"Would you . . . ?" Part Two: Scum and Stammerer. (Presidential Debate Thread)

[Birdjaguar]

Mortgage rates being high is a function of interest rates being raised to combat inflation. Given the benefits of having an independent central bank I for one am happy that didn't come up.

Rent being too high is a function of not building enough housing for the past 30 years, there is literally no short term solution, and the only solution at all is to remove burdens to building housing for the next decade+.

Yes, and the burdens to adding more housing happen at the local level: zoning, land availability; planning departments, NIMBY, etc. There is no universal fix.

 

[amadeus]

Probably a good idea for the Biden camp to avoid having that on any debate agendas. I remember in 2015 when ¡Jeb! tried to dislodge Trump on a real estate question, and Trump just mopped the floor with him.

 

[Narz]

Yeah, my next little essay is going to make the point that Biden's mind processed thoughts in a more complex fashion than Trump's throughout the debate.

As an example, Trump once spoke of illegal immigrants taking "black jobs." Not "more heavily impacting the African-American workforce," or "taking jobs disproportionately from Black workers," or something along those lines, but taking "black jobs." That's a crudity of thinking which, as you say, we long ago "priced in" with Trump.

To use a chess analogy, Trump realizing they are playing blitz (where you have 3-5 minutes for the whole game) whereas Biden trying to think as if he has two hours to speak (as debates used to be but now they have to compete with tiktok)

When you have two minutes to speak yeah it's "black jobs", even in longer form why waste the words when people know what you mean (maybe the 1st time you say it if you have two hours)?

 

[Gori the Grey]

No, Narz. It's a sign that Trump plays chess the way a pigeon does.

In an unhurried context--one of his rallies, say--he would speak the same way. It arises from a specific limitation in his cognitive abilities. It is one to which we have long become accustomed/numbed. Samson gets at it when he says Trump's mind works with "tokens." But if the question is cognitive ability, then this limitation of his should be brought back into full focus, not just ceded him as "oh that's just Trump."

 

[Narz]

No, Narz. It's a sign that Trump plays chess the way a pigeon does.

He made it to the presidency, demolishing the other Republicans in 2016 like a bowling ball beats pins. He played the debate game as the game was set up and won.

But Biden is smarter?? Probably but his processing speed is like a Apple IIe and he's throwing out stats he can barely remember like he's in grade school when emotion is the name of the game.

 

[Voidwalkin]

No, Narz. It's a sign that Trump plays chess the way a pigeon does.

In an unhurried context--one of his rallies, say--he would speak the same way. It arises from a specific limitation in his cognitive abilities. It is one to which we have long become accustomed/numbed. Samson gets at it when he says Trump's mind works with "tokens." But if the question is cognitive ability, then this limitation of his should be brought back into full focus, not just ceded him as "oh that's just Trump."

How much does it matter if it's intentional or not?

Trump's short, belligerent and insulting manner of speaking is effective regardless. It is a sort of escalation deterence. His opponents seem committed to a style that leaves them vulnerable - go high when he goes low doesn't work. Only equivalent cruelty to him personally really hurts Trump.

It's like he's the first to figure out that civility in speaking just isn't as valued as its been presumed to be.

Trump's manner wouldn't have worked in past eras. You couldn't imagine him speaking to William the Conqueror that way. He'd get run through. When all his opponents are unwilling or unable to effective check his cruel and crude manners, though, that **** works.

 

[Narz]

He says a lot of lies but his core message is that Democrats are weak and obviously he's correct about that.

Democrats core message is that Trump is mean.

 

[r16]

it is the new way . Just like "civility" protected by then current sanctions that a thing about Western (military) interventions kept a system one could insult all but all would be divided into 10 pieces if one of ten tried to respond in kind and nine of ten shaming one of ten . This is really explained by all not really bent on beating one who insults all , as a man of the masses who were long oppressed by the elite , rich and bigoted ten . In some random country that's not America . This is indeed the finest product of American universities and think tanks . Like who wants to bet they failed to develop an antidote , failing to imagine it could happen to them ?

 

[Gorbles]

He says a lot of lies but his core message is that Democrats are weak and obviously he's correct about that.

Democrats core message is that Trump is mean.

And they're correct about that, right?

I mean I'm as tired of "vote for us or you get the bad guy" as anyone is, but if you're saying you gotta give Trump props for his core message, on some level you do for "Trump is mean" as well.

"mean" is kinda downplaying it but I've given up arguing with bias at this point.

 

[Gori the Grey]

He made it to the presidency, demolishing the other Republicans in 2016 like a bowling ball beats pins. He played the debate game as the game was set up and won.

But Biden is smarter?? Probably but his processing speed is like a Apple IIe and he's throwing out stats he can barely remember like he's in grade school when emotion is the name of the game.

The question of Biden's debate performance is a separate one from the one I am taking up, which is what are we to make of Biden's poor debate performance? Is it a sign that he is cognitively impaired? If that is now our (voter's) question, I want' Trump's cognitive impairments as fair game for discussion instead of just ceded him as a given. It feels to me like we're saying, "This guy doesn't have the mental capacity for the demands of the presidency. This guy over here doesn't either, but we won't factor that into our considerations because he's always been a moron." What sense does that line of reasoning make? Same quick answer to @Voidwalkin. I'm not primarily interested in debate effectiveness. I'm interested in the question that the debate seems to be prompting people to ask: is Biden cognitively up to the demands of the Presidency? Ask that question of Trump, too, is my only point. Unbake that question from Trump's cake.

My answer to your question is yes. Biden's mind was working better on its worst day than Trump's does on his best.

I have thoughts on Trump's debate style and Biden's failure to respond to that debate style (because I have thoughts on everything). I'm happy to treat those separately.

 

[Narz]

At the end of the day it's not like either of these guys is doing the heavy lifting of actual decisions.

But does Biden's mind work better than Trump's? I don't really think so.

Trump isn't trying to memorize facts. He's not being the way he is because his brain is failing, his personality has been the same forever. Is he skipping a little from 8 years ago. Maybe a little but not as much as Biden.

 

[EvaDK]

Good thing that the US administration usually functions without much input from the President. The system mostly prevailed during and especially during the end of Trump's Presidency. But that's no excuse for the Republicans and Democrats to nominate two candidates, that would have been thrown out with the bathwater by the voters just 15-20 years ago.

 

[Farm Boy]

The quality of rich predator hasn't changed much. But the internet requires them to speak stupider to get traction with their constituencies.

 

[Core Imposter]

I understand what Gori is saying but is it not some evidence that Trump Derangement Syndrome is real? How many people for how long have been covering up Joe Biden's condition and why?

I don't think Biden is clinically suffering from Alzheimer's but is that really how low the bar is set for a president? I adored Reagan but I was holding my breath the last years. I have said that only Republicans can reject Trump (and I believe would have but for Democratic efforts which just triggered the rally round effect) and now we are seeing a moment when only the Democrats can reject Biden. Will the Democratic party step up and prove for once that they are in fact superior in some way to the Republicans? I guess we'll see.

 

[Farm Boy]

So what? Biden performs now. You elect the VP for a reason, get a good one.

I mean histrionic political arguments aside, there's a whole system.

 

[Voidwalkin]

And they're correct about that, right?

I mean I'm as tired of "vote for us or you get the bad guy" as anyone is, but if you're saying you gotta give Trump props for his core message, on some level you do for "Trump is mean" as well.

"mean" is kinda downplaying it but I've given up arguing with bias at this point.

Is it presumed that mean is inherently bad, and nice is inherently good, or something? Nice isn't a universal human value.

It's not the way I view it. A politician has a vision for society and mean and nice are two different ways to get there. Mean is a better fit with the zeitgeist. Whether the meanie is the builder of a healthy system or the Dark Lord of Mordor is more to the vision and less about kindness.

I understand what Gori is saying but is it not some evidence that Trump Derangement Syndrome is real?

The dude is talking retribution, enemies lists, and doesn't promise to accept the results of the election. Not standard American politics.

 

[Farm Boy]

From the highly regulated, it is interesting to see it said rather than to just feel it done through policy.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

TDS is real. Go to any Trump rally to see the most severe cases.

 

[Gorbles]

Is it presumed that mean is inherently bad, and nice is inherently good, or something? Nice isn't a universal human value.

"mean" is both a kinder word than I'd use and one that doesn't explicitly describe competence. So in-context it both undermines what the Democrat's "core message" is meant to be, and also doesn't even say if it's correct or not. A pretty poor showing on both levels.

Your argument is different, and I don't really care for the distinction. Tends to be made by people insulated from the consequences of "mean", or worse, people that genuinely think it's good for them. Wouldn't want to guess though.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Ok, I can't bear to watch the whole thing, so I decided to offer my opponent the advantage of wind and sun and focused my attention on the moment that is supposedly the clearest sign of Biden's cognitive impairment:

The question on which Biden lost his train of thought was his 1 minute follow-up to a question originally posed to Trump: "given that your first tax cut added 8 trillion to the debt and benefited mostly the wealthy, and that you’re promising more such tax cuts, why should people support that proposed policy?” Trump’s answer went all over the place. I’ll get to that in a moment. Even though it did, Biden remained mindful of the question that had been asked, so that when he got his minute, he directed his answer to the question that was originally asked. He gave an alternate plan to lowering taxes on corporations, and he had some details regarding the form that the plan would take. He would raise the tax rate on billionaires from 8 to 24 or 25 percent, and this would yield 500 billion dollars. He then went on to list where he would spend that money: paying down the debt, child care, elder care, strengthening our health care system generally. He blanked on the final element of his list. I think it was supposed to be “make everyone eligible for Medicare.” Except for forgetting the final element of his list, his answer was a complete, focused answer to the question that was asked, and it was designed to tell the American people what life would be like for them under a second Biden term.

Trump didn’t answer the original question put to him. To the extent that he did address it, he did so only implicitly. He focused on the good economy before Covid and claimed it was the result of the tax cuts. The implicit answer to Tapper’s question was, “I plan to cut taxes for the wealthy again because doing so stimulates the economy as it did in the first three years of my term.” That’s the kind of answer that one can expect from someone who has $8 trillion in debt to answer for and is planning more of the same policy: an evasive answer. It’s a debate success for him to have answered so vigorously that probably most of the audience forgot what the question was.

In the course of his two minutes, Trump drifted to a number of other concerns. The pivot into this drift concerned Covid. He led into it still talking about economics: the pre-Covid economy, he claimed, was so good that it helped our country weather the economic challenges posed by Covid, in a way that even Biden, in pulling us out of Covid benefited from. But once he did shift to Covid, he entirely lost sight of the original question. He boasted that he handed a good situation to Biden, pointed out that more people died of Covid under Biden than under Trump, came down on Biden for the vaccine mandate, slid from that to how highly respected the US is in the world at large, from there to Biden’s putative weaponization of the Justice Department, called the US a third-world nation, and asked Biden why he was allowing across the border millions of people released from mental institutions.

This too, I suppose, could be considered good debating. Pivot off of the question that is uncomfortable to you and instead use your time to rattle off a list of negatives about your opponent. But it’s more than that. In the course of his tirade, Trump full-on forgets what the original question even was. You can see it when they offer Biden his minute. Trump’s eyes roll to his left, “oh, wait, the original question was about economics.”

We might say that both answers were prepared answers and Trump “remembered” his talking points better than did Biden. But that is only because Trump’s talking points put a lighter cognitive load on him in that they don’t need any logical connection. If a question about tax cuts for the wealthy can have as legitimate answers material having to do with vaccine mandates, the weaponization of the Justice department and immigration, what can’t it include? Trump is well practiced at this string charges, so of course he can rattle them off. In any case, in terms of memory, the whole exchange is a wash: Biden forgets the fifth element of his list; Trump forgets the original question. In terms of overall quality of thought, Biden carries the day. He remembers the question, gives an answer that is in logical connection to that, gives an answer that has internal logical coherence.

I know people can’t look past superficial aspects of performance (bluster), but if the question is which candidate’s answer to this question shows a more capable mind, Biden is the winner. Biden in the worst answer he gave in the debate shows mental capacity than Trump.