Watching it was painful. Like a train wreck. But that, I later realized, said more about me than what was on the screen.
I liked Harris’s gallant handshake. And her pleasantness while Trump glowered darkly through slit eyes. Yet that’s his shtick; his very transgressiveness perversely appealing to certain sorts.
And I feared he came on stronger — by shamelessly willing to say the most nonsensical and outrageous things — which Harris didn’t call out enough. I doubted most voters would get it.
But then, hearing the CNN commentariat, I realized my perspective was a casualty of too much information. Not seeing the forest for the trees.
In fact Harris cleaned his clock. Not tackling his every absurdity was disciplined self-restraint; yet she got under his skin, and he took her bait every time, his whacko psyche plunging him down rabbit holes. Ever lucid Van Jones said finally someone foiled that bully.
Every single Trump answer — literally every one — was a farrago of ridiculous lies. At least three right in his opener: “worst inflation in history” (not even close); immigrants coming out of prisons and insane asylums (utter nonsense); “highest level of criminality” (ditto).
Any facts he doesn’t like are fake and rigged. FBI crime data showing it was higher in his administration and declining in Biden’s? Fake! Rigged! The cascade of prosecutions for his crimes? Politically weaponized! (Something he actually threatens opponents with.) And of course his 2020 election loss — rigged!
He loved taunting Harris for not accomplishing this, that, and the other, during the past three plus years. Cute, but also ridiculous given the VP’s limited power.
Meantime his other accusations were not just false but hyperbolically so. Like Democrats wanting “open borders;” to confiscate guns; to ban fracking; to reap fraudulent votes from non-citizens. He repeated his completely fabricated tale of offering 10,000 troops to defend the Capitol on January 6 but Nancy Pelosi refused, later being recorded admitting responsibility for the violence. Didn’t happen. Nor did President Biden mysteriously receive $3-1/2 million (or any amount) from the wife of Moscow’s mayor.
And he accused Democrats of favoring end-of-pregnancy abortions — indeed, “executing” babies after birth. While claiming his Supreme Court appointees ending abortion rights, “returning the issue to the states,” was what everybody wanted. Brought the country together, no less. Yeah, right. With Republican-controlled states imposing draconian laws almost no one actually wants.
Of course Trump’s most grotesque lie was Haitian immigrants eating people’s pet cats and dogs. Lunatic even for Trump — and that’s saying something. Turns out this was a bogus internet meme local officials debunked. Moreover, it only concerned cats — dogs were a Trump embellishment.
In the post-debate spin room, J.D. (“cat lady”) Vance called this “crazy stuff” — referring not to Trump’s words, but the alleged pet eating. Insisting it hadn’t been absolutely disproven. What a creep.
CNN’s Dana Bash aptly pointed out that attributing this pet eating nonsense to Haitians is outright racism. Trump’s vile racist history was one thing Harris did call him out on.
It’s theoretically conceivable Trump has a case to make that’s not false at its core. But the pervasive use of lies suggests otherwise. If there’s any truth there, why lie? So much?
Watching his debate performance felt like a buzz-saw ripping through my heart. I feared its sheer power could carry him to triumph. But then most of a CNN focus group of undecided Pennsylvania voters liked Harris better. And a national poll of debate watchers gave her the victory by a lopsided margin. Yet Trump called those results — guess what? — fake. Claiming he won the debate, bigly. Even though it was — guess what? — rigged against him!
Finally, when confronted about legions of his own former top officials now warning he’s a menace who should never be entrusted with power again, Trump said they were all people he’d fired for doing a bad job. Another lie — all or nearly all left of their own accord — but if it were true, what would that say about the guy who appointed them in the first place?
And what does all this say about anyone still voting for him?