The Final Debate

Whoever you are for won the debate.  If you're for Biden, the attacks on Trump's finances, racist policies, and lack of empathy were damning.  If you're for Trump, the pounding on Biden's decades of not getting it done and frequent references to Hunter were devastating.  If you were for Welker, she was by far the most commanding of all the moderators although her bias toward Biden was pretty clear.

I would give the win to Trump.  He was more controlled than his last debate.  This is probably because he was forced to be thanks to the muted microphone.  He repeatedly hit Biden on the obvious question: you were VP for 8 years and didn't get it done.  Why didn't you let Obama know how to get it done.  Though the MSM is still trying to suppress the Hunter Biden laptop story, Trump hammered it.  Joe replied with denials that could come back to bite him soon.

For a guy who everyone says is suffering dementia, Biden did well but never effectively answered the point of having been there already and not gotten it done.  He made the claim of a Republican congress.  True.  But there was the first year where the Democrats controlled both houses and the presidency.  Trump had that same benefit for 2 years.  As for Hunter, one has to be willfully obtuse not to know his financial success is directly tied to his father's political career.  Same goes for any of Trump's kids.  Hunter isn't rich because of his keen business sense.

As to the moderator, I was unimpressed.  Why is it that in the four debates (#2 was cancelled but still worth mentioning), all the moderators are Democrats.  Admittedly, I don't know their registration but it was obvious in every case that they were pro-Biden and anti-Trump.  Who's Chris Wallace voting for?  How about Susan Page?  Steve Scully?  Kristen Welker?  Every one of them is a Biden voter.  Why do Republicans let this happen every single election?  Welker was more of an interviewer than a moderator.  She constantly cut off any debate between Trump and Biden because 'we have a lot of questions to get to.'  Who came up with this format?  Why not let the candidates decide what questions to ask and have the moderator just try to keep the time even and maybe move things along if there is a lull.  You know, what the candidates thing is important might tell us a lot rather than what the moderator thinks is important.  When the interruption numbers come in, it is going to be astonishingly lopsided as to how often she cut off Trump vs. Biden.  Two Democrats vs. one Republican.  Typical.

The Dog that Didn't Bark

Jonathan Turley offered a keen insight about the Hunter Biden's emails regarding the Biden Campaign's reaction.  There are three obvious responses that have not been offered.

1. That's not Hunter's laptop.  If it's not his laptop, say so.  Get in front of this hoax.  That the campaign hasn't pursued this line of attack says they think it probably is Hunter's laptop.

2. Those aren't Hunter's emails.  If this is bogus, why not challenge the authenticity of the emails or the pictures.  No claims that these are fake.  Interesting.

3. Defamation.  A major paper has printed clearly defamatory claims against Hunter Biden and, if it's not true, he should be suing them.

Rather than deny the authenticity of the claims, the campaign has offered specific responses regarding Joe Biden's schedule not showing the meeting reported in the emails.  Huh.  Well, if it isn't on his schedule, it must not have happened because nothing gets left off the schedule.  This doesn't exactly sound like a denial.

It is clear that Hunter Biden got his high paying position in Burisma because he was the Vice President's son.  Why else would a foreign company hire a man who was kicked out of the navy for drug use?  Not for his judgement.  Could it be that his father was the point man for Ukraine in the Obama Administration?  No, that's just a coincidence.

An October Surprise

The New York Post has emails revealing Hunter Biden's dealings with Burisma and implicating his father in the scandal.  Here's Tim Pool on the topic:

Of note, Facebook and Twitter have blocked this story.  There are stories that the public should not read.

VP Debate

Quick thoughts

Pence was calm, collected, and unflappable.  Unlike Trump, he was controlled and measured, rarely offering an interruption.  However, he did finish his point.  It was almost comical how he would drone away as Susan Page kept telling him that his time was up.  He was never rude but definitely firm and resolute.  Wow, this guy is great.  He got a little repetitive but that is how you make it stick with the audience.  What I took away from his comments was that Biden will raise my taxes, cozy up to China, coddle the Iranians, rejoin the Paris Accords, and end fossil fuels.  Sounds grim.

By comparison to the granite like calm of Pence, Harris seemed nervous.  Of course, compared to Trump, she would have appeared to be the calm one.  Oddly enough, this debate also reminded me of the VP debate of Biden vs. Ryan but in a completely different way.  Biden had come across as the confident old hand while Ryan was the young recruit.  In this case, Pence was the veteran while Harris was the recruit.  This same thing happened with Benson vs. Quayle in 1988.  Harris was mostly on attack.  From her, I took away that Trump has ruined the economy, failed in addressing Covid-19 such that 210,000 Americans are dead, that Trump tax cuts were for the wealthy, that our world standing is in the toilet, that we lost the trade war with China, and Trump won't condemn white supremacy.

Susan Page was better than Chris Wallace but that may just be that she had more cooperative debaters.  Her questions were slanted left, as one expects.  Of note, she is writing a biography of Nancy Pelosi but had previously written one of Barbara Bush, so the complaints on that point are weak.  It was odd that she asked what Pence would do if Trump didn't accept electoral defeat and for balance she asked Harris what she would do if Trump didn't accept defeat.  Hmm.  Pence noted that Hillary advised that Biden should not concede under any circumstances and that the Democrats still haven't accepted defeat from 2016.  Maybe a fair question for Harris would have been, "Will Joe Biden accept the election results?"  You know, like Chris Wallace asked Trump, but not Hillary, in 2016.

Pence won.  His demeanor and iron control were palpable.  His attacks were more difficult to rebut - especially the Green New Deal line of attack - and he had better replies to Harris's attacks.  His question about stacking the court and Harris's refusal to answer was telling.  After she was done with her non-answer, Pence tossed in the aside that she didn't answer.  Nice.  His reply to the 8th grader was reassuring and uniting while Harris offered a youth are the future boilerplate.  Really, Pence's answer seemed like it was pre-planned it was so good.  Nonetheless, I don't think this moved the needle.  People don't vote for VP.  Then again, as Susan Page brought up, one of these two will be VP to the oldest president in American history.  They have higher odds than most VPs of getting elevated.  If it did move the needle, it was toward Trump-Pence.