The showdown last night – pitting a devotee of democracy who aspires to be our next president against a groupie of autocracy who aspires to be our last-ever president – was more delicious than an ice cream sundae with cherry on top.
Thanks to a shrewd performance by Kamala Harris, one that surely exceeded Democratic dreams, Donald Trump was reduced to the most imbecilic parody of himself. He was the neighborhood lunatic who wanders the street in his bathrobe screaming at trees.
Gee, perhaps men are too emotional to be president.
Indeed, after what many of us witnessed, you have to wonder what more evidence America’s “undecideds” could possibly need in casting their ’24 ballots.
If there’s any justice in this world – if a modicum of sanity still reigns in this country – this race should have ended last night, once and for all, when Trump was asked why he blocked a tough bill that would’ve put thousands of new agents and officers on the border, and instead of answering the question, he lost his mind: “Look at what’s happening to the towns all over the United States…A lot of towns don’t want to talk about it because they’re so embarrassed by it. In Springfield (Ohio), they’re eating the dogs! The people that came in. They’re eating the cats! They’re eating – they’re eating the pets of the people that live there!”
The guy is a poet. He is e e cummings on acid:
They’re eating the dogs
They’re eating the cats
They’re eating
They’re eating the pets of the people
Given the dearth of evidence for that soliloquy, I have to wonder whether our “undecideds” would really consider putting this demented fool in charge of anything more taxing than a lemonade stand. And I could’ve posed that same question throughout the 90 minutes, every time Harris goaded him into going Full Idiot.
Pre-debate, there was much concern in MAGA GOP circles over whether he could exercise some self-discipline and stay “on script.” Nah. He’s too far gone for mental rigor.
Repeatedly, Harris put bait in the water and, repeatedly, he took it. And to see him tortured that way by a Black woman…how sweet it was. Like when she teed him up with this, addressing the folks at home: “I’m going to invite you to attend one of Donald Trump’s rallies because it’s a really interesting thing to watch. You will see during the course of his rallies he talks about fictional characters like Hannibal Lecter. He will talk about windmills cause cancer. And what you will also notice is that people start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom.”
What a cinch it was to reel him in. “People don’t leave my rallies!” he bellowed. (They do leave early. It’s on video.) Then he recycled one of his August delusions: “People don’t go to her rallies! There’s no reason to go! And the people that do go, she’s busing them in and paying them to be there!”
Over and over, he fell hostage to his worst weaknesses – pets & cats, rally size, the 2020 election…especially the latter. How many Americans, outside the MAGA bubble, care two shits about time-traveling to 2020, to revisit his delusion about a “stolen” election?
But he cares, because that phony issue is all about him (whereas Harris spent much of the debate talking directly to the voters about our cares and our concerns). The terminal narcissist wasted precious time still insisting that he won in ’20: “There’s so much proof. All you have to do is look at it…If you look at the facts, and I’d love to have (ABC News) do a special on it. I’ll show you Georgia and I’ll show you Wisconsin and I’ll show you Pennsylvania and I’ll show you – we have so many facts and statistics.” When it was pointed out that he lost 60 court cases, he said they were all thrown out on “a technicality,” whereas those of us who were alive at the time well remember that judge after judge (including some Trump appointees) ruled that his lawyers had presented zero evidence of stolen or fraudulent votes.
And Harris, who eyed his string of rants with puckish bemusement, dropped the mic on him: “Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people. So let’s be clear about that. And clearly, he is having a very difficult time processing that.”
It was also fun when Harris skewered him for saying in 2017 that there were some “very fine people” among the neo-Nazis who marched in Charlottesville, and his defense was that his favorite doormats, “Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity,” felt that what he’d said was “perfect.”
It was also fun when Harris baited him about his global reputation – addressing him directly: “I have traveled the world as vice president of the United States. And world leaders are laughing at Donald Trump. I have talked with military leaders, some of whom worked with you. And they say you’re a disgrace” – and this was his response: “Let me just tell you about world leaders. Viktor Orban, one of the most respected men – they call him a strong man. He’s a tough person. Smart. Prime Minister of Hungary…He said the most respected most feared person is Donald Trump.”
Yes, that’s who he chose as his character reference: the autocrat who’s been systematically destroying democracy in Hungary. Harris nailed him for that too: “It is well known that he admires dictators, wants to be a dictator on day one according to himself…And it is absolutely well known that these dictators and autocrats are rooting for you to be president again because they’re so clear, they can manipulate you with flattery and favors. And that is why so many military leaders who you have worked with have told me you are a disgrace.”
She also hit him with this gem about sucking up to Vladimir Putin, who could threaten eastern Europe if NATO is weakened: “Why don’t you tell the 800,000 Polish Americans right here in Pennsylvania how quickly you would give up (Poland) for the sake of favor, and what you think is a friendship with a dictator who would eat you for lunch?” The look on Trump’s face – go easy on me, proctologist! – was priceless.
The old loon spilled so much blood, it’s a miracle he didn’t need IV fluids. Harris pounded him for repeatedly trying to sabotage Obamacare (he’s still hawking his non-existent health plan: “We’ll come up with something, we’re working on things”). She hammered him for his long racist track record, starting with his refusal in the ’70s to rent apartment units to Black families (he had no answer for that). When he recycled his standard lie that the crime rate is “through the roof” (the FBI says it’s going down), she twisted the stiletto: “This is so rich – coming from someone who has been prosecuted for national security crimes, economic crimes, election interference, has been found liable for sexual assault, and his next big court appearance is in November at his own criminal sentencing.” And when he started to obsess (yet again) about President Biden, she gently reminded him: “You’re not running against Joe Biden, you’re running against me.”
Indeed, one of her tasks last night was to sell herself to voters who are still getting to know her. Whereas Trump as always stayed focused on himself, she spoke to the voters’ hopes and dreams: “I have a plan to build what i call an opportunity economy. We know that we have a shortage of homes and housing, and the cost of housing is too expensive for far too many people. We know that young families need support to raise their children. And I intend on extending a tax cut for those families of $6,000, which is the largest child tax credit that we have given in a long time. So that those young families can afford to buy a crib, buy a car seat, buy clothes for their children…I love our small businesses. My plan is to give a $50,000 tax deduction to start-up small businesses, knowing they are part of the backbone of America’s economy.”
Will this debate prove consequential, swing the “undecideds,” and spare us a MAGA restoration? Given what happened in 2016, I’m done with predictions. But I keep thinking about what she told Trump: “You’re not running against Joe Biden, you’re running against me.”
Oh I bet he knows that now.
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Epilogue:
Fleeing this morning to the Fox News cocoon, Trump offered two assessments of the debate. (1) It was “rigged” against him, and (2) He doesn’t “know that I want to do another debate.”
Righto. As if he’d ever want to suffer another beatdown from a Black woman.