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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 19, 2024

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Trump's pretty bad at debate too. People considered him to have lost most of the debates he was in.

I suspect the people who say that are missing the point, from the Trump campaign's perspective. Perceptions of how Trump does in debates seem very polarized and, even moreso than normal for such things, watching him in debates mostly seems to intensify whatever the viewer already thought about him. And, a small minority are swayed by this charisma he apparently has (which is completely invisible to me) and do switch to him. Maybe not a lot, but it seems to be a lot more than I've heard of moving in the other direction, especially post-2016. So from his perspective they do their job regardless of who the Serious People think won.

Trump is not "bad at debate". Remember the Trump/Hillary debate where the sour grapes response was that if the sexes were reversed Trump never could have gotten away with that? Then they staged a simulation of it with sex-reversed actors and "female Trump" won even bigger against "male Hillary"?

Trump is pretty good at debates, but he is a little less spry at off the cuff comments as he’s aged. The debate is going to be both highly unpredictable as well as highly consequential. And honestly, helpful for voters!

That play was something else. I still watch the video sometimes. It's amazing how much I want to vote for Fem!Trump.