After patting herself on the back at length for allegedly co-producing a musical about women voting — gag — Hillary Clinton finally got to the real reason she was once again disturbing America’s inner peace: She wanted to tell everyone how they don’t really need to watch the debate Thursday between President Biden and the man she lost to eight years ago.
In a wince-inducing op-ed for The New York Times this week, Clinton declared herself singularly knowledgeable about how the face-off between Biden and former President Trump should go. “I am the only person to have debated both men (Mr. Trump in 2016 and, in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary race, Mr. Biden),” she wrote. “I know the excruciating pressure of walking onto that stage and that it is nearly impossible to focus on substance when Mr. Trump is involved.”
She went on to inadvertently humiliate herself, writing of Trump, “It’s nearly impossible to identify what his arguments even are;” “He starts with nonsense and then digresses into blather;” and, “[e]xpectations for him are so low that if he doesn’t literally light himself on fire on Thursday evening, some will say he was downright presidential.” Again, this is the person Clinton lost to, against all odds, with all of the media, all of Hollywood, and all of Washington at her back. If Trump is really so incoherent, the op-ed should have been headlined, “He is the stupidest person on earth and he kicked my a–.”
In any event, the thrust of Clinton’s argument was that if voters pay attention to the “substance” of the debate, they will inevitably conclude that Biden won, even before the event has taken place. “This election is between a convicted criminal out for revenge and a president who delivers results for the American people,” she wrote. “No matter what happens in the debate, that’s an easy choice.”
This is another way of saying there’s no need to watch the debate; don’t.
Hmm… Now why might one of the most prominent names in Democrat politics tell voters to skip what will likely be just one of two times that the major party candidates for president directly face one another? It’s a mystery.
Kidding. It’s because Clinton herself performed terribly against Trump and there’s a significant risk that Biden is about to do the same — not just including but perhaps especially on substance.
Remove “convicted criminal” and “democracy” from the Democrat lexicon this campaign and they literally have no case for a second Biden term. Trump is a convicted criminal and his poll numbers have shown little to no change. He’s either beating Biden or they’re tied. As for “democracy,” what good is it to voters when one party is instigating political prosecutions of the other? What good is it to voters when they don’t feel safe in their cities and they can’t afford to buy the things they want? What good is it to voters when they’re told it’s their “patriotic duty” to fund a war in Eastern Europe to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars when they themselves watch their personal finances turn to ruin? That’s where Biden got them.
Democrats might still be able to squeeze some miles out of the abortion issue, but it’s a tough sell — Trump is adamant that he’s not interested in further national legislation for it and Republican leaders in Congress say the same.
As for the non-“substance,” contrary to what some Democrats might fret and what many Republicans delude themselves into believing, Biden has shown time and time again that he has it in him, whether through natural force or artificial injection, to rise to the occasion and scream out a high-energy performance in front of a national audience. He most recently did it during the State of the Union Address, and there’s no reason to believe he can’t do it again. There’s still a flicker of life in that old skin suit.
Ironically, it may be Biden who stands to benefit from lighting himself on fire at the debate. Then he won’t have to talk about his appalling first term.
