Last night’s debate between Trump and Harris was certainly more entertaining than the debate a couple months ago between Trump and Biden.
NY Times, Opinion, 11 Sep 2024: ‘Trump Brought Darkness; Harris Brought Light’: 14 Writers on Who Won the Presidential Debate [gift link]
Here’s a grid showing where the 14 writers came down on who won and whether the debate was inspiring.
Not all 14 are Times columnists or contributors; Liam Donovan is a Republican strategist, Kathiner Mangu-Ward is editor of Reason, and so on. The one guy who thought Trump won is Daniel McCarthy, is editor of the periodical Modern Age (subtitled “A Conservative Review”). Aside from their overall verdicts, the piece also asks the 14 to describe the “most pivotal moment” and “something small but revealing.”
Reading a bunch of pieces on the web today, and listening to the radio this morning and at lunch, the general tenor seems to be that Harris successfully goaded Trump into spouting his familiar craziness; he’s easily baited. He couldn’t help himself. Defending his rallies as “the most incredible rallies in the history of politics.” Citing Victor Orban as a character reference. Claiming doctors execute babies after birth. He even couldn’t help himself citing the Haitian immigrant story: “They’re eating the dogs. The people that came in — they’re eating the cats.”
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Some headlines collected throughout the day.
- The Atlantic, David A. Graham: What Was He Even Talking About?, subtitled “Trump’s rant about immigrants eating pets was another sign of his break with reality.”
- The Atlantic, Peter Wehner: Kamala Harris Broke Donald Trump, subtitled “In their first face-to-face meeting, the Democratic nominee humiliated the former president.”
- CNN: Harris Utterly Destroyed The Felon At Debate
- Media Matters: Trump’s debate debacle put the GOP’s dangerous obsession with MAGA media nonsense on display, subtitled “He’s responded by retreating deeper into its bubble”. (I like the phrase here about “Fox News Cinematic Universe”.)
There were fact-checks.
- Politifact: Fact-checking Kamala Harris and Donald Trump’s first 2024 presidential debate
- Washington Post: Fact-checking 55 suspect claims, mostly Trump’s, in debate with Harris, subtitled “Trump, on the defensive, makes four times more false or suspect claims than Harris in their 2024 presidential debate.”
Of course if you read them through, Harris’s sins are exaggerations or spins (“half-true,” “true,” “mostly false” (about Project 2025)… and just one “false”), while many more of Trump’s are “false” and “debunked” and “flat wrong” and “poppycock.”
Many Republicans are mortified by Trump’s bad performance — he let Harris bait him, he should have stuck to policies — but the MAGA loonies are outraged, especially because the ABC moderators dared to fact-check him.
- Mediaite: Fox News Contributor Reposts Call to ‘Criminally Charge’ ABC Debate Moderators
- Citing Lance Wallnau: Pastor Bad Wig: ABC Used “Witchcraft” On Trump
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Let’s end with a moderate voice of reason.
John Scalzi, 11 Sep 2024: Reminder: This Is As Good As It Gets With Trump
He begins:
I’m not here to go into detail about last night’s presidential debate, since the results of that are already well known: A massive humiliation for Trump, who was easily batted about by Kamala Harris, who kept him angry and defensive the entire night. Only the most delusional of observers believes it was anything other than that, and I will not be humoring them, nor should you.
And here’s his point.
What I am here to say is that last night, Donald Trump was at the best any of us will ever see him again. This was the one place and time where he was meant to be prepared, coherent and presidential, where he was not surrounded by handlers, coddlers and sycophants. This was meant to be the one place and time where he was meant to keep his id and his ego in check, put voters and Americans first, and make a case for a second shot at the presidency. This was the one place and time where his worst and most self-indulgent impulses were supposed to be reined in. This was Trump on his best and most decent behavior, or at the very least, the best and most behavior he is capable of. We see how that went.
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Of course, all of us who are getting older (and the older we are, the faster we seem to get older) could claim the same: the way we are right now is the best we will ever be seen. Biden realized that, and withdrew. Trump does not realize this.
