First impression: Both candidates look so, so very old.
It’s a bit odd to watch a presidential debate on a CNN set rather than in a debate hall. Gives it much less stature. Makes it look more like an episode of Crossfire.
Trump’s spin room is reportedly stocked full of potential Vice-Presidential nominees, which inevitably makes one wonder who the obvious decoys are.
@afahlberg writes: “Expect Joe Biden to continue making his democracy-versus-chaos pitch onstage tonight and bait Trump into tense exchanges over the overturning of Roe v. Wade, January 6, and the 2020 election.”
The fact that we’re having a June debate at all is an indication that the president’s team knows it’s incumbent on them to change the dynamics of this race. This offensive strategy suggests they want to achieve that by agitating and mobilizing the Democratic Party’s lethargic base vote.
The theory makes sense, but the Biden campaign’s means are fraught. If the president swings for the fences on every pitch, he’s going to look cloying – cementing the already prevalent impression among political observers that the incumbent is the underdog in this race.
Not to burst everybody’s bubble, but the threshold is really high for something to happen tonight that would actually change this race. In the coming days, the Supreme Court is going to release major decisions; then it will be July 4 holiday weekend; then we’ll have Trump’s sentencing and VP pick; then we’ll have the RNC and DNC conventions. If something major happens — a particularly obnoxious evening for Trump, Biden having a senior moment that can’t be spun — it may make a difference. And a good night for Biden may be a relief to supporters worried about the latest grim polling data. But given how early the debate is happening in the year and how many more big events are coming in the next two months, it’s very unlikely that votes will be significantly influenced by anything that happens tonight.
Jim, I think it is grimly hilarious that we have just accepted that this has been an uneventful presidential campaign because the most exciting thing that happened was one of the candidates getting convicted of 34 felonies.
Expect Joe Biden to continue making his democracy-versus-chaos pitch onstage tonight and bait Trump into tense exchanges over the overturning of Roe v. Wade, January 6, and the 2020 election.
I also wouldn’t be surprised if Trump reminds viewers that Biden has spent the past seven days away from the White House undergoing intense debate prep at Camp David.
“I don’t know what they’ve got in these performance enhancers,” a post on the president’s official social media account began, “but I’m feeling pretty jacked up.” The “performance enhancers” the president referenced is a can of Joe Biden’s “Secret Sauce,” available today for just $4.60 a pop beginning July 18th. I kid you not. Among the secret ingredients in the formula Biden “took before going on stage” at tonight’s debate include “MAGA tears,” playing off a bit of long-running Right-wing bravado that graces kitsch from coffee mugs to novelty wine. If you can’t beat ‘em, I guess, join ‘em.
Jeff’s right; one of the reasons I think tonight's debate is getting so hyped is because the media is desperately hungry for something dramatic and surprising to shake up a rematch that looked likely at the end of last year. Other than Trump’s conviction and a few Biden freezes, the 2024 campaign has been predictable and dull, a rematch between two extremely well-known quantities. There’s at least a chance that something surprising or unexpected could happen tonight, so CNN and all the other news organizations are hoping that something happens so they have something to talk about beyond, “who will Trump select as his running mate?”
MBD has a point that Trump should come in hot because that is who he is and what he does, and you may as well do the stuff that has worked whenever things have worked for Trump. But Trump does not need to put Biden on the canvas and glare down at him like the Ali-Liston fight. What he needs most of all is to remind people that he’s more interested in the stuff happening to you today than he is in his own grievances from 2020 and from his ongoing criminal trials. He needs to show that he’s running for president and not for payback.