Presidential Debate Thread: Take 2 (Tonight at 9 PM Eastern)

I watched. He was absolutely fine. This was 9 days before he met with the guy who called him an “elderly man with a poor memory”. He was fine at SotU. Idk what happened at the debate. At first I thought omg he’s choking, then he must be sick. But he never really recovered.

The powers that be didn’t allow a primary this time, so isn’t this basically what happened anyway?

Having the VP replace the guy at the top of the ticket feels like a natural move. She’s been vetted, she’s on the staff, voters have kinda sorta given her the thumbs-up. idk how you explain to regular non-politics people why we’re helicoptering in Newsom or Whitmer when Harris is right there ready to go.

The WH is sure working hard to prevent anyone from learning that he is currently fine.

Everyone with elderly parents or relatives knows a) the downturn can really fast, it’s not at all uncommon for someone to be lucid and then scattered just a few months later; and b) the long window of time where elderly people have good days and bad days. Septemer 2023 was a long time ago, in the specific context here.

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Right. Also, not selecting her pretty much says that she was a bad VP pick in the first place, since she’s supposed to be next in line of succession for when the president can’t fulfill his duties (in this case sundowning)

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On the contrary, he admitted to doing exactly this many times with literal stays at crackhouses. That was/is his base degen state. Just covertly doing coke most days and crack occasionally was his business mode. He was almost never actually sober for any extended period of time.

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I don’t think people need the explanation. It’s like that william goldman thing about when a new movie comes out; I don’t remember the quote exactly but it’s basically how people don’t actually care much about who’s in it or what it’s about, all they really want to know is: Is it good? It’s really good? So I really should see it?

also everyone learned what hock tuah meant in nine seconds, and a meaningful convention would be the most hyped political event in forever. Imo too many people just aren’t into kamala, and nobody I know thinks she can win. Bad vibes are death in a three-month speed dating campaign. I think most people don’t care about the how they just want to know who

big donors might be different though, idk

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Numbers. Lol

Okay boomer.

This was 12 days before the debate apparently

https://x.com/mviser/status/1808264991763468531?s=46

My thinking as well. Good post.

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I don’t want to armchair doctor.

But … (haha)

If memory is the issue, then there will be a big difference between trying to remember

  • what that guy just said in depth
  • the things I just learned in a hurry for this debate

Vs

  • things I’ve been working with in depth for months that have fully embedded

There’s a period where it’s much harder to make memories, but not impossible. The stuff Biden has been working on for four years will be fully bedded down. New stuff not so much.

With my dad, plenty of people would think he was fine, because he stayed on well trodden paths. Anything new he would struggle big time.

Two of Biden’s granddaughters joined him for the final day of the swing, before they reunited with the rest of the Biden clan ahead of a scheduled family photo shoot with Annie Leibovitz at Camp David — a tableau that, as party leaders privately fretted about a second Trump term ushering in the end of American democracy, had echoes of Nero fiddling while Rome burned.

https://wapo.st/3XN8wXy

https://x.com/Timodc/status/1808307429236695288?t=dxPGXnHSh2VjlBteCZqEYQ&s=19

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Well, lucky for us Nero didn’t play the fiddle.

Surely he’s done, right? He has to be. The dam has broken. Actual elected Democrats are now asking him to step aside. His approval rating is in the 30s, he’s losing every swing state, 75% of his own voters think he’s unfit. He can barely finish a coherent sentence without a teleprompter and he just released a statement saying he fell asleep at a debate because he traveled to Europe two weeks ago.

Sure the Democratic Party is famously incompetent, but this would be a colossal blunder, right? Like unimaginably bad. They can’t PR their way out of this right? Or can they.

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Any way to get a Whitmer/Michelle ticket or vice versa, with Michelle only there long enough to get the W?

@NotBruceZ, any history of something like this?

Why not? Republicans are playing as dirty as they possibly can. Michelle runs and gets the Presidency, then gives it to her running mate and goes back home. Totally legal. Play ball!!

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heal the rift vote taylor swift / for fifty nifty united swifties

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I can’t think of anything quite like that in American history. As a practical matter, I think the way to get there involves both Joe Biden and Kamala Harris dying. (Hello, President Johnson!)