I don’t know what was wrong with Joe Biden. It’s hard to imagine that they ever would have asked for a debate if this was the way he is normally. We’ve seen him recently holding press conferences and giving speeches and he seemed to be fine. They said he had a cold so maybe he really was on drugs — Nyquil or Mucinex or something that made him seem so shaky and frail. Whatever it was, it was a terrible debate for him and if he does stay in the race (which is almost certain in my opinion) the campaign is going to have a lot of work to do to dig out of the hole that was dug last night. The media smells blood and they are circling like a bunch of starved piranhas.

. . . For some odd reason, moderator Jake Tapper told Trump in the beginning that he didn’t need to answer the questions and that he could use the time however he wanted. Trump ran with that, essentially giving a rally speech whenever he had the floor and was unresponsive to the vast majority of the questions. He made faces and insulted Biden to his face, at one point calling him a criminal and a Manchurian candidate. If anyone had said 10 years ago that this would happen at a presidential debate they would have been laughed out of the room.

After the debate when most of the country had turned off cable news or gone to bed, CNN aired its fact check. And it’s a doozy:

It sure would have been good if even some of that epic litany of lies could have been checked while people were still watching. The decision to have the moderators sit like a couple of potted plants woodenly asking questions about child care while Trump responded with irrelevant lies was inexplicable. Why did they even bother to ask questions at all? They could have just run the timer and let the candidates talk for two minutes each about anything they wanted. It probably would have been more enlightening.

    • Psycoder@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      I am losing my mind over what I see on Reddit right now. They are arguing that Trump should quit running for president if he wants to serve his country.

      Biden is senile! Trump is a POS. He has always been a POS. This no news to anyone. But, the biggest thing the debate revealed is that Biden is senile. He lost A LOT of votes during the debate. Trump did not lose any votes. Everyone knew Trump was a POS before the debate.

      • berno@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Reddit is heavily astroturfed by Democratic Party staff and affiliates, along with a host of other organizations and literal nation state actors. If you can’t see the agendas being pushed there, you might need a new pair of glasses. I got mine from my friend John Nada.

        • SulaymanF@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          It’s more like Reddit is a bunch of edgy teenagers who already skew in favor of liberal ideas far beyond that of the regular voting public. It’s why atheism is wildly popular on Reddit as well as issues like abortion or trans rights, when the American public is far more evenly split.

          Yes there’s some campaigning going on on Reddit as well but it’s dwarfed by the left wing base already on the site. The swell in anti-Biden posts make this split all the more obvious.

          • berno@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            That as well, but make no mistake - there is a ton of astroturf laid down on that site daily.

      • GladiusB@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        You just made facts up. “He lost votes during the debate” is not measurable in any meaningful way. It’s still 5 months from now. There are other debates to come.

      • SulaymanF@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        We all know Trump doesn’t actually want to serve his country. During a Hannity interview Trump couldn’t name a single thing he wanted to enact in his second term. It’s all about keeping himself out of prison and helping heal his wounded ego for losing in 2020.