Did RFK Jr win the debate?

Before starting this blog, I read the one I wrote concerning the 2020 debates, specifically after the presidential debate in October and the Vice Presidential one that followed. Frankly, I didn't remember how visceral my reaction was, how utterly pissed off I was that those debate candidates reflected the best the American political system could off us, as voters. Here is a link to that post

https://wurdsfromtheburbs.blogspot.com/2020/10/the-debates.html

At that point, I decided to file this post under the label Election 2024, then thought it wise to review what I have already written on that subject. Here is a link to the post from March of this year, which contains a link to the one I posted in January, 2024.

https://wurdsfromtheburbs.blogspot.com/2020/10/the-debates.html

If you have read my comments on the 2020 debates, you already have an inkling of what I thought about this one. To put it mildly, it was even worse. 

Now, to be fair, there was an attempt to eliminate one candidate talking over the other, and that worked relatively well. I believe there was only one time when I saw Trump speaking but couldn't hear him, which indicates that he can follow rules when compelled to do so.

Sadly though, regardless of who was speaking, there was very little worth hearing. 

Biden shuffled onto the stage, looking as old as his critics claim. And for all of the first half, and some of the second, he fell far short of explaining his accomplishments, his vision, and the contrast between his agenda and his competitor. While he did seem to gain some lucidity in the latter part of the second half, and in his final statement, (and actually looked pretty good in the after debate address), he woefully dropped the ball. To say he had a bad debate is a monumental understatement.

Trump on the other hand was confident in his constant barrage of half truths, exaggerations and lies. His newest one was that Nancy Pelosi admitted that she was responsible for the lack of national guard troops at the Capitol. Right, Pelosi was hoping to die that day so she didn't try to get help. And of course he trotted out all his top hits as well, that countries are emptying their prisons and mental hospitals and sending those people to America, that everything during his presidential term was the greatest ever, and that the Ukraine invasion and the Hamas-Israeli War wouldn't be happening if he were president and on and on. 

But at least Trump was consistent. He answered many questions with comments about how illegal immigrants are responsible for virtually everything, even the one about how he would fix Social Security and the one about helping young parents afford child care.

Biden, on the other hand, was all over the place, and, as I read in an opinion piece earlier today, unable to communicate his positions even when the facts were on his side.

For instance, Biden's job record is far superior to Trump's but Trump was able to deflect that fact by calling the 15 million jobs created since Biden took office as rebound jobs. Of course, there is some truth to that assertion, but the truth is because of all the jobs lost during the Trumps Administration. You can't say you handed off a great economy then take credit for the millions of jobs created after you were gone. But Biden was unable to counter with sufficient clarity, so many people may have left with the impression that Trump was right.

What bothers me most is that Trump played to his strength, his bombastic presentations, his avoidance of the questions, his ability to turn any fault or mistake of his own into that of his debate opponent, while Biden failed miserably to apply his strengths.

Did Biden's team really think Joe could cite numbers and stats to counter Trump's lies? 

I tell people that I would have had Biden look at Trump after he spoke, shake his head, and say something really simple like, "Wow, I almost ran out of fingers counting your lies and exaggerations", as he looked down at his fingers. Then look straight into the camera, and says, "Folks, I don't have enough time to counter all the falsehoods, but I will answer the question that was asked", and then present a simple to understand answer. Perhaps even connect that answer with his own upbringing. 

We needed Uncle Joe to demonstrate that America's problems are serious, that he understands that inflation sucks, but that he is the kind of leader who works with Congress, both sides, to find solutions, unlike Trump who told his Congressional allies not to pass the most conservative, restrictive immigration bill ever, a bill created with an extremely conservative Senator, because he only cares about winning in November and didn't want to give Biden a win. 

Kind of the exact opposite of America First. Perhaps Biden should have actually used that phrase to emphasize the contrast, as we all know Trump is about Trump first, above all.

Instead he went down the rabbit hole with Trump, engaging in talk about who was voted the best or worst president and who could hit a better golf tee shot. Yikes.

Trump was not there to debate Biden, he was there for another rally. And he succeeded in making it look like a Trump rally by bombarding us with his inflammatory rhetoric, and his amazing ability to tell us who we need to hate and who is to blame.

In trying to debate him, Biden played right into his hands because a true debate is about facts and proof, and Trump is unable to engage in such a thing. Biden's advisers should have known that, should have told him to counter Trump's invective language with a smile and a simple acknowledgement of Trump's avoidance of providing any kind of solution other than giving tax breaks to the rich and deporting millions of undocumented people.

Which brings me to the moderators. Were they so hesitant to appear biased towards Biden that they were unable to require Trump to answer their questions? They couldn't mute him, or Biden, when either candidate responded with something other than an answer to the question? 

As it was, what was the point of them being there? The questions could have been displayed on a screen and ignored just as well as being presented by a person and ignored. I don't know how many times the question presented on TV below Trump was not broached in the least by his responses. Often the moderator reminded him of the question, yet he still refused to answer.

Biden was horrible, Trump spewed nonsense, nobody won, lease of all the American electorate, although I must admit that Biden lost more so. We know Trump is full of doo-doo, but we at least thought that Biden could handle himself with some semblance of respectability.

Which brings me to the title of this post, did RFK Jr win, simply by not being there? 

Personally, I don't think he would have been much better, as the few times I have seen him interviewed, he hasn't impressed me in the least. But, it might have been interesting to see if he attacked Trump or Biden more, or agreed with one over the other. 

I guess that says everything, that the person not on the stage did better than the two that were actually there.

So, what do we do?

I am reminded of the movie, Brewster's Millions with Richard Pryor. If you are familiar with it, you will remember that he decides to run for mayor to help waste the millions of dollars he must spend to inherit the even more millions of dollars, but he runs as 'None of the Above'. 

If we can't convince the two parties to name new candidates, can we petition for None of the Above to be placed on the ticket?

I know, it isn't going to happen. 

So we are left to choose between a caring man who is far past his prime, or a felon who has been convicted of sexual abuse and business fraud, and indicted for spurring an attack on our nation's capitol, and keeping classified documents even when asked to return them.

Sounds like a no brainer, yet the fact is we should have better choices than this, something better than the lesser of two evils, so to speak. 

Perhaps, like in sports, Biden's bad day will be situational, and he will exhibit more strength and mental acuity in the following months, just as he did at the State of the Union. He will get back up after being knocked down, as he said at his rally yesterday.

At least there is that possibility, even if slim, compared to the chance of Trump ever being anything more than a self-centered, convicted felon and adulterer whose long time business CEO is spending time in Rykers for tax evasion, whose company faces hundreds of millions of dollars in fines, who only accepts elections that he wins, and whose favorite world leaders are all dictators and authoritarians. 

And yet who leads in the polls.

Is it any wonder why I am convinced that we have already lost our democracy?