The (only?) debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris was Tuesday night. I decided I couldn’t live-blog it because I didn’t know whether I would watch it all, but it turns out I did.
Being the knownest of known quantities, Trump had much less to lose going in than Harris did. Had she come out and tanked this opportunity, it could have been fatal for her campaign.
She did not. She came out poised and confident, and remained so for the full hour and a half. She embraced the challenge and excelled. Any fears I had that she’d muff this were gone in the first couple of minutes. Additionally, though debates don’t feature near the policy discussions they once did—this is mostly a risk vs. reward thing—Harris did discuss specifics of her proposals a few times.
As for Trump, I will say he remained mostly poised until Harris commented on people leaving his rallies.
Trump could not stand it.
He hit this comment like a fat largemouth bass on a shiny spoon bait, and never recovered. Descending steadily into self-caricature, he made less and less sense. He’d begin comments, then interrupt himself and start something else without context—something that actually afflicted Biden in the previous debate—and the result was not coherent thought.
Talking about Harris’s race again was a huge unforced error, as was his steadfast refusal to finally acknowledge that he lost the 2020 election. And why would he not say he wanted Ukraine to win the war with Russia? And who will ever forget “in Springfield they’re eating the dogs! The people that come in, they’re eating the cats!”?
Kamala Harris won the debate. I called it “decisive” on Facebook. I wish I now believed it implausible for Trump to win, but I don’t. We’ve seen his lockstep sycophants remain so through worse than this.
But maybe—just maybe—someone, somewhere, or (better) several someones in several somewheres, saw the debate Tuesday night and thought “hey, we have an option. We can vote for a composed adult for President of the United States.”