The debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump was so heavily slanted in Trump’s favor that it almost could have been paid for as a Trump campaign event.
It did not take more than five minutes to see the difference between Trump and Biden: while the incumbent president sounded tired and weak, Trump was energetic, vigorous, almost conversational. The longer they got into the debate, the more shallow Biden’s lines got, while Trump maintained his reasoning, his multi-clause sentences, his command of facts.
The best we can say about Biden after this debate is that he could go home afterward and sleep.
Biden made a long line of startling claims. To begin with, he wants to reinstate Roe v. Wade, by which he refers to the Supreme Court case that made abortion legal in all 50 U.S. states. With its Dobbs v. Jackson decision in 2022, the Court overturned Roe v. Wade and ended the nationwide legality of abortion. Instead, the legal status is now decided by the states.
Early in the debate, Biden made clear that he wants to bring back nationwide abortion legality, without offering any idea of exactly how he would do that. His administration cannot simply go to the Supreme Court and request a new ruling—the Court is an equal but separate branch of government and does not answer to either the president or Congress.
The only other option for President Biden and his Democrats would be to pass a law in Congress that makes abortion legal nationwide. In addition to a majority in the House of Representatives, they would need a 60-vote majority in the Senate. That way, they can overcome the filibuster that Republicans otherwise would use to stop such a law.
With the Senate evenly split, and with the Republicans controlling the House by a slim margin, there is no path for the Democrats to a ‘Roe safe’ majority. But this was not the point with Biden’s statement—his somewhat startling announcement was instead a signal to his campaign workers around the country to aggressively propagate ‘abortions for all’ as a way to win votes.
On other issues, Biden stumbled and had visible difficulties formulating his thoughts. At one point his mind froze and he botched a sentence. It was unclear what the message was supposed to be, but it came out something like ‘we crushed Medicare.’ On another issue, his argument degenerated into such a rhetorical hodge-podge that Trump said: “I have no idea what he was saying there, and I don’t think he does either.”
It was a cheap point to grab, but one that Biden offered on a silver platter.
Throughout the debate, Trump came across as vibrant, filled with purpose, and eager to get to work as president. His appearance on the stage was nothing short of impressive, given the extreme pressure he has been under since de facto clinching the Republican nomination in the primaries earlier this year. He even turned his own conviction in a New York court earlier this month into an asset. He remarked that Biden “cannot win” unless he indicts his election opponent.
If Joe Biden had possessed even close to the same vigor as Trump, he would have given a classy, witty reply to that. But he didn’t; if anything, he dropped the rhetorical ball every time Trump made the ‘indict your opponent’ point.
Although Biden got through the debate almost without freezing up, his performance was weak. He felt tired, he did not speak with the ease and assertive attitude that Trump had. Listening to Biden was like hearing an old, heavily medicated relative try to explain the difference between oatmeal and porridge. His lines were long, winding, often mumbling, and increasingly shallow.
Which brings me to what was perhaps the most startling impression from the debate. About halfway into it, a pattern emerged where Trump was increasingly playing a debate game with his opponent. He would make an argument and criticize Biden, then wait for Biden’s attempt to fire back, and poke him again, but from a slightly different angle.
At first, this seemed to be just a debate technique like any other, but when Trump started ignoring the questions he was asked by the moderators and instead kept going after Biden on some previous issue, it became clear that Trump’s goal was to make Biden try to respond in a second or third round. Biden always took the bait, and each time he did his reasoning got more and more shallow, he got lost in his own sentences, and his factual points got more and more foggy.
Every time this happened, Trump looked satisfied—and then provoked Biden into the same round of rhetorical repartee again.
Slowly but steadily, Trump ground Biden down to his bones. He picked apart the sitting president’s efforts to sound coherent—and he did it without even being rhetorically unfair about it. He simply structured his arguments as if he was in a Lincoln-Douglas debate with the president.
Which, I must admit, was a brilliant strategic innovation. The Lincoln-Douglas form of debate is probably the most challenging form of formal debating that is used in debate societies, classes, and tournaments. It requires a flexible mind, a solid command of facts, and an adaptive mind. Trump proved that he has all this—and he also proved that his opponent does not.
But Trump deserves even more credit than that. When Biden lost track of his own argument in his increasingly feeble attempts to keep up with his opponent, Trump showed remarkable restraint in pointing out the terrible state of Biden’s intellect. A cheaper man would have kicked the dead horse for a quick round of laughing emojis on social media, but Trump used these occasions to let the current president literally speak for himself.
To be fair to Biden, though, he made a few strong points for himself. He spoke at length about the events in Washington, DC, on January 6, 2021, when a mob of people stormed the U.S. Capitol after attending a pro-Trump rally. He valiantly tried to pin the attackers on Trump, and to at least hint that Trump is unfit for office because he cannot be trusted with respecting the Constitution.
The only problem with Biden’s January 6 arguments was that Trump was all too prepared for them. With a relaxed rapid-fire response, he picked apart Biden’s narrative of that day, with one particularly compelling high point. Trump reminded the viewers that Nancy Pelosi, the former Democrat Speaker of the House, recently took responsibility for the chaos on Capitol Hill by admitting that she declined to order National Guard troops to protect the building.
Biden tried at least twice to revive the January 6 issue, and his arguments were met with the same fate each time: like he was wearing Teflon armor, Trump deflected Biden’s attacks and struck back—all with a calm, composed, almost casual attitude.
Growing desperate, Biden tried to revive the Nazi ghost from the events in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017. The sitting president added some spicy ingredients by claiming that during a confrontation between different political factions, Nazis came marching out of the woods with torches and swastikas. This is a complete fantasy, as is the idea that Trump somehow had endorsed all this.
Using his excellent rhetorical skills, and showing that he knows his opponent, Trump led Biden to remain in Charlottesville and with events that are of no consequence in 2024. Meanwhile, he himself moved on and developed his arguments on all kinds of issues, from Ukraine to the economy.
At the end of the day, it was both sad and disturbing to see Biden in action. The sad part was that his mental condition was exposed to the point of embarrassment; the disturbing part is the fact that this man has access to our military nuclear codes.
Trump, on the other hand, offered the whole package. He is an impressive debater, an important asset for a 78-year-old man and proof of his intellectual acumen. He also showed that he is not only well versed in national and global political issues, but that he also knows how to offer solutions to even the most complex problems.
While Biden at one point claimed that Belarus is a NATO member, Trump explained how he is going to make sure the Europeans continue to pay their fair share of their own military defense costs. Biden also kept screwing up economic numbers and suggesting that his administration has created “thousands of millions” of jobs.
This debate was a runaway victory for Trump. Let us hope his next runaway victory along the campaign trail will be to pick U.S. Senator Tim Scott (R-S.C.) for his running mate.
The Debate That Became a Trump Infomercial
Photo: ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP
The debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump was so heavily slanted in Trump’s favor that it almost could have been paid for as a Trump campaign event.
It did not take more than five minutes to see the difference between Trump and Biden: while the incumbent president sounded tired and weak, Trump was energetic, vigorous, almost conversational. The longer they got into the debate, the more shallow Biden’s lines got, while Trump maintained his reasoning, his multi-clause sentences, his command of facts.
The best we can say about Biden after this debate is that he could go home afterward and sleep.
Biden made a long line of startling claims. To begin with, he wants to reinstate Roe v. Wade, by which he refers to the Supreme Court case that made abortion legal in all 50 U.S. states. With its Dobbs v. Jackson decision in 2022, the Court overturned Roe v. Wade and ended the nationwide legality of abortion. Instead, the legal status is now decided by the states.
Early in the debate, Biden made clear that he wants to bring back nationwide abortion legality, without offering any idea of exactly how he would do that. His administration cannot simply go to the Supreme Court and request a new ruling—the Court is an equal but separate branch of government and does not answer to either the president or Congress.
The only other option for President Biden and his Democrats would be to pass a law in Congress that makes abortion legal nationwide. In addition to a majority in the House of Representatives, they would need a 60-vote majority in the Senate. That way, they can overcome the filibuster that Republicans otherwise would use to stop such a law.
With the Senate evenly split, and with the Republicans controlling the House by a slim margin, there is no path for the Democrats to a ‘Roe safe’ majority. But this was not the point with Biden’s statement—his somewhat startling announcement was instead a signal to his campaign workers around the country to aggressively propagate ‘abortions for all’ as a way to win votes.
On other issues, Biden stumbled and had visible difficulties formulating his thoughts. At one point his mind froze and he botched a sentence. It was unclear what the message was supposed to be, but it came out something like ‘we crushed Medicare.’ On another issue, his argument degenerated into such a rhetorical hodge-podge that Trump said: “I have no idea what he was saying there, and I don’t think he does either.”
It was a cheap point to grab, but one that Biden offered on a silver platter.
Throughout the debate, Trump came across as vibrant, filled with purpose, and eager to get to work as president. His appearance on the stage was nothing short of impressive, given the extreme pressure he has been under since de facto clinching the Republican nomination in the primaries earlier this year. He even turned his own conviction in a New York court earlier this month into an asset. He remarked that Biden “cannot win” unless he indicts his election opponent.
If Joe Biden had possessed even close to the same vigor as Trump, he would have given a classy, witty reply to that. But he didn’t; if anything, he dropped the rhetorical ball every time Trump made the ‘indict your opponent’ point.
Although Biden got through the debate almost without freezing up, his performance was weak. He felt tired, he did not speak with the ease and assertive attitude that Trump had. Listening to Biden was like hearing an old, heavily medicated relative try to explain the difference between oatmeal and porridge. His lines were long, winding, often mumbling, and increasingly shallow.
Which brings me to what was perhaps the most startling impression from the debate. About halfway into it, a pattern emerged where Trump was increasingly playing a debate game with his opponent. He would make an argument and criticize Biden, then wait for Biden’s attempt to fire back, and poke him again, but from a slightly different angle.
At first, this seemed to be just a debate technique like any other, but when Trump started ignoring the questions he was asked by the moderators and instead kept going after Biden on some previous issue, it became clear that Trump’s goal was to make Biden try to respond in a second or third round. Biden always took the bait, and each time he did his reasoning got more and more shallow, he got lost in his own sentences, and his factual points got more and more foggy.
Every time this happened, Trump looked satisfied—and then provoked Biden into the same round of rhetorical repartee again.
Slowly but steadily, Trump ground Biden down to his bones. He picked apart the sitting president’s efforts to sound coherent—and he did it without even being rhetorically unfair about it. He simply structured his arguments as if he was in a Lincoln-Douglas debate with the president.
Which, I must admit, was a brilliant strategic innovation. The Lincoln-Douglas form of debate is probably the most challenging form of formal debating that is used in debate societies, classes, and tournaments. It requires a flexible mind, a solid command of facts, and an adaptive mind. Trump proved that he has all this—and he also proved that his opponent does not.
But Trump deserves even more credit than that. When Biden lost track of his own argument in his increasingly feeble attempts to keep up with his opponent, Trump showed remarkable restraint in pointing out the terrible state of Biden’s intellect. A cheaper man would have kicked the dead horse for a quick round of laughing emojis on social media, but Trump used these occasions to let the current president literally speak for himself.
To be fair to Biden, though, he made a few strong points for himself. He spoke at length about the events in Washington, DC, on January 6, 2021, when a mob of people stormed the U.S. Capitol after attending a pro-Trump rally. He valiantly tried to pin the attackers on Trump, and to at least hint that Trump is unfit for office because he cannot be trusted with respecting the Constitution.
The only problem with Biden’s January 6 arguments was that Trump was all too prepared for them. With a relaxed rapid-fire response, he picked apart Biden’s narrative of that day, with one particularly compelling high point. Trump reminded the viewers that Nancy Pelosi, the former Democrat Speaker of the House, recently took responsibility for the chaos on Capitol Hill by admitting that she declined to order National Guard troops to protect the building.
Biden tried at least twice to revive the January 6 issue, and his arguments were met with the same fate each time: like he was wearing Teflon armor, Trump deflected Biden’s attacks and struck back—all with a calm, composed, almost casual attitude.
Growing desperate, Biden tried to revive the Nazi ghost from the events in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017. The sitting president added some spicy ingredients by claiming that during a confrontation between different political factions, Nazis came marching out of the woods with torches and swastikas. This is a complete fantasy, as is the idea that Trump somehow had endorsed all this.
Using his excellent rhetorical skills, and showing that he knows his opponent, Trump led Biden to remain in Charlottesville and with events that are of no consequence in 2024. Meanwhile, he himself moved on and developed his arguments on all kinds of issues, from Ukraine to the economy.
At the end of the day, it was both sad and disturbing to see Biden in action. The sad part was that his mental condition was exposed to the point of embarrassment; the disturbing part is the fact that this man has access to our military nuclear codes.
Trump, on the other hand, offered the whole package. He is an impressive debater, an important asset for a 78-year-old man and proof of his intellectual acumen. He also showed that he is not only well versed in national and global political issues, but that he also knows how to offer solutions to even the most complex problems.
While Biden at one point claimed that Belarus is a NATO member, Trump explained how he is going to make sure the Europeans continue to pay their fair share of their own military defense costs. Biden also kept screwing up economic numbers and suggesting that his administration has created “thousands of millions” of jobs.
This debate was a runaway victory for Trump. Let us hope his next runaway victory along the campaign trail will be to pick U.S. Senator Tim Scott (R-S.C.) for his running mate.
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