First debate between VP Harris and Trump...The only one? Tues 10 Sept 2024, 9pm EDT

I just pray it's the last time we have to experience Trump in a debate. As a lefty, I'm genetically inclined to feel anxious about presidential debates. Living in the moment, however, there's no reason why Harris can't hold her own and even flip the tables a bit with Trump. I understand and agree that the media so often give Trump a pass for his despicable behavior, his inability to speak in a remotely coherent way. I doubt that'll change much, but you never know. Harris, at least this far, has been very effective in not taking the bait and engaging in a back-and-forth exchange with Trump over his asshole statements about her. At some point, you do probably have to have a line ready that addresses them in a dismissive way. Her statement in the CNN interview batting away the question about her race, saying it's just the same old tire playbook is what I assume and hope she'll stick to. Maybe with an add-on line or two that makes it clear that so much about what he says is absurd and purposefully cruel. It's quite literally all he has to offer.

This is the third cycle that Americans have had to watch this clown. 40-some percent of the country may like it, but most of the country is either bored or disgusted by it. Regardless, it's not news to anyone at this point. Trump has a record (and a rap sheet) that she can pick apart and contrast with what she plans on doing if elected. Trump just offers pie in the sky generalities, just as he's done in the past, almost none of which he's ever followed up on.

I understand she didn't do well in previous debates, but I doubt that matters much anymore. Here's she's not going to try and differentiate herself from a stage-full of other potential nominees. Plus, she just seems to know her shit at this point. She looks and sounds presidential. And, as has been mentioned a lot recently, while her "I'm a prosecutor" background might not have been what the country wanted to hear in 2019, but it resonates today. I think she'll do well.

 

Mods (@ASF), could we get "Tues 10 Sept 2024, 9pm EDT" added to the thread title?

 

Kamala needs to have one strategy ready for if the moderators are weak, and another for if they’re medium, and yet another for if they’re strong about pushing back on Trump if/when he breaks the rules or tells insanity-level lies.

That IMO should be a big, big part of her debate prep. If the moderators are weak, should she set up a talking point based around the media’s sanewashing, something the campaign as a whole can push to get more honest and balanced media coverage?

 

I’m pretty sure that’s “infanticide” rather than “abortion.” And it’s illegal pretty much everywhere these days.

 

Yet trump supporters refuse to believe the facts and the mods generally just let him make up crazy lies without any push back

 

Party discipline. Lenin and Stalin would love Trump’s GOP.

 

Kamala shouldn't respond to anything Trump says -- she needs to keep hammering him on the nonsense he's been spewing, accuse him to his face of being a dementia-addled nut, and question him about everrything the MSM has ignored: "post-birth abortions", arresting political donors, make it clear his a fvcking moron on economic issues -- e.g., "tariffs are paid by other countries" etc., etc., etc.

Of course, she needs to work in something about he she knows just who Trump is: a convicted felon "and I should know, as a prosecutor I put a lot them behind bars."

 

On Pod Save America last week, they interviewed Dana Bash, who spoke about CNN’s approach to the first debate. Basically, she said that, unlike in a one-on-one candidate interview, when the journalist could reasonably be expected to call out the candidate on obvious lies, in the debate, their position (I think she referred to it as being ‘traditional”) was that it would be left up to each candidate to call out the other on their lies.

Fine. Frankly, I doubt we’ll see on Tuesday a moderator calling out Trump on any of the crazy shit he says. I mean, in the history of these debates, how often does that really happen?

But what I’ll never understand is why the moderator can’t as Trump a question about his pathological lying. It’s a thing, something on display 24/7 for the past decade. Like Biden’s age, or some other candidate’s health issues or lack of experience, it matters. So why not say, “we won’t be fact checking either candidate in real time tonight, however Mr Trump, I want to ask you a question about the extent to which you repeatedly tell obvious lies on the campaign trail…”

I don’t expect they’ll have the balls to do so, but they should.

 

I think it should be a direct question: "Mr. Trump, you have said that many states allow abortion after birth. That is a clear falsehood because there is no such thing. In fact what you're describing is infanticide, and that is illegal in every state -- no state allows it and no politician supports it. Why would you say that?"

 

There are only three or four words anyone could say in this debate to change the race, only Trump is capable of uttering them, and we all know what they are.

Let's hope he loses control and squeamish centrists see who he really is.

 

I disagree. My take on the last debate was Trump was awful, but that was masked by Biden being a lot worse. Biden had eleventy thousand chances to pounce, and missed them all.

Here’s my point…in addition to the non-zero chance Trump throws out the C word or the N word, there’s also a non-zero chance that Trump has a breakdown. Harris needs to have as part of her agenda facilitating a breakdown.

 

But would that actually change the race? Would people who are voting for the orange fascist care?

 

Not sure what you mean here. Would all of them care leading to Trump getting 2% of the vote? No. Would it turn 3% of voters from Trump to Harris? Maybe…that’s all that’s needed. The polling consensus seems to be Harris +2, give or take. Harris +8 means a blowout.

 

We need ~200,000 Trump voters across three out of the six swing states to stay home.

I think we agree -- I just think a Trump breakdown against Harris looks a bit different, more bigoted, than one against Biden.

 

Really?

If you're not interested in politics, why would you watch a debate? I know people who really don't care about football but watch the Super Bowl because it's a thing, but I can't imagine people who barely care about this election watching this.

 

Well, I'm with him if by "watching the debate" 'nutter includes "watches clips on social media instead of scrolling past them."

 

They’ll watch for the spectacle, not for policy details. Trump is primarily an entertainer (not always intentionally), and I imagine that’s going to draw quite a few people in.