That sound you’re hearing is me breathing a sigh of relief that the debates are finally over and Joe Biden not only survived, he thrived. He won both debates and the dueling town hall that replaced the second debate.
Biden did nothing to disqualify himself and quite frankly, that’s all he needed to do. Trump on the other hand is facing an uphill battle. The number of persuadable voters are shrinking everyday by the millions due to record turnout in early voting. Trump was hoping that these debates would convince the few remaining voters on the fence to support him, but he failed to accomplish that.
Tonight, Trump was much calmer, but make no mistake, he was just as mendacious as any other day of the week. His attacks fell flat, because a majority of Americans do not understand the buzz words he uses which are unique to his base and those in the FOX News bubble. So, they went right over our heads.
I guess conservatives are happy because with Trump, the bar is in hell, and tonight he managed to cleared it because he didn’t light himself on fire like he did in that first debate. But, bigger picture, it wasn’t a win. Trump desperately needed a strong win against Biden on that debate stage tonight and this wasn’t it.
Biden had a good night. He was strong on the issues Americans actually care about this election cycle, the coronavirus pandemic and health care. He was also able to get a few good hits in on Donald Trump on these issues. He was empathetic and spoke as an American president while Donald Trump spoke as the president of just the red states and tried to paint himself as the underdog or an outsider even though he’s currently in the White House.
Overall, the debates didn’t change the trajectory of this race.That’s great for Biden and bad for Trump because now he has fewer opportunities to speak to Americans outside his base to cut into Biden’s lead.
Trump needed to obliterate Biden on that stage but that didn’t happen. He squandered the opportunity to convince Americans that he cares about fixing the issues that we actually care about. Now, its back on the campaign trail for both candidates with Biden hoping to run out the clock and Trump hoping for a Comey-esque miracle.
