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Should Biden agree to debate Trump?

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Basically, from the Axios interview and numerous statements from Trump, GOP senators and representatives, governors, down to GOP dog catchers....what I've been able to glean from all that is the GOP is now a party of white grievance whining about racial tensions.
 
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K1052 said:
After watching the Axios interview of Trump I cannot fathom why the Trump campaign would actually be demanding more debates. It's all his worst qualities on showcase for the nation.

The debates this year won't have audiences so it will be closer to this format than anything.
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Because Trump has no intention of debating. Trump does not debate, he rants. Any debate with him is going to be nothing more than a gish gallop straight into crazy town. Trump does not need to prove any point, he just needs to make it look like Biden can not disprove the lies that Trump is going to rapid fire at him, and then lean on being President to claim that gives him some credence.
 
SMOGZINN said:
Because Trump has no intention of debating. Trump does not debate, he rants. Any debate with him is going to be nothing more than a gish gallop straight into crazy town. Trump does not need to prove any point, he just needs to make it look like Biden can not disprove the lies that Trump is going to rapid fire at him, and then lean on being President to claim that gives him some credence.
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There isn't going to be a crowd to get reaction from which is essential. Without one he looks dumb, sad, nuts, and overwhelmed. You know...like reality.
 
K1052 said:
There isn't going to be a crowd to get reaction from which is essential. Without one he looks dumb, sad, nuts, and overwhelmed. You know...like reality.
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I actually doubt that will be true. I'm willing to bet Trump will make having at least a 50% audience a requirement for them to debate.
 
K1052 said:
Whining, complaining, evading responsibility, blaming others, shuffling though papers that you don't understand but like because you think it validates your view. Not exactly tremendous optics for an incumbent who large majorities think has fucked things up really badly.
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This interview was a total disaster. I spent more time watch Jonathan Swain’s reaction and efforts to get his questions out than the Orange Wannabe Tinpot Dictator. Every time I did,I said something out loud. A debate would a epic dumpster volcano. He would be winding through his stream of consciousness and would not answer a single question. All Biden must do is stand there. I get that tribe will not falter, as evidenced by the past debates, but that tribe seems to be dwindling with the virus and the other things that are happening. “Read the books. Read the manuals.”
 
Jhhnn said:
Pretty much. Trump is in deep shit in swing states he barely won in 2016 & some states where he won handily. Arizona. Wisconsin. Michigan. Pennsylvania. Florida. N Carolina. He might lose Georgia & even fucking Texas.

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I'd love to see Trump lose Texas. If he loses Texas his ass is so much grass. Come on Texas, call a spade a spade.
 
Fenixgoon said:
trump wouldn't be able to put together a coherent answer to any of those questions...

here's an idea - independently interview each candidate on the same day, with the same set of questions, then put the two recordings together and televise the "debate" - neither candidate can shout at or interrupt the other because they are merely side-by-side interviews. trump would look like an absolute fool next to biden.
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Best idea I've seen. Same questions, possibly asked at the same time. Could be virtual. Candidate in identical environment, watches the same interviewer via video ask the same question. Given, say, 5 minutes to answer. Have a count down timer visible to the candidate while answering so they know exactly where they stand. When the 5 minutes is up, their mic is shut off and the next question is asked. It's all taped and played for TV audience later. They could have a random A/B generation system to determine which candidates answer is seen first for each question. I think this would be infinitely better than the bullshit that would come down if they could interrupt one another, run on past 5 minutes, etc.
 
K1052 said:
There isn't going to be a crowd to get reaction from which is essential. Without one he looks dumb, sad, nuts, and overwhelmed. You know...like reality.
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Yeah...Most likely, it will be some sort of Zoom debate where no one is in the same room. Certainly there won’t be a live audience. For those reasons alone I can’t imagine Trump agreeing to debate. He craves the adulation and applause of the crowd. In this format, he won't even be listening to what Biden has to say any more than he listens to his staff when they try to offer him advice. The only thing Trump listens to is the voices in his own head. Trump believes he knows better than everyone else so he only listens to himself.
 
Muse said:
Best idea I've seen. Same questions, possibly asked at the same time. Could be virtual. Candidate in identical environment, watches the same interviewer via video ask the same question. Given, say, 5 minutes to answer. Have a count down timer visible to the candidate while answering so they know exactly where they stand. When the 5 minutes is up, their mic is shut off and the next question is asked. It's all taped and played for TV audience later. They could have a random A/B generation system to determine which candidates answer is seen first for each question. I think this would be infinitely better than the bullshit that would come down if they could interrupt one another, run on past 5 minutes, etc.
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I've been saying that I think at least one of the 'debates' needs to be a youtube debate, where each candidate is given the list of questions and then is allowed to submit a video clip of their answer. Each answer has a time frame allowed for the video, no video over the allowed time amount will be put up. Then publish each video, and then the candidates each have a day to film a rebuttal to the others video, this time with no time limit (or maybe just a longer of a time limit), and those videos will be posted as replies to the original candidates answer. Then they get another day to reply to the rebuttal, and it just keeps going as long as the candidates want to respond.
There would of course have to be some rules, specifically about staying on topic, but thouse could be hashed out.

It would have at least the opportunity for us to have some real dialog, where each candidate gets to actually explain his position, consider the oppositions point and respond to it.
 
SMOGZINN said:
I've been saying that I think at least one of the 'debates' needs to be a youtube debate, where each candidate is given the list of questions and then is allowed to submit a video clip of their answer. Each answer has a time frame allowed for the video, no video over the allowed time amount will be put up. Then publish each video, and then the candidates each have a day to film a rebuttal to the others video, this time with no time limit (or maybe just a longer of a time limit), and those videos will be posted as replies to the original candidates answer. Then they get another day to reply to the rebuttal, and it just keeps going as long as the candidates want to respond.
There would of course have to be some rules, specifically about staying on topic, but thouse could be hashed out.

It would have at least the opportunity for us to have some real dialog, where each candidate gets to actually explain his position, consider the oppositions point and respond to it.
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The only problem is Trump would cheat unless someone neutral was watching him and he was checked for earphones.
 
HomerJS said:
Biden needs to do the debates to maintain the precedent for future elections but my previous provisions for real time fact checking still apply. No matter how much time that eats up.
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To make debates less of a circus no audience, in addition to real time fact checking
 
Fenixgoon said:
....how exactly is this supposed to help Trump?
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He is going to ignore all debate questions and bombard Biden with garbled statements that include "Ukraine, Russia, Hunter Biden and "The Blacks™"
Trumps handlers are hoping that by letting Trump ramble on long enough that Biden might eventually lose patience and his composure and slip up.
They are thoughtering and prayering that they can get a Harris vs Biden moment out of it to make him slip up on a word.
 
pauldun170 said:
He is going to ignore all debate questions and bombard Biden with garbled statements that include "Ukraine, Russia, Hunter Biden and "The Blacks™"
Trumps handlers are hoping that by letting Trump ramble on long enough that Biden might eventually lose patience and his composure and slip up.
They are thoughtering and prayering that they can get a Harris vs Biden moment out of it to make him slip up on a word.
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Yes, that is what they are hoping.

The thing is, Trump's awfulness is a known quantity and the understanding of it is on a 60/40 political fault line. Right now, Trump is at his floor, meaning he isn't likely to lose any support no matter how the debate goes. But Biden can lose support. I think 8-10 points is Biden's maximum possible lead, and that this won't go up but could go down depending on events in the campaign and the country between now and then. That's why I don't think Biden should debate.

But he's going to do it anyway, so it's academic.
 
pauldun170 said:
He is going to ignore all debate questions and bombard Biden with garbled statements that include "Ukraine, Russia, Hunter Biden and "The Blacks™"
Trumps handlers are hoping that by letting Trump ramble on long enough that Biden might eventually lose patience and his composure and slip up.
They are thoughtering and prayering that they can get a Harris vs Biden moment out of it to make him slip up on a word.
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Biden's campaign should sandbag the mofo. Trump is incapable of cogent debating. He will have some ideas to riff on, but he's incapable of being coherent much less thoughtful. He will ramble on, looking for anywhere he can launch his verbal missiles. Jumbled stream of consciousness verbal diarrhea shitshow. Do we need this? The Biden campaign should try to fulfill a sense of necessity to engage in meaningful debate (if there is any, I'm not sure there is) but not allow a scene where it gets out of hand and no substantive in quality and meaning.
 
I'd like to change my vote. The swan interview showed a really good road map. Turn his attacks into stumbles by asking clarifying questions. Would show biden as coherent and engaged, while trump would be a blubbering, incoherent mess. That would blunt the last arrow trump has in his quiver; the drive drive to paint biden as senile.

In reality though, I agree with the posts above, that's still a low reward/high risk scenario as most minds are made up and there just aren't many persuadables left.
 
Based on my "spidey senses", they want to move the first debate up in September to give them more time to spin things ahead of election day.
The original debate Schedule placed the final debate too close to election day and only gave them 2 weekends "Conservative editorial push" and one full week of talking points to influence voters. Thats not enough time for the professionals to do their job.
Based on Trumps history, they need at least 2 weeks including weekends to have the "cleaners" fix all the bad press that results from allowing Trump to have a microphone and will need at least 5 days to introduce whatever BS narrative they want to plant on Biden.

If Facebook and Twitter were to suddenly announce that they were shutting down the the last week of October and the first week of November, you would see the administration basically send the National Guard to force them to stay live
 
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uclaLabrat said:
I'd like to change my vote. The swan interview showed a really good road map. Turn his attacks into stumbles by asking clarifying questions. Would show biden as coherent and engaged, while trump would be a blubbering, incoherent mess. That would blunt the last arrow trump has in his quiver; the drive drive to paint biden as senile.

In reality though, I agree with the posts above, that's still a low reward/high risk scenario as most minds are made up and there just aren't many persuadables left.
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Trump has set the bar for Biden so low that unless his brain tumbles out of his skull on stage that he's likely to be fine.

But yeah if Trump is sitting on or near his floor no reason to toss him anything he might be able to climb. Biden agreed to the debates back in June and hasn't wavered from that commitment. It's all been Trump trying to weasel some advantage out of this to little effect.
 
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