I missed this post-debate assessment yesterday from David Sanger of the New York Times:
But what worried American intelligence and homeland security officials, who have been assuring the public for months now that an accurate, secure vote could happen, was that Mr. Trump’s rant about a fraudulent vote may have been intended for more than just a domestic audience.
They have been worried for some time that his warnings are a signal to outside powers — chiefly the Russians — for their disinformation campaigns, which have seized on his baseless theme that the mail-in ballots are ridden with fraud. But what concerns them the most is that over the next 34 days, the country may begin to see disruptive cyberoperations, especially ransomware, intended to create just enough chaos to prove the president’s point.
For Inside Members, I can hope you can join me tomorrow at 2 PM for an important briefing with Bob Bauer (Obama White House Counsel) and Jack Goldsmith (Office of Legal Counsel, Bush DOJ). We’ll be discussing a critical question we’ll face perhaps either in four months or four years: how to reconstruct, how to batten down the presidency in the wake of President Trump’s lawless presidency. The two have written a new book, After Trump: Reconstructing the Presidency, with a range of proposals for bringing the 18th century office of the presidency up to code on issues ranging from conflicts of interest, pardon powers, foreign interference and control of nuclear weapons.
I hope you can join us. As an Inside Member an email invitation should already be in your inbox.
Please join me at 2 PM.
Rage, narcissism, self-loathing, fear – each vividly on display. We got a clear view last night of something very basic about this moment. The country isn’t so much facing an election as a hostage negotiation. Trump is losing, probably not just the presidency but just as critically his immunity from the law. Does he come out peacefully? Or is he one of those degenerates who kills his wife and kids on the way out?
If he’s going to lose he wants to burn the country down.
As my vivid and ugly analogy suggests, this isn’t strategy. It’s instinct. It’s rage.
He’s been one of the most confusing senators to me for some time.
JoinHaving had a night to sleep on it – and sleep very soundly – I’m much closer to what I said was the downside possibility for the President: not just a missed opportunity but a self-immolation. This was truly the worst of Trump: racist, belligerent, angry, unstable. I’ll give the man his due. Trump can be if not funny then jocular, entertaining in a predatory, roguish way. Last night had none of that. It was pure id and an id under threat.
Beyond all the individual offenses one of the underrated sub-themes of anti-Trumpism is exhaustion. One of the deepest traumas of living in the home of an abuser stems not from the outbursts of physical violence, verbal abuse or manipulation but the accumulated stress of ambient tension, uncertainty, the reflexive, unshakeable hyper-vigilance. It is exhausting in a profound way. Trump is exhausting – I suspect even for some who share his dark values. This was 90 minutes jam-packed with everything that makes Trump exhausting. Living with an abuser means being trapped in close quarters with the abuse, being unable to run. In a month voters get the chance to walk away.
We just shared our quick reactions to the debate on a special episode of The Josh Marshall podcast. Check it out here, or click through for an embedded player.
I worried what this momentous night would bring. In the event I think it was somewhere between bad and disastrous for President Trump.
The most important fact about this debate is that going into it President Trump was clearly behind. He needed to shift the dynamic of the race, force some major error, introduce some new factor. That didn’t happen. I saw nothing tonight that seems at all likely to improve things for President Trump. Nothing.
Biden did fine. Not great. But fine. I’d say he had a B performance with some B+ or even A- minus moments. But for him that’s fine. He’s ahead. He’s not running as best debater. He’s not running as most dynamic figure. He’s not competing for most unstable affect. He’s running as the guy who will end the nightmare. If that’s the goal he turned in just the right performance.
We’re recording a quick podcast of reactions. I’ll share my thoughts on the debate momentarily.
9:47 PM: One critical thing to remember here is that President Trump is behind. He needs to shift the dynamic. Even at its best for Trump this is not changing any dynamic.
9:32 PM: That part from a few moments with Biden saying can you believe him after all his lies, how he hasn’t leveled with you about how he blew it at the beginning. That was the clearest part of the whole debate.
9:25 PM: I’m seeing a lot of people complaining about Chris Wallace, saying Trump is dominating the debate. That’s not what I’m seeing. Trump is taking up more time. But I don’t think he’s helping himself.
9:05 PM: And here we go … Trump hard mad mugging from the start.
9:03 PM: He’s been decent in debates. But can’t forget that this first off debate is hosted by the top host from Fox News.
Our whole team will be bringing you full coverage of tonight’s debate. And I will too. I confess though I find it a funny thing to cover. Biden is a policy-knowledgable, well-meaning guy who’s been in elected office most of his adult life. Trump is a compulsive liar with little interest in or knowledge about any policy question currently working to delegitimize the election itself.
Both will play to form because neither are capable of doing otherwise.
This means that what we are watching, what we are all collectively evaluating are the possibilities of unpredictable events and the general optics and how those impact the very small number of voters who are not strongly committed to either candidate. It’s almost impossible that any of these ‘events’ will have any substantive bearing on how either man would serve as President.
And yet, as we know they can have a big impact.