The debate was fine. I suspect there are more parents and middle class people than there are single issue pro oil voters. Houston, the global capital of the chemical and oil industries, is extremely blue at this point.
Trump looked terrible to anyone we had a chance of actually getting.
There are excellent reasons why attacking the media is popular. They have very little legitimacy, and the only person responsible for that is themselves.
One of the reasons Trump got elected is the lack of faith and trust in our institutions, especially the media.
Worrying about what PBS says after the debate seems like a waste of energy.
I just want to remind everyone how terrified we were in September of Biden debating Trump. We pretty much universally agreed that it would be a disaster, net negative for Biden. Granted Iāve only watched highlights and read this thread, but it seems like through the 2.5 debates that really wasnāt the case. Biden didnāt make any seriously bad gaffes and Trump was the asshole he always is. Yes, the media is treating Trump as a new tone presidential savior, but we kind of all knew theyād do that even if he literally took a shit on the stage. They need their horse race to be tight.
Good point
Respect 
i wonder what kind of correlation weāll see between this debate going up against Thursday night football featuring a division matchup with the eagles in it. it has to have affected trumps chances to win voters over in PA.
Iād assume undecided voters in PA are much more likely to watch an eagles game than the debate.
Early this morning, CNN.com had a decent lead headline - something like āTrump quieter in second debate, but still lies throughout the whole thingā. A couple hours later it was changed to āExpecting a brawl, viewers see a debate break outā. That one seemed worse, but CNN seemed to be doing a decent job last night of not fawning over Trump clearing a ridiculously low bar.
The subheading was still good though:
This was the sub-heading on the original headline too, so I guess they are just playing with different headlines for the same article/analysis.
I think Trumpās gentler tone will be forgotten as soon as he goes off the rails again in another rally. And I guess heāll have several.
60 million people watch the debate. A rally is, what, a million or two, tops? Almost all die hard supporters.
No joke it really does warm my heart to see Crow T Robot is a fire-spitting lefty. First one I saw from him was about how Nazis should be given a platform and then he posted a picture of hanging gallows.
People will see him on 60 minutes too. I guess my point is that the overriding impression for most voters is that Trump is an obnoxious prick and thatās not going to go away because of one gentler performance in one debate.
I think one thing that is going to get buried by the āwho won the debateā argument is the fact that by reasonable standards, this was a terrible debate. Now, virtually all political debates are bad if we are judging the participants on the quality of the arguments that they make and the effectiveness with which they present them. But this was was particularly awful. We have two dotards who have extreme difficulty making a cogent argument. And one of them lies about virtually everything.
It is a tragedy that one of these two people is going to lead the country for the next 4 years. This is the best we could do? This is what Americans wanted? How depressing is that?
Both Biden and Trump are a result of a) the olds voting at a much higher rate and b) the Boomers being an especially larger generation. It is what it is.
Biden was fine at making cogent arguments IMO
This was awesome.
Thanks for providing this.
Your standards are low.
Watch something like the West Wing. I realize thatās fictional, but there are actually people that smart in real life. Really. I mean a good trial attorney would mop the floor with either of these guys taking either side.
Iām not even expecting West Wing level. Thatās obviously unrealistic. But we could be a lot closer to that than Biden and Trump. Even halfway between that and last nightās shit show would be tolerable.