Election 2020: “Debatesville”
Tuesday, September 29 it begins. The face-off some of us have been waiting for for over a year is now upon us.
Welcome to the 2020 version of “debatesville” where our perpetual state of division is trumpeted through an arcane and unsettling public forum.
Of note is how alienating these Presidential debates are. The “Town. Hall” format enlarges the audience, but does not decrease the probability that candidates will talk past each other to “gin up” their followers.
The following topics have been selected for Tuesday’s debate:
The Trump and Biden Records
The Supreme Court
COVID-19
The Economy
Race and Violence in our Cities
The Integrity of the Election
Of note are the topics which give the “incumbent” an advantage:
The Supreme Court
The Economy
Race and Violence in our Cities
The Integrity of the Election
meaning that these are “presumptive topics,” addressing issues for which there are no explicit consequences for current decisions.
Trump has a double advantage over Biden: first, Trump is in power until January 20, 2021 and second, his party has an investment in keeping the accountability spotlight off him — at least until November 3.
Biden’s advantage is “marginal,” meaning that he comes to the debate with the advantage of attacking the President on his record and his competence at “being President,” an argument that can be turned against him (Biden).
Both candidates will be vying to become the “choice” candidate vs. “becoming” a referendum on their record(s).
The sole topic that challenges our trust in a beneficial outcome for the country is the pandemic and Trump’s role in mitigating the effects of the pandemic and it’s spread.
Understandably, the pandemic is in most voters’ minds. Yet the pandemic is only one of five debate topics and occupies the same space as “The Supreme Court,” and “The Economy.”
Of the debate topics, consider “The Supreme Court,” as Exhibit A.
Biden on Sunday in Wilmington Delaware from a rhododendron splashed porch echoed the DNC’s position that with regard to filling the Ginsburg vacancy ‘the Republicans will come around, and will do the right thing .’
MSNBC on Sept. 22 booked Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia for a one-on-one Q &A with Hallie Jackson. The gist of Kaine’s position was explicitly that Republicans “do the right thing” and honor their commitment 4 years ago to withhold passing on a Presidential nomination to fill a Supreme Court vacancy until after the President is sworn in.
Kaine and Biden are barking up the wrong tree. We don’t restore faith in the Senate as an institution unless it is challenged. So why not challenge it? This is exactly what Republicans are doing, eg. break your own rule(s).
The Kaine-Biden position is not that of the opposition but that of the minority. Their argument that we can wait until his Republican colleagues see “their way” to preserving a faulty rule, is a latter day Panglossian attitude.
Consider that Kaine who professes not to dwell in hypotheticals is speaking for a party that values its own survival ahead of the country, the very tact that Democrats criticize Republicans for.
Partisanship will suck the wind out of democracy; so too will the fairness platitude when each moment portends an end to accountability.
“Doing the right thing” is appropriate when the stars align. But if your party is in the minority you need to act to foment challenge not succumb to business as usual.
We see more bravery in the streets these days than we do in the Senate chamber and hallways.
As a friend suggests, “ I hope you’re wrong.”
So be it.
Sen. John McCain, in whose memory Kaine invoked optimism about “coming around,” is no longer with us.
September 27–28, 2020
