From TPM Reader JY …
Trying to collect my thoughts reading the debate reactions from readers you already posted, and hearing about Axelrod and Plouffe going on tv and just aimlessly panicking, and the biggest thing that came to mind was the Access Hollywood tape. I’m about your age and that’s the only time I can recall that the other side actually panicked. You had reporters saying they were hearing from GOP operatives that all was lost.
And you know what? All should have been lost because it was in fact really bad! It was a serious manifestation of one way Trump was absolutely unfit for office. But they powered through it and got some media help and he won the election.
It’s important to hold fast onto the idea that what happened last night was not anything like the Access Hollywood tape in real life. It was an old man who acted old. He still has the same agenda, the same moral scruples, and the same team he did before. He’ll still do the same stuff if he’s re-elected.
Do I wish we had a better fighter in the fight? Sure! But the reason we don’t is deeply complicated by cross-coalitional pressures that are hard to resolve. You know who else has cross-coalitional pressures that are hard to resolve? The other side! That’s why they’ve got an out-and-out misogynist bigot at the top of their ticket even though not all of them are misogynist bigots.
So what I’m saying is, have some time pride. Don’t confuse means and ends. Could Biden lose? Of course! But he hasn’t lost yet and he could actually use our help talking our book instead of flailing around helplessly. So like the man says, get up off the floor, dust yourself off, and get back to work.
