavow their term as a failure and knee cap their party,
– and he has only fixed a tiny amount of the stuff that needs fixing, even though he has achieved more than even FDR in a single term.
bjacques
I’m in a foreign speaking land so I woke up briefly to listen to the debate, within the first 15 minutes I think. He gave good answers but seemed rushed and out of breath. If that’s partly due to a bad cold, that’s just shitty luck.
It was an important night, but it’s still just one bad night out of 3-1/2 mostly good years.
By the way, now I’m looking forward to the SCROTUS handing down some shitty decision (insofar as it’s possible to look forward to) to blow away the chatter about the debate.
VFX Lurker
Good call. I just donated $100 to Biden-Harris. Every bit helps.
Jay
@OGLiberal:
It wasn’t a “debate”, it was clickbait.
Most Jr. High Schools know how to run a proper “debate” format, but CNN can’t.
Jay
@prostratedragon:
As we noticed, “rules” did not apply.
Chris T.
Watched the whole thing (more or less) live, with an alarmingly large glass of The Balvenie (the 12 year stuff).
Wish Biden had come out stronger initially, and that the moderators had at least tallied up the number of questions Trump actually answered (almost none of them). It’s kind of a shame that they long ago decided that calling out obvious lies was Not Their Job, but at least “did/didn’t answer question” could get a check mark and a sum-up at the end could be useful.
Doubt anyone’s mind is changed.
Aussie Sheila
@Jay:
But why worry about rules set by the hosting broadcasting medium?
Biden wasn’t prepped properly for this kind of ‘event’. It could never be a debate with a decompensating sociopath like trump.
CNN sold a ‘debate’. Biden’s advisors bought it. More fool them.
Organising between now and November will have more effect than this made for Cable TV idiocy, which is made for money, not for votes.
Biden is great with people, trump is only great with rallies full of his junkies. This fact will count far more as the campaign progresses.
Chris T.
Huh… nothing at all? (Is this thing on?) I thought I’d at least kick off a discussion of proper scotch whisky. But I guess it’s late…
Barbara
@Chris T.: You can’t debate a lying sociopath.
Jay
@Aussie Sheila:
yes,…………but.
The Felon generated over 1,000 ads, memes and tic tocks for the Biden Campaign.
And in 2 weeks, “The Debate” will be memory holed, except for those ads.
With out a proper debate structure, a small army of real time fact checkers and rules enforcement, one cannot “debate” a gish gallop of lies.
As Admiral Ackbar, pointed out, “it’s a tarp”///
A no win situation that is going to be spun by the media to favour “Biden is Old! Elect The Felon! So we don’t have to work for a living!”
They will be the death of us.
tobie
I’ve been in Europe the past 6 months and have made a point of avoiding most American news and especially all horse race stories, but my two cents from afar is that debates don’t really matter any longer and maybe haven’t for a while. Hillary Clinton won all three debates against Trump in terms of substance, style and one-liners and it still made no difference. Joe Biden will need to show vigor in the coming months and if he does, things will turn around.
Aussie Sheila
@Jay:
I think you are synthesising what I’ve been trying to say this whole thread.
Democrats, at least here, seem to lack the partisan vigor necessary to rally supporters and overrun opponents. I’ll never understand the constant palpitations over a candidate who has already won handily over his opponent.
Where it counts.
At the ballot box, not on Cable TV.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Aussie Sheila:
Kind of a bit of difference between the wolves of a fascist movement like our MAGA Republicans and the bunch of cats that are the supporters of our Democratic party.
A bit like the difference between horse piss and mother’s milk.
Chris T.
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
Which of those is the whisky?
Bruce K in ATH-GR
The bastards are trying to get us to lose heart, give up, and not vote, to depress our vote output. It’s the only way they can realistically win. And the media are complicit. I took a look at the FTFNYT front page, and if it had been a physical broadsheet, I’d have lit it on fire, ninety-degree drought conditions be damned.
Subsole
@oldgold:
In order?
0.
100.
No one.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Chris T.:
I have no idea but if you put them in casks, age them for 12 years and then give them both a try, you too can find out for yourself! ;)
Subsole
@Tazj:
Yeah.
Didn’t watch the debate, but what I have seen on soc med was that independents and undecideds were pretty unimpressed with Joe and pretty disgusted with Trump.
Chris T.
@Odie Hugh Manatee: As Shawn Spencer (from Psych) might say, I’ve heard it both ways.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Subsole:
Unimpressed usually beats disgusted. Usually.
@Chris T.:
On the bright side, at least you’re only hearing two voices!
Fading out for a bit. Will tune in later!
Lumpy
If you want to know who is winning a debate, turn off the sound and look at their body language. Some of the commenters think a presidential debate is the same kind of event that school debate teams engage in… no it’s not. A lot of Americans vote on “vibes” they get, they can’t follow politics very closely and they just want a president who can say “I’ve got everything under control”. Biden’s biggest errors were not looking directly into the camera (you’re trying to convince home viewers, not Jake Tapper, stop looking at him when you answer). Biden also looked down way too much, as if he was ashamed by the things Trump was saying. And many times when not talking, Biden’s mouth seemed to be open and slack. He just looked bad, and these avoidable errors were “media training 101” (“look directly at the camera!”) Obviously I’m still voting for Biden and the debate isn’t the end-all and be-all. But it means that the “too old” attack line will continue. And IMO Trump voters have been a little bit subdued lately (less yard signs, for example) and a debate “win” will be good for their morale and might help more of them feel motivated to vote. Nobody wants to vote for a loser (why bother) but if Trump seems to have a real shot at winning, it will help him on election day.
TL;DR – it’s not about the words they say, it’s about the non-verbal cues that home viewers see.
Subsole
@Omnes Omnibus: PTSD is a motherfucker. And we’ve been dealing with it for about a decade now.
Subsole
@Glyph2112:
The American usage is one word. Batshit.
Liminal Owl
We didn’t watch, and my comment might just be stupid. But I can’t help thinking that what is being described as “cognitive decline” (which, btw, doesn’t set in overnight, and we know that Biden has sounded damn good quite recently) sounds exactly like being under the influence of strong antihistamines. Plus the stutter, yes, but that’s no cognitive indicator.
Subsole
@OGLiberal: It’s not all of us. Maybe not most of us. But yeah, it really is depressing how many folks would sacrifice 250 years of hard-won democracy because the Crazy Cruncheezy Quadruple Chalupaduparito costs an extra buck-fifty.
rikyrah
The problem was that the so-called moderators failed to confront or follow up with the Orange Menace and his lies. WTF is a BLACK JOB?
The allowance of the lies about abortion.
They didn’t do shyt, in real time, to confront the obvious lies.😠😠😠
Subsole
@rikyrah:
Yeah. You could literally replace them with an AI and get better performance.
Subsole
@rikyrah:
Shitty min-wage jobs that get no respect. Because those are the only kind of jobs Trump thinks black people are qualified to do.
rikyrah
Matt A. Barreto 🇵🇪 ⚽️ (@realMABarreto) posted at 10:16 PM on Thu, Jun 27, 2024:
If you haven’t been watching the Univision FG of undecided Latino voters, nearly every single undecided voter said they now support Biden, not Trump! Latinos were watching and listening and Trump sounded like a crazy liar. Watch this video clip from @uninot https://t.co/YvCNdHmUSJ
(https://x.com/realMABarreto/status/1806527153388834916?s=02)
rikyrah
Madam Auntie VP Kamala Harris is THEE GOAT! (@flywithkamala) posted at 11:01 PM on Thu, Jun 27, 2024:
How many mics does @VP Harris have tonight? ANOTHER MIC DROP 🫢 https://t.co/XWtRnJBNAs
(https://x.com/flywithkamala/status/1806538370601943061?s=02)
rikyrah
Isis ♓️🔺🐘💜 (@IsisJai) posted at 10:16 PM on Thu, Jun 27, 2024:
CBS journalist just asked Marc Rubio, “What’s a Black Job?”
“You know migrants come in and work at a lower wage.”
Journalist: “So Senator are you saying Black jobs are low wage jobs?”
Senator: *stutters*
He’s fumbling! CLOCKED!!! https://t.co/MvhwXZke4l
(https://x.com/IsisJai/status/1806527018328019359?s=02)
rikyrah
Madam Auntie VP Kamala Harris is THEE GOAT! (@flywithkamala) posted at 10:44 PM on Thu, Jun 27, 2024:
OMG @VP KAMALA HARRIS GAVE ANDERSON THE WORKS TONIGHT 🔥 https://t.co/sHresLFNjE
(https://x.com/flywithkamala/status/1806534164813955412?s=02)
Ramona
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): no guessing about this! If undecided Latino voters are indeed swayed to vote for Biden because of this debate, then that’s a big thing. If this finding is not just an artifact.
rikyrah
Palmer Report (@PalmerReport) posted at 10:01 PM on Thu, Jun 27, 2024:
If you’re sitting there watching MSNBC or CNN after the debate, you’re part of the problem. It was a non-event that won’t win either candidate any votes, so no impact. Yet MSNBC and CNN are making up fear porn to keep you addicted to your doomsday hysteria crackpipe. Turn it off.
(https://x.com/PalmerReport/status/1806523164161085930?s=02)
Bruce K in ATH-GR
I take solace in two things:
Ramona
@Barbara: I don’t recall seeing this nym either. They sound awfully like a troll.
Another Scott
TCFFG ran with his “you just tell them and they believe – they just do” tactic in the debate. He thinks the truth and facts don’t matter. All that matters is getting what he wants.
He recycled the “you won’t have a country any more” rhetoric from January 6. I’m sure that I’m not the only one who noticed.
Biden pushed back hard. There will be more pushback from the campaign. There continues to be pushback from the courts and the juries. I don’t think that TCFFG is going to get away with it this time. He’s finally entered the FO phase and he won’t like it at all.
Eyes on the prizes.
Cheers,
Scott.
Juju.
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: the mistake that Biden made was not telling everyone that he had a head cold and his voice was not as strong as it usually was, before he started answering questions. That would have explained the situation rather than having everyone speculate in their minds what was going on. Most people have had the experience of dealing with a cold when you’d rather not.
YY_Sima Qian
Not surprised at the MSM narrative post-debate (Biden is old & infirm & he should step aside for the good of the Dems), but everybody I follow on Twitter (policy/tech wonks, serious journalists & commentators, & academics, etc., normally quite sober types not given to hysteria & hyperbole) are overwhelmingly advocating that Biden steps aside for the good of the Dems & the country to improve the chances of defeating Trump…
I can’t see how Dems gracefully change horses now & not suffer electorally (Dems in disarray would be accurate for once). Either I am completely obtuse, or the world has gone nuts.
I think the solidifying post-debate zeitgeist will be more damaging to Biden & Dems than the actual debate performance, & all those Dem politicians (at all levels), donors, & activists anonymously spreading the doom & gloom on MSM are self-defeating.
Juju.
@Quinerly: Yes I am still in Pitt county. I will be for the near and possibly far future. I’m taking care of my mother, who is in advanced dementia. She’s 91 and I don’t make predictions, but she is very frail in some ways and surprisingly healthy in other ways. Last Friday I stressed my vocal cords to a point where I could barely talk. My sister had to come and help because my mother couldn’t hear me and didn’t understand that I wasn’t sick or mad at her, I just sounded sick and I needed not to talk. My voice is finally sounding more like me. It was nice having a break and some help. Dementia sucks.
You sound very happy in your new state and house, and with the new pupper boy. I have two rescue girls, Ruby Jean and Lulu. Ruby Jean is a terrier and hound and other things mix and I can see the attraction of smaller dogs, she’s a 40 pound dog, about half the size of Lulu, a golden retriever rescued former breeder girl and she is sweet and beautiful, but the people who had her as a breeder girl must have been absolute pieces of garbage humans. Lulu is a work in progress, but she improves a bit each day.
Another Scott
@YY_Sima Qian: Policy wonks are rarely experts at the nitty-gritty of electoral politics. They should look at Nate Silver and take the lesson that expertise in one area doesn’t translate into another. They should stay in their lane.
https://nitter.poast.org/bidenhq is a palate cleanser.
Hang in there.
Cheers,
Scott.
superdestroyer
@Prometheus Shrugged:
Based upon the reaction to the debate, Mifepristone will not be available starting in late Feb/early Mar 2025. By the end of 2025 most forms of birth control will be unavailable.
Sandra
@catclub: Housing costs and loan interest rates are very high, ramen noodles are $3/package, and wages for the middle earning band are stagnant. It is a mistake to think that the average voter feels confident about the economy based on stock prices.
YY_Sima Qian
@Another Scott: Yes, wonks & academics can suffer from ivory tower syndrome when it comes to nitty gritty politics, but the incredible negativity & calls for Biden to leave the race coming from journalists, commentators, & Dem politicians/operatives/donors/activists are baffling & annoying.
No need to put lipstick on a pig by pretending Biden wasn’t so bad during the debate, but no need for moral panic, either. The panicked reactions give me greater concerns that Biden’s bemusingly poor performance. (Having now seen some clips & read some excepts, it was not pretty.)
YY_Sima Qian
@superdestroyer: I suggest staying away from MSM & social media for a few days.
However, if Trump does win, I am not stepping foot in the US for a long time, & I will not take my daughters Stateside as we had always planned.
artem1s
this. I’ve read perhaps 200+ comments on this blog and have no idea what either candidate actually said. Or what policies were discussed. Only how they acted and sounded. Too many people in this country have bought into the media narrative that the candidates are there to entertain us rather than inform. I’ll check out some of the live stream coverage but honestly not expecting much more. This performative doomerism is going to be the death of this country as much as the population’s need to have an authoritarian daddy figure in charge.
superdestroyer
@YY_Sima Qian: That is what people all the losing side say during every presidential election. It never comes true.