The clash between Trump and Kamala Harris on Tuesday night in Philadelphia is still reverberating around the presidential campaign which has 54 days to go. The result was a clear win for the Democratic candidate as Trump’s bandwagon hit the buffers, derailed and burst into flames. There is a consensus - even among senior Republicans - that their boy took a real beating from Kamala Harris. Robert F Kennedy junior, another loony who dropped out of the race and endorsed Trump in return for a promised cabinet post, said the Vice President won the debate. Bang goes that job!
Kennedy said: “Vice President Harris clearly won the debate in terms of her delivery, polish, organization, and preparation.” And he was right.
Trump claimed he was the winner, but this was more bravado on his part, demonstrated by him having to go into the spin room afterward and carry on the debate, this time without Harris, to recover from the train wreck he had just stepped out of.
It looked like desperation. Trump was badly rattled and Harris came across as cool, smart, and very confident. She looked every bit like a president while he ranted like an angry, deranged pub bore.
Some of the things he was saying were totally unhinged. He claimed Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating cats and dogs belonging to residents! You need to be half crazy to believe that’s happening, but Trump not only believes it, he’s prepared to say it out loud in front of 67 million viewers, without laughing! An actor speaking those words in a Simpson’s episode might need several takes. I know I would. But Trump? No, problems. Harris was openly laughing at him, it was that crazy.
The original story came from a tweet by his running mate J D Vance, who he must now regret appointing:
Months ago, I raised the issue of Haitian illegal immigrants draining social services and generally causing chaos all over Springfield, Ohio.Reports now show that people have had their pets abducted and eaten by people who shouldn't be in this country. Where is our border czar? pic.twitter.com/rf0EDIeI5i— JD Vance (@JDVance) September 9, 2024
Vance has never been fitted with any door furniture and is even more unhinged than Trump. There is no truth in the story whatsoever, as the city authorities confirmed to ABC who hosted the debate. The former president refused to accept it because 'he had seen somebody on television' who had had a dog taken!
This is typical of Trump. He would sooner believe an unknown bod from Palookaville than state officials who know the facts and have access to everything. This was how he made foreign policy in The White House. Trump would take cues from men like Sean Hannity on Fox News rather than his own experts in the State Department in Washington.
Somebody commented that he fell into every bear trap she guided and goaded him into. He fell into some of his own too.
I’ve hung around salesmen for most of my working life. Trump is a bad salesman. He is exactly the kind I used to despise. You can tell this by the way he describes things, in his case, his business or his policies. He has to rely on phrases like “you’re going to have tremendous growth” and “nobody has ever seen numbers like the ones I’m talking about.”
He has a business worth “billions and billions” of dollars. How many? We don't know because he doesn't say. Inflation in the US is “the worst in our history.” How bad? He didn't tell us. Note the pattern.
It’s impossible to pin him down because he never says anything you can usefully process. His lies - and there were plenty as usual - are always vague and delivered in an unending stream with machine gun rapidity. Trying to correct him is like trying to stop a herd of stampeding cattle. As Oscar Wilde once said: “Facts fled before him like frightened forest things.”
So, Harris’ plan was the right one. She laid traps and he duly fell into every one.
Trump is all bombast, hyperbole, and exaggeration but nothing specific. I hear it and think, you really have no idea what you’re talking about. If you did you’d be able to say something sensible, something a details person could recognise as even the approximation of a fact.
Instead, you get these highly simplistic claims. This isn’t to say a lot of people don’t believe him because they do. Half of American voters think he could and should be president of the United States. I wouldn’t employ him to sweep floors.
The BBC's take on it was: Trump's message of American decline resonates with pivotal voters
We are talking about the richest and most powerful nation on earth. If the US has a problem, it's inequality in wealth which a Trump presidency would make worse by cutting taxes for the richest while public services and infrastructure continue to decline.
What it does reveal is how easy con men find it to fool their marks in America. He’s not that different to the jerry builder who convinces gullible clients that he is going to construct a top quality extension for half the price of anyone else. Or the internet scammers duping innocent people into giving up a chunk of their life savings.
They are all in the deception business one way or another. None of them have the slightest respect for the men and women they’re deceiving. Trump is no different.
However, a note of caution. Before we get carried away, note this:
Hilary won the debates and lost the elections. Harris camp shouldn’t celebrate too soon https://t.co/d7BVXyqqGA
— Praveen Asthana (@asthanaprav) September 12, 2024
There is still a long way to go.
