In the lead-up to this week’s presidential debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, the polls showed a dead heat, both nationally and in seven swing states. The 2024 race is, by all measures, the closest presidential race we have seen in our lifetimes. But the usual presidential math applies: The person upon whom the race becomes a referendum loses.
For Trump, then, the task of the debate was threefold: to hammer the point that Kamala Harris is responsible for the failed policies of the Biden-Harris White House, and that he is the agent of change — a proposition with which the majority of Americans tend to agree; to drive home that Harris is actually dangerously far-left, and that she is lying about her current policy positions in order to protect them from scrutiny; and that she is incompetent, having blown every single task she has ever been handed. In short, Harris is a cipher; it is Trump’s job to clarify just who she is.
For Harris, the task was more complicated: she had to avoid all of these points, and she had to somehow go further by providing an effective counter. It wasn’t enough to merely dodge punches; she had to establish that she is different than Joe Biden in some marked way; that she is a moderate who has experienced a change of heart; and that she isn’t the cackler who regularly enjoys a heaping helping of word salad.
And for the moderators, the task was to help Kamala Harris achieve all of these things.
They certainly did their best. David Muir and Linsey Davis turned in the most discreditable job of moderation in presidential history. They repeatedly (and wrongly) fact-checked Trump four times, without ever calling Harris on a single one of her lies. They asked Trump follow-ups and demanded clarification while allowing Harris to skate on her bumper sticker platitudes. They structured their questions to elicit prepared responses from Harris, while demanding that Trump forgo obvious responses to Harris’ lies.
It worked. It threw Trump off of his game. Distracted by the three-on-one pile-on, eager to defend himself from every charge and to engage in fisticuffs over his remarks and record, Trump forgot his reason for being there: to target Harris. Instead, he talked about Jan. 6 and the election of 2020 and his record on COVID and his proposals on tariffs and his negotiations with the Taliban.
Harris, meanwhile, appeared relatively cool and collected; she dodged nearly every question, with the help of her Praetorian Guard.
But there’s a problem: Because both Harris and the media were so intent on dragging Trump down, they forgot that Harris needs to do more than label Trump; she needs to redefine herself. She didn’t do that at all during the debate. Perhaps some Americans came away from the debate more quiescent about her incoherence. But none will come away satisfied that she represents a change in the direction of the country. None will be assuaged that she is a moderate unifier. That’s because she isn’t. Yes, she did better than Trump did, with the help of her loyal apparatchiks. But she didn’t close the deal.
Perhaps that’s because she can’t close the deal. The lies are just too big for Americans to swallow. In the end, she is only the nominee because she is Joe Biden’s vice president; she has never won a single primary vote as a candidate. In the end, she is only on the debate stage because of the Biden-Harris administration, in which she claims a critical role. In the end, it is Harris who ran as a Bernie Sanders socialist in 2019, and it is Harris who says that her values haven’t changed.
Americans aren’t stupid. And they still have more questions about Harris than about Trump. Trump still has two months to remind Americans to ask those questions.
Ben Shapiro’s new collection, “Facts and Furious: The Facts About America and Why They Make Leftists Furious,” is available now. Shapiro is a graduate of UCLA and Harvard Law School, host of “The Ben Shapiro Show,” and co-founder of Daily Wire+. He is a three-time New York Times bestselling author. To find out more about Ben Shapiro and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website.
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Anyone that is still undecided between Trump and Harris at this late stage has either been living in a remote cave for the last decade or they are a complete idiot. Seriously!
No completely staged and choreographed modern so-called debate by the MSM is designed to educate and inform voters on the issues to any meaningful degree. Debates today are largely theater design to promote the Democrat candidate and agenda of the Democrat Party, while at the same time attacking whoever the Republican candidate may be. All these articles about how Trump or any Republican being discussed needs to do this or that during a debate is essentially mental mas********.
Now if we still had real debates, that could go on for multiple hours or be staged over multiple days with actual unbiased moderators, where the candidates actually had to interact with each other on the issues most people actually care about, then voters might actually learn something. If and until that model ever returns, and I’m NOT holding my breathe expecting that to ever occur, I expect nothing will improve in terms of these MSM orchestrated debates.
Kamala doesn’t need to “define herself”, her history and actions have done that already. It is well known she literally climbed to the top in California on her knees, then later she was chosen as VP because it was thought the DNC could pass her off as being black. As for actual accomplishments, well she was appointed “Border Czar” by President Mumbles after his stolen election and just look at how well she did.
I like Ben Shapiro. And his optimism is refreshing: “Americans aren’t stupid.” But in election after election, a large percentage of the American electorate has proved its stupidity.
We should get over the COVID thing. The whole world had problems with COVID. We are not unique. You think Biden would have done better??? Trump was very supportive throughout the whole thing. He got a vaccine in record time, there were medications and supplements that helped with COVID, but everyone scoffed, and the Biden administration banned them (some were even removed for sale), and he made it a crime for doctors to dispense or recommend them. Not only that, but stupid people also clung to the insanity that Trump suggested pumping Clorox into your veins. Come on, you don’t recognize sarcasm when you hear it? Be real. When NY said they were out of space for patients, Trump got them two hospital ships that were never used. Instead, the governor sent patients to nursing homes where many elderly died. And another thing, Biden mandated the vaccine if you wanted to live a life. Trump never mandated and wouldn’t have. I don’t want to hear any more about how TRUMP handled COVID. PERIOD!!!
Leftism will always get a free ride from TV newsreaders, from newspaper editorialists, from university academics. It happens every time – to Goldwater, to Nixon, to Trump. Every time – without fail.
The thing she has to be careful about is what happened in the history of the Praetorian Guard. Over the centuries, as the Guard grew in power, they could DEPOSE the Emperor. Look what happened to Joe – of course, the Dems will be very subtle in lying, telling partial truth, etc. As Mr. Shapiro (and others) points out, the media, too willingly made it obvious in their attempts to build up Kamala with ‘sunshine, lollipops …’ (Lesley Gore), but virtually nothing of substance. She has shown that she is a great dodger – I do not remember anytime during the debate that she actually answered any question directly. Pointed out that she did nothing to ‘redefine’ herself. Anyone that really tries can find out her so-called ‘stances’ on and actions on helping Joe make this country secure (at least, that is the major mission of the president – a National Security strategy). She did a great job of making her own family secure – but not the American public. 2 Chronicles 7, v 14.
This is the most level headed, accurate assessment of the debate I have heard, eventhough I think Harris’ position is strengthened more than Shapiro has stated. Trump has a lot of work to do to retake the Presidency.