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This was by no means a good debate for Trump, at least in terms of his individual performance. He blatantly refused to answer some questions, and they were the pretty important questions involving stuff like Putin and J6. Others were bad for different reasons, e.g. "will you accept the results of the election" with his response being basically "not if I lose". Worse than any of that though is that his responses were just incoherent. It's like if a lobotomized chatGPT was told to act like Trump, and it spewed a random collection of things that individually sounded like something Trump would say, but without any coherent structure or chain of logic. Trump has always had a meandering speaking style, but compare his performance tonight to the debates in 2016 and there's a world of difference. He's pretty clearly suffered a substantial age-related mental slowdown since then.
Of course, Biden's performance was way, way worse so it'll likely just be forgotten.
It depends on the standards you're using for "good." Trump is never going give an answer that is detailed or factual, because he doesn't know details or facts. He's going to sell something -- usually himself -- with confidence.
His past debate failures have been down to misjudging how aggressive and petulant he can be. He toned it down last night for the most part, and let his opponent lose without interference, so it was a relative success for him.
Sure, it was a relative win since his opponent self-destructed a lot harder than he did. But the 2016 Trump I remember would have at least had a coherent story to follow, and would be better at selling himself than... whatever the heck was onstage last night.
Debate is against the other opponent. It’s not against ideal images of him in the past or against an arbitrary standard. It’s a sport where you square off against an opponent and you either eat him or he beats you. And Biden lost big time. Trump only had to be the guy who knew where he was and not ramble. Biden was lost, rambled, and had numerous word salads and blank stares followed by him having to be lead off stage by his wife because he didn’t know where the exits were.
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This is an excellent debate strategy. You have a limited amount of time to express your ideology and there’s no reason to stay within the fictitious drawn square that CNN places you in. Putin and J6 are not serious questions, I don’t think, but rather attempts to remind the viewer of Trump Bad.
I’m surprised you believe that. I went into the debate thinking Trump would do badly but he came out strong and quick-witted. His reaction time to questions was immediate.
Avoiding questions never looks good. Politicians do it when they know they have no good answer. Usually they can get away with 1 or 2, but it seemed like Trump did it 4-6 times, and he pivoted very awkwardly every time.
Even when he wasn't clumsily dodging questions, Trump's answers were just bad. Again, watch some of his debate performances in 2016 compared to this one, and the evidence is pretty stark.
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Nearly all the "Trump unhealthy" speculation is in bad faith. I immediately discount people who espouse that belief since it's so easily contradicted by my own eyes.
He has lost weight, even if he's still fat. He actually is a good golfer, even if he lies about his scores. And his schedule is just epic. I doubt most people on this forum could keep his schedule.
While he's no genius, he's clearly on the upper end of charisma and energy for adults of any age, let alone someone who is nearing 80.
"Both candidates old" is cope.
When was the last time Trump played a round of golf where his score was verified by someone other than a MAGA ally or a subordinate? His best scores all seem to come at his own golf courses.
You can't estimate the ground truth by adjusting the words of a lying liar.
We'll probably never have the proof you want, but you can find videos of him golfing. He's good. Extremely good for his age.
Lindsey Graham says Trump shot a 74 when they played a few years back. That's an astoundingly good score for someone of any age. Maybe Graham's in on the lying too. Maybe Trump cheated. Even if he cheated by one stroke on every hole that's a 92 which is quite decent.
You can also see videos of him swinging. It's not a pro level swing, but it's very good for his age. He makes solid contact and drives the ball straight and far. Why are people so determined to say he's bad at golf? To me it's one of the clearer signs of TDS. He can be evil, no good, stupid, and still be an excellent golfer.
It reminds me of people who disparage Hitler as a "failed painter" or whatever. I mean I'm not a fan of his, but his artwork seems alright.
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Seriously. Who wouldn't expect the owner of tons of super fancy golf courses to actually be good at golf? TDS indeed.
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It's common for people to talk about Biden being juiced up on nootropics, but I'm curious about the possibility that Trump was on something as well (Adderall/Caffeine/Modafinil?) It would make sense to consult a physician as to how to become as mentally alert as possible for such an important event.
I mean, maybe caffeine, but there's a pretty good chance Trump doesn't know what Adderall or Modafinil even are.
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I would be surprised if he was, he's notoriously "straight edge" due to his brother's struggles with alcoolism, and that's one of the things I can believe is a deeply-held personal conviction of his.
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Isn't it public knowledge that the dude crushes like 8 diet cokes daily?
I don't drink soda, but I've heard that a regular stream of that kind of rocket fuel makes you durably "peppy" but destroys mental focus - which is exactly how Trump has acted since he came down the escalator.
Trump definitely falls into word salad constantly, but I've never believed that it's because of mental decline or impairment. I think it's a habituated verbal pattern developed over years and years of constant hyper-marketing. I've never heard of the business world thinking Donald Trump is a master of financial engineering, or that he really has an eye for underdeveloped or undervalued properties, or that he has the autistic wizard gifts to get permitting done quickly (although I think he kind of did this once on accident in the 1980s. Don't remember details). He, is, however, a marketing natural and his particular marketing style has always been hyperbole, bluster, repetition, and volume.
When he says something like "Everyone said we had the best Presidency of all time," it's exactly the same as him opening the Taj Mahal (that had non-functioning slot machines) and saying "Everyone is saying this is the best Casino they've ever been to." This is just how he talks.
You can see the same ingrained verbal patterns in academics or podcast Bros. Elon definitely has his own eccentricities. None of this excuses Trump from constantly lying but, after round 100 of this, people can't continue to be shocked, SHOCKED!, that he's spewing falsehoods.
That's like 4 8-oz cups of coffee, assuming we're talking 12-oz cans and not 2-liter bottles. It's pretty moderate.
Moderate? I don't think 4 cups of coffee a day is moderate, at least personally. And for a 77 year old?
I might be caffeine sensitive, but it's not a small thing.
4 cups of coffee a day is usually considered moderate. I know of no reason this would be different for the elderly. Note Biden is a coffee drinker.
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I've never seen this clip before. Jeb is more forceful and well-spoken than I'd given him credit for, and Trump is (was?) a marvellously entertaining public speaker.
I remember Jeb being derided as low-energy back in 2016, and I used to laugh along with everyone else when Trump smacked him in his smug face. The days when I supported Trump seem so distant now, but rewatching some of those debates brings back lots of memories.
But nowadays, bring back 2016 Jeb! and he would wipe the floor with either of the candidates as they presently stand.
Only if he had a different last name
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I don't recall that specific moment between Trump and Jeb, but wow does Trump come across as the winner there.
Kind of what I'm saying about "it's what they hear". Jeb could have won that exchange if he didn't sit back and smile and laugh and internally celebrate "winning a point". He should have made a connection that matters, not a just settled for a cerebral, conservative purist talking point. He should have gone "Trump is a bully and self-absorbed and if he's president he's going to run right over all of you like that old lady when it's convenient for him". Instead, voters see a tangle about something they don't care strongly about, and one candidate clearly acting like the winner. People like winners. Jeb sitting back is implicitly accepting Trump's later unrelated claim about the studio audience all being wealthy donors.
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That was meta win for Trump. It was the early sign that substance didn't matter in 2016. Everyone kept playing the game like it did, even when they should've known better.
Trump was a reality star for over a decade. Everyone else is playing chess, expecting him to play checkers, when he's really yelling loudly at pigeons in Central Park.
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There's no such thing as a good debate for Trump. He's an incoherent windbag.
There's also no such thing as a good campaign for Trump. He's an incoherent windbag with non-existent managerial and executive skills.
None of that matters.
47% of the country votes blue. 47% of the country votes red.
Because of the demographic makeup of states and the electoral college, that remaining 6% has slightly advantage to Red team. So, it's always Blue team's job to hold a bit of an edge. Incumbency advantage is 1-2%, the rest is usually the economy.
Biden has needed to find a simple narrative on the economy plus one major issue (default: abortion) on which to campaign. He's failed to do that. I wondered why for a long time. I thought it had to do with internal conflict within the Democrat party or an inability to sustain a consistent core narrative through the constantly shifting news cycle.
Nope. The fact of the matter is that candidate himself isn't up to the task at all. That's what we learned conclusively tonight after a few months of secret-not-secret speculation. This election has been Biden's to lose all along and he probably just did.
Now, can The Democrats still win? Probably. Their biggest obstacle is themselves. I doubt Kamala will go quietly into that good night, but she's utterly un-electable and Gavin New some was in the Biden green room tonight. Trump? His debate performance was exactly as it has always been - pretty much abysmal and an easy win for anybody not named Joe Biden. His strongest issues are immigration and inflation and he consistently overplays both (that's how we got into "We're living in hell right now!" territory). Trump will not win votes, you (the Democrats) can only lose them.
The democrats aren’t going to win the presidential election. The establishment dems have acknowledged this for a while- the Biden economy is perceived to badly for them to win.
Their goal was to prevent ‘Biden loses’ from collapsing support downballot. A Kamala-Newsom duel is probably even worse at that than leaving the candidate who belongs in a memory ward at the top of the ticket.
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If Trump was the reincarnation of Cato in terms of eloquence he wouldn't get any credit from anyone. You miss the point of the debate. It mattered, not that it was expected to change anyone's mind, but that it was a holy ritual of the American republic held for the sake of tradition. That Biden couldn't even rise to the very mild task that this is a bad omen for the republic, and a sign of weakness.
Things like this matter.
But debate DO tend to move the mind of undecided voters. Well, not always. But often enough. Bush-Perot-Clinton was big, Bush-Gore was big, Trump-Hillary was big. I don't think it's purely performative.
It's punditry on my part. Imagine the American president as a sort of pontifex maximus, a secular priest, who keeps the republic sacred through keeping the forms of rituals and propriety, as Confucius states.
Voters will never outright say that it's part of the sentiment (and neither will it be asked.) Part of Biden's appeal was that he promised to obey the American aesthetic of power, to uphold the norms of republican life. If he's too old and senile to remember how then that advantage goes away.
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Come now, let us not forget Hillary Clinton, or the Republican primary candidates that got slaughtered back in 2016 so badly, that no one could even come close to challenging him in the current run, even after he lost the 2020 presidency.
Republic Primaries - fair. He did bring it.
Vs Hillary? I always felt like she let him back into it because she's so insincere herself. I believe most of the "experts" said she won each debate, but I think that was also at a time when the "experts" were pretending about half of American didn't exist, didn't vote, and certainly didn't matter. The whole story of 2016 is just how far willful self-deception can take you (all the way until you're face to face with your own glass ceiling).
Yeah. All I'm saying is that the list of people capable of losing to Trump is longer than just Joe Biden. I agree that it says more about them than him, but this is where we are.
Trump's political "gift" is that he is the antidote to a certain kind of entrenched mainstream political insincerity by himself being a cartoon of political insincerity. Every politician loses in some way by appearing with Trump.
He mocks his opponents merely by appearing alongside them -- and then also points out that he is mocking them as he mocks them directly on micro-subjects. He is the clown who reveals that it's been a clown show all along. I think this makes him a shitty president, but very useful as a sort of corrective to a game that has been playing with itself for far too long.
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I agree Trump has never been a great debater, but he generally held his own in 2016 against both the Republican challengers and against Hillary. I encourage anyone who doesn't see the difference to watch some clips from 2016, and then watch some of his responses from tonight right after. The difference is quite stark.
I don't disagree that the Dems have some tough choices ahead for them. If they try to nix Biden, that's unprecedented and causes chaos and is undemocratic. If they don't get rid of him, he'll probably lose. Trump would probably even get to 47% and beyond in that case (he didn't in either of his previous elections).
The big issue with Biden is that he’s manifestly unfit to be president in the ‘can’t do the job’ sense. If democrats won’t show up to vote Biden because of that, the odds are they won’t vote downballot either, which can massacre democrats in congress.
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I found this analysis lines up pretty closely with my thinking about debates, from a pollster who does "dial testing" where voters instantly react to things throughout the debate. His claim: it's usually not about the one-liners and what the media hypes. For example, a lot of people didn't notice Bush Sr. check his watch, or care; Trump's first Biden debate performance where he interrupted a lot played very very poorly with women voters; Trump's "because she'd be in jail" against Hillary was actually loved by a lot of viewers. Just to pick a few examples he listed about how the classic "big moments" analysis is often wrong or misguided by popular media.
I'd say in terms of debate performances from Trump, 2016 > 2024 > 2020, but we've only seen one debate of two so that might still change. I'd peg a Biden victory in the 25-40% range, currently. Not impossible, but not the kind of numbers we usually see in presidential races where it's normally 40-60% in the last 30 years or so.
Yeah, I agree with that article. Anyone who knows anything about politics knows that debates as they ought to be (the issues) are a farce. They're just two simultaneous press conferences, and voters care about amorphous "vibes" more than anything. Nobody can really predict what the definitive vibes will be even shortly after the debate, and in the end they usually don't matter much anyways (e.g. Romney's first debate in 2012).
For Trump's debate performances, I generally agree but will add nuance that I think 2016 > second debate 2020 > 2024 > first debate 2020. The second (non cancelled) presidential debate of 2020 Trump did... fine? I can't remember much about it. At least he didn't blatantly shoot himself in the foot like he did in the first one.
For current odds of Biden's victory, I peg it at around 25% now, with a 15% chance the Dems switch candidates and win, and a 60% chance that Trump wins.
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I don't know if you intended this to be a subtle "ha ha, I got you!" If not, nbd. If you did -- it's not the win you think it is. You're absolutely correct Trump got less than 47% in both 2016 and 2020 which means he unperformed a replacement level Republican candidate - and came out on top the first time. Donald Trump is the worst Presidential candidate in the modern era .... except for Hillary Clinton. Depending on this years results, he might end up in a weird tie for second-worst candidate with Joe Biden - and also be a two term President.
Again, Donald Trump is a stationary target highlighted in high contrast paint. The Democrats have perfect data on windage and distance, and have the ability to sight in with lasers and use a bench rest to take their shot.
Their first instinct, since 2016, has been to shoot themselves repeatedly in the face.
The problem with this is that the Dems are also held hostage by a galaxy of personal interests and corruption - the uniparty policies that Trump makes vast amounts of noise about taking down (his actual effectiveness at doing so has been mixed, of course). Sure, the democrats COULD change things around and run a real candidate who can stand up to Trump both in terms of personality and policy... but they won't, in the same sense that I COULD spontaneously type in the private key to some random BTC wallet and transfer myself a vast sum of money.
Apparently Trump is going to be getting big oil and gas money this cycle, among other billionaires. He's even letting them write executive orders for his team, allegedly in part because the corps don't trust that he'll get enough talent to write them good enough themselves. I wouldn't hold my breath for any swamp-draining from either candidate this time around.
But I think the Democrats are genuinely echo-chambered, rather than being ruled by deliberate PMC plants. Too much college education, I hate to say it.
Would trump’s oil and gas policies be any different from what the industry wants?
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The unprincipled calls for "windfall" taxes blackpilled a lot of people in the energy industry, who were very much willing to join the uniparty in 2020.
Most people assume that oil is this incredibly profitable industry. That hasn't been very true since 2014, when U.S. fracking flooded the world with cheap oil. Since then the price of XOM stock has flatlined, while tech companies like Apple and Microsoft have increased by 500% or more. Many smaller energy companies failed to survive the 8 year downturn.
When a small positive cycle came around in 2022 (with inflation-adjusted peak prices still far below the 2010–2014 norm), some oil companies were finally, after nearly a decade, making profits again. To be immediately hit with calls for windfall taxes was a powerful reminder that the Democrats hate energy companies and want them to fail. It is quite literally the inverse of what people think. In energy, the profits are socialized while the losses are privatized.
You make a great point. More voters should certainly be aware of this, and I agree that looting the oil/gas industry isn't the best policy prescription either. However, it's worth noting that the oil and gas industry is one of those that has a particularly nasty personal history in terms of how they encourage certain foreign policy objectives, and also their treatment of the environment overall as well as people who interfere with traditional pollution. It's a bit naive to think that some of these at least slightly evil executives are all gone just because 10 bad years have passed. Some institutional skepticism, then, I feel is still warranted. But yeah, skepticism != hate and desire for failure. Also worth noting that at least my perception is that actual anti-oil Democrats are still the minority in the party. Oil, after all, still gives a fair amount of jobs.
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Request: General write-up on your views on the Energy industry. Genuinely curious as I nerd out on anybody who has more than a surface level of how different sectors work. Too much "financial analysis" is Bloomberg levels of "Well, apple sells phones and I used my phone this morning, so I guess apple is a great investment!"
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I wonder how different the executive order writing (assuming it would indeed be happening as presented) is from the standard lobbyist contribution to legislation? Obviously, the latter at least has some sort of check in the form of other legislators having to vote on it.
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I think Democrats just have misidentified Trump's appeal, and thus all their messaging is aimed at the wrong (voter) target. They've lost their populist everyman instincts, badly. So yes, Trump is highlighted, but you aren't aiming at Trump, you're aiming at voters. Typical swing voters often make their decisions on gut more than brain. (That's fine, BTW, I personally think). And yes, there's some infighting too. But the GOP has had some significant infighting as well, which has also hurt them, so I'm hesitant to totally blame that alone. Which is why I think constructing the message wrong is, yes, a bit of a self-own, but not because of a lack of vision, it's a lack of awareness.
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