I don't really know how Tapper & Bash could have fact-checked Trump without turning it into a four-way debate. Maybe have Daniel Dale onsite and take occasional pauses to rate the veracity of statements?
Every debate involving Trump goes off the rails and none of the revised rules really did much to prevent that. I legitimately don't know what they could have done.
Trump isn't great at much, but he's a gifted bullshit artist. Debating a bullshit artist is impossible, it's a category error. Debates need to be engaged with in good faith to be meaningful. Otherwise the bullshit artist runs over everyone else and the whole thing is a train wreck.
The problem is after last night's performance that would be perceived as Biden being scared to debate, not as Trump being too much of a liar to be worth debating
In my opinion, so be it. Better than getting run over on national television again.
For the record, I am not a professional politics person and frequently have no idea what I'm talking about, so grain of salt and all that.
we're long past having how things *might be perceived / used by the GOP* dictating behavior. It seems self-evident some of the firehose will stick.
It seems the real point, as Trump has demonstrated, is keeping the spotlight on the other's un-fitness instead of shivving your own guy.
How much longer do we have to let the GOP dictate that dynamic, I wonder? They have the media by the curlies. Everything is always the Democrats fault, no matter how vile the GOP behave.
The train wreck was what we wanted to see anyway, we all know both guys and the people who are waffling and “haven’t made up their minds until they hear more about their platforms” are lying to you or aren’t watching that nonsense
They cut the mic off plenty, Biden talked into a dead mic a few times near the end just snapping back at Trump. They mostly just shut up when the “your mic is off” light came on though because no one could hear them unless they yelled loud enough for the other guy’s mic to pick it up
(Example: Biden yelled “show me!” At Trump when he said lie number 37,251,004 of the night. I forget which lie it was but I remember hearing Biden come through trump’s mic from far away lol)
They could have not done a debate that involves an obviously malignant narcissist as a candidate. But the “news” media wants to sell ad slots. That’s all they care about.
There is nothing other than having them read prepared statements at each other from fifty paces and if one deviates from the script they are dropped into a moat
Has anyone ever tried to go up an just slap him? Like, a shovel-like hand, square across his face? The audacity alone may shut him up for a minute at least
