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ACCORDING TO LIZ - No winners at all, as far as I can tell, just losers. The American people. The climate. Women. World peace. And the economy.
While Trump had clearly listened to his handlers and by-and-large stuck to the issues, strong on immigration, economy, was civil but still widely disliked for stand on women, violence on Jan 6, convicted felon and his continuing falsehoods such as claiming Biden had weaponized the Justice Department against him.
Unfortunately, Biden never really found his feet, starting poorly and reaching persuadable voters, never articulated a compelling vision for the future, and failed to show he had the mental acuity to deliver, which allowed his opponent to win by default.
If Biden’s people were smarter and not caught up in their own narrative, they would have called for the debate to be rescheduled, whether because he had a bad night – don’t we all? or was ill, which he obviously was. Or that he was stressed from his role as running the free world instead of providing the butt of entertainment by his piece-of-shit opponent.
They would not have tied to pull Biden away from important affairs such as working with the governors in states that had been flooded in the recent torrential rains to mitigate the impact on Americans, from critical negotiations about Gaza, Israel’s incursions into Lebanon, and Putin’s continued war on Ukraine, and the ramifications of G7 discussions.
They would not have harangued him to be what he wasn’t and, instead insisted that notes, at least in point form were not only acceptable but were important to best communicate issues of concern to the American people.
Trump was equally incoherent, increasingly so approaching total derangement as the debate went on, but he knew how to make love to the camera.
And his followers keep their mouths shut instead of leading the attack and ripping him apart with knives borne by his own party.
Biden may have won the debate on policy, but he lost it on presentation/ Trump was increasing(ly) incoherent and deranged as the debate went on, and Trump’s extremism was on full display, Biden and Trump are deeply unpopular / Trump’s lack of remorse about / former president’s past tariffs raised prices for consumers and businesses, economists say. His next plan could tax 10 times as many imports.
If Biden persists in his run for President, and if the DNC persists in its unconditional support for his campaign, it will lead to an unmitigated disaster for Americans. Aging in place is not an option for the occupant of the White House.
Not sure if the White House is more a rumor mill or sieve but as reported by NBC, this emerged out yesterday:
“President Joe Biden is expected to discuss the future of his re-election campaign with family at Camp David, Maryland, on Sunday, following a nationally televised debate Thursday that left many fellow Democrats worried about his ability to beat former President Donald Trump in November, according to five people familiar with the matter.”
The future for the country, and for the whole world, may depend on Biden gracefully bowing out of the race right now and leading the charge to find and endorse a dynamic successor to rally the country.
No better day to do so than on the upcoming 248th birthday of the United States.
But given Biden’s recent propensity to dither, to avoid changing course, will he find the huevos to do so?
Will his loyalty to the American people trump his misguided belief that he can lead the charge against those who would destroy this nation, one that is indivisible, with liberty and justice for all?
On the other hand, was his performance the result of a perhaps inappropriate demand that the debate be conducted without notes? I use written scripts all the time when I speak, why shouldn’t Joe?
And just as I would never trust a lawyer relying on memory instead of researching precedent, I would take a man working from prepared notes from qualified advisors over Trump’s erratic bombast, spurred by a coterie that enables rather than controls his excesses, any day.
The following day in Raleigh, Biden delivered a far stronger performance with a teleprompter, rousing his audience with some excellent zingers that had eluded him Thursday night.
Using a teleprompter the next day, Biden delivered a far stronger performance in Raleigh, N.C., rousing his audience with some excellent zingers, ones that eluded him Thursday night.
That’s preparation, that’s thinking, something Trump clearly does too little of.
Then there’s John Fetterman, much maligned by talking heads in the wake of a disappointing debate in 2022 during which he relied on a teleprompter to overcome the immediate aftereffects of a stroke. The Democrat elite devolved into full-on panic mode, despairing about holding onto the Senate.
Fetterman’s response to Biden’s poor showing on Thursday?
“I’ve been there; people lost their mind after my debate. Maybe there’s something we could learn from that.”
Fetterman won that election by nearly five percentage points and became a strong voice for his constituents in the Senate.
I will spare readers a continuing litany of Trump’s conspiracy theory claims, the fantasies of a narcissist on steroids, and his sewage spew of falsehoods, along with the too many squirmable moments that seemed to stretch forever during Biden’s unstellar performance.
Suffice it to say that they have been parsed ad infinitum by the talking heads on all sides and their online echo chambers.
The time has come for a change. Neither of the men on stage last Thursday are qualified or suitable to lead the United States.
Neither has any ability to inspire the wider audience in America and around the world in the vale of tears in which we are currently living – of climate change and corporate greed, of global warmongering and the threat of future pandemics, of rapidly widening wealth disparities and Neither even approaches the leadership level of an Abraham Lincoln, a Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a Winston Churchill, a Martin Luther King, Jr.
Or even a Ted Kennedy who tanked Robert Bork’s confirmation to the Supreme Court by evoking a piss-poor new world:
“...a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution, writers and artists would be censored at the whim of government, and the doors of the federal courts would be shut on the fingers of millions of citizens for whom the judiciary is often the only protector of the individual rights that are the heart of our democracy.”
It's time to move on, not because Biden blew it on Saturday – after all who puts a great racehorse down for stumbling in one outing?
But because we need new blood to cut through the apathy many voters feel about the current political landscape and tell a story with enough clarity and force to capture their imagination and, especially, define and control the narrative of what is happening in this country as a majority of voters understand it.
With Biden we expected folksy pablum and defensiveness about his record, we got that on top of his evident inability to communicate without notes.
With Trump we expected drama and godlike declamations, disorientation, dizziness and not much else. And got that along with his histrionic abilities developed on his reality TV show.
And we already know he has promised to assume the mantle of “dictator” on Day 1, pay of those who supported him and seek revenge on political opponents.
We also know Biden promises more of the same but at least with reasonably decent advisors who by-and-large respect the concept of democracy.
What there has been to little of is a deep dive on the issue of succession. Both are old men; and perhaps presumed front-runner’s lifestyle leanings will cause his body to fail before that of the apparently cognitively challenged incumbent.
Kamala Harris is a decent human being, certainly better than Trump, or most of his potential Vices.
Voters this time around need to balance a Biden-Harris ticket against the unsuitability of whomever may be joining the Ex on his. They are too many to enumerate. And all guarantee a ruinous future for the country and for what it stands.
Think about how many voters McCain lost when Republicans realized that he was a fading heartbeat away from Palin leading the county.
Now is the time for all good people to come to the aid of the country… But how?
(Liz Amsden is a contributor to CityWatch and an activist from Northeast Los Angeles with opinions on much of what goes on in our lives. She has written extensively on the City's budget and services as well as her many other interests and passions. In her real life she works on budgets for film and television where fiction can rarely be as strange as the truth of living in today's world.)
