Presidential debates have their own special stakes, media rituals, cadences, and implications, and since its likely we only have one debate — more on that later — tonight’s showdown in Atlanta will be one for the ages. The all matter. This one matters a lot.
One consequential factor playing into this debate is the media’s outright bias against one of the candidates. Their preference for the showmanship, click-and-eyeball catching antics, and scenery-chewing fun of Donald Trump isn’t ideological; it’s just business. The buttoned-up, boring, old and old-school Biden White House just lacks the crazy carnival ride appeal of Four Last Years for the American experiment.
The treatment of Biden versus Trump in the days leading to this debate continues to astound me.
Donald Trump has been virtually speaking in tongues, his incoherent logorrhea practically requiring a team of trained linguists and semioticians to extract even a scintilla of meaning from torrential flood of word vomit. He’s spent months promising a reign of political vengeance, flaunting his lavish criminality, assaulting the truth like a SEAL team’s worth of Tommy Flanagans, and promising a reign of authoritarian excess.
But Biden is so old, right? He did boring debate prep, like a nerd.
The spin structure ahead of the debates permeating the media noosphere this week centers on Biden’s age, and the seemingly never-learned lessons about Trump’s battlefield preparation of the debate stage. “If Biden wins, he’s on drugs! If he loses, he’s senile!” was the central thrust of the Trump’s highly aggro approach this week.
But Trump isn’t feeling the confidence and swagger he usually sells.
He knows Biden beat him twice before. Trump knows Biden has been prepping while he’s been golfing. He regrets the format and the lack of an audience. None of this feels right to Team Trump, which is why the teased withdrawing from the debate earlier this week and why his senior aides are very quietly working to lower expectations.
His social media followers are making “rigged debate” tweets at a ferocious clip this morning. Everyone in their orbit seems eager to talk about the VP contest…”Oh, yeah, the debate. Biden’s on drugs. Whatever.”
The headlines and assertions in the MAGA media betray a certain degree of nervous resignation:
The increasingly Rupert-y Wall Street Journal opined: “Even with the moderators in Biden’s corner, the president will have a hard time with the questioning.”
Ben Shapiro weighed in: CNN’s Debate Moderators: Don’t Expect Fairness
The lesser lights of the MAGA media crazy train also bleated their wrongpinions:
Donald Trump’s Handicap Match: Liberal media won’t let this be a fair fight.
Watch Out for Shenanigans From CNN Debate Moderators Tapper and Bash!
Three Hoaxes To Watch for In Thursday Night’s Debate
That’s just a very superficial collection of their pre-gaming.
For the debate tonight, not only for the spin before and after, but for every Trump utterance on stage, remember the MAGA Debate Rules below. You will hear a thousand ways to contextualize every one of Trump’s assertions. I’ve written a set of rules that I believe give you a chance to know what he really means, no matter what he says:
MAGA DEBATE RULES
Every accusation is a confession.
Every denial is a full confession of guilt.
Every claim of evil is projection.
Every boast of strength is an admission of failure.
Every fact is subject to Trump’s sole interpretation.
Every law is a conspiracy against Trump.
Every anecdote is pure fiction.
Every casual cruelty and crazed conspiracy leads deeper into more cruelty and conspiracy.
Every word is a lie, every lie is a promise of betrayal.
Every person or group Trump claims to stand for, he loathes.
Finally, Everything Trump Touches Dies.
I was going to write up a clever drinking game for tonight, but I don’t want to be responsible for a wave of alcohol poisonings.
Tune in! Will be wild!
"Casey at the Bat: A Ballad of the Republic, Sung in the Year 1888"
The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville nine that day;
the score stood four to two, with but one inning more to play.
And then when Cooney died at first, and Barrows did the same,
a sickly silence fell upon the patrons of the game.
A straggling few got up to go in deep despair. The rest
clung to that hope which springs eternal in the human breast;
they thought, if only Casey could get but a whack at that –
they'd put up even money, now, with Casey at the bat.
But Flynn preceded Casey, as did also Jimmy Blake,
and the former was a lulu and the latter was a cake,
so upon that stricken multitude grim melancholy sat,
for there seemed but little chance of Casey's getting to the bat.
But Flynn let drive a single, to the wonderment of all,
and Blake, the much despised, tore the cover off the ball;
and when the dust had lifted, and the men saw what had occurred,
there was Jimmy safe at second and Flynn a-hugging third.
Then from five thousand throats and more there rose a lusty yell;
it rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell;
it knocked upon the mountain and recoiled upon the flat,
for Casey, mighty Casey, was advancing to the bat.
There was ease in Casey's manner as he stepped into his place;
there was pride in Casey's bearing and a smile on Casey's face.
And when, responding to the cheers, he lightly doffed his hat,
no stranger in the crowd could doubt 'twas Casey at the bat.
Ten thousand eyes were on him as he rubbed his hands with dirt;
five thousand tongues applauded when he wiped them on his shirt.
Then while the writhing pitcher ground the ball into his hip,
defiance gleamed in Casey's eye, a sneer curled Casey's lip.
And now the leather-covered sphere came hurtling through the air,
and Casey stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there.
Close by the sturdy batsman the ball unheeded sped—
"That ain't my style," said Casey. "Strike one," the umpire said.
From the benches, black with people, there went up a muffled roar,
like the beating of the storm-waves on a stern and distant shore.
"Kill him! Kill the umpire!" shouted someone on the stand;
and it's likely they'd have killed him had not Casey raised his hand.
With a smile of Christian charity great Casey's visage shone;
he stilled the rising tumult; he bade the game go on;
he signaled to the pitcher, and once more the spheroid flew;
but Casey still ignored it, and the umpire said: "Strike two."
"Fraud!" cried the maddened thousands, and Echo answered fraud;
but one scornful look from Casey and the audience was awed.
They saw his face grow stern and cold, they saw his muscles strain,
and they knew that Casey wouldn't let that ball go by again.
The sneer is gone from Casey's lip, his teeth are clenched in hate;
he pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate.
And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go,
and now the air is shattered by the force of Casey's blow.
Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;
the band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,
and somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout;
but there is no joy in Mudville—mighty Casey has struck out."
Rick, I am waiting for your opinion about the debate.