On the Third of Two Debates

 

Clockwise from top: Trump, Biden.

Does anyone else notice how much Donald Trump resembles Muhammed Ali?

Watching the US Presidential debate last week, I thought Biden was leading in the early going, but then Trump came on strong and won on points.

Perhaps this was a “rope-a-dope” strategy. Biden obviously easily gets tired. So, it made sense to save the best ammunition for later, when Biden could be expected to lose focus and be less able to effectively respond. And that’s the way I thought it played out.

In retrospect, though, I increasingly think Trump did better than win on points. He murderated da bum. I think he scored several knockdowns and three virtual knockouts. And still looked pretty doing it.

The first knockout was when Trump brought up the recent revelations from Hunter Biden’s laptop, Biden turned to look straight into the camera, and said:

“There's a reason he's bringing up all of this malarkey. He does not want to talk about the substantive issues. It's not about his family and my family. It's about your family and your family is hurting badly.

“You're sitting at the kitchen table this morning. We should be talking about your families, but that's the last thing he wants to talk about.”

And Trump responded with the uppercut on the outthrust jaw: “That’s a typical political statement. ’Let's get off the subject of China and let's talk about sitting around the table.’ Come on Joe, you can do better than that. I’m not a typical politician. That’s why I was elected.”

Trump here reminded everyone why he got elected. Because he cut through the crap, and promised to drain the swamp. I think he jarred a lot of memories, and cast Biden, convincingly, as the ultimate swamp creature. Are people really ready to go back to that—when they were so fed up with it?

He seemed to follow up with other responses. “All talk, no action.” “If this is a great idea, you’ve been in Washington for 47 years. Why didn’t you do it?”

I think that volley was unanswerable. 

Biden thought he had a counter to the Hunter Biden laptop revelations in claiming, as the media has, that it was “Russian disinformation.”

Trump was ready for that one. He could have made the logical argument that it hardly matters where it came from if the accusations are demonstrably true; and there is no evidence Russia was involved. But many voters might be unable to follow the logic. Trump has a talent for the quick jab. That is why he loves Twitter: “Russia, Russia. So that’s how he’s going to play it. Now we’re back to Russia.”

To my mind, it tellingly made Biden look intellectually limited, like a stage humour with a fixed idea he can’t get beyond. I think it reinforced a lot of people’s concerns about Biden. A talking suit, not a leader. And a liar, who just makes things up. This was on top of swiping away any power the “Russia” claim might have had to counter the Hunter Biden revelations.

Biden did not openly manifest and incoherence. Nevertheless, I think his dementia caused him to land at least two devastating blows on himself, in the later rounds. He was getting tired.

Challenged on fracking, he insisted he had never opposed it, and idiotically doubled down by defying Trump to post the video showing he had. That was remarkably stupid, since he knew Trump could. 

This may have been a manifestation of Biden’s narcissism. M. Scott Peck observes, of narcissists, that when challenged directly they seem to become delusional; he calls them “ambulatory schizophrenics.” For that brief moment, Biden may have sincerely imagined he had never opposed fracking, and there was no such video.

Trump, of course, next day sent out a highlights clip of multiple examples of Biden and Kamala Harris saying they would end fracking. Just as had been advertised in advance by Biden.

Proving to all beyond all reasonable doubt not just that Biden opposed fracking, but that that Biden is a bald-faced liar. Undermining everything else he has ever said, and exposing him again as just another corrupt politician who will say anything.

This was the second knockout blow, although the full effects were not seen until the next day.

I think Biden realized soon after he said it that he had gotten himself in trouble; that the next day the video would inevitably be there and the truth would come out. And I suspect that buffaloed him into making his next damaging statement, in a vain hope it might cover his anterior portions. He then said straight up that, yes, he did in principle want to end the entire oil industry. “Over time.”

Of course this is true, and evident to anyone who looks at the Democratic platform. But many or most voters might not have known it, and Biden might have danced away from the point, unpopular in several critical swing states, had he not already compromised himself with the lie about fracking.

All Trump had to do was to then point out how significant this was.

Had there been no early voting, I think this too would have been a knockout: this would have ended Biden’s chances in Pennsylvania or Ohio, probably needed to win. Because there has been a lot of early voting, he may survive. But reportedly “can I change my vote?” has been trending on Google.