First presidential debate (3 Viewers)

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    Optimus Prime

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    Since we usually have a separate thread for these
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    NEW YORK (AP) — President Joe Biden begins an intense period of private preparations Friday at Camp David for what may be the most consequential presidential debate in decades.

    The 81-year-old Democrat’s team is aware that he cannot afford an underwhelming performance when he faces Republican rival Donald Trump for 90 minutes on live television Thursday night. Biden’s team is expecting aggressive attacks on his physical and mental strength, his record on the economy and immigration and even his family.

    Trump, 78 and ever confident, will stay on the campaign trail before going to his Florida estate next week for two days of private meetings as part of an informal prep process.

    The former president’s allies are pushing him to stay focused on his governing plans, but they’re expecting him to be tested by pointed questions about his unrelenting focus on election fraud, his role in the erosion of abortion rights and his unprecedented legal baggage.

    Thursday’s debate on CNN will be full of firsts, with the potential to reshape the presidential race. Never before in the modern era have two presumptive nominees met on the debate stage so early in the general election season. Never before have two White House contenders faced off at such advanced ages, with widespread questions about their readiness.

    And never before has a general election debate participant been saddled with a felony conviction. The debate-stage meeting comes just two weeks before Trump is scheduled to be sentenced on 34 felony counts in his New York hush money trial.

    “You can argue this will be the most important debate, at least in my lifetime,” said Democratic strategist Jim Messina, 54, who managed former President Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign.

    PRESSURE ON BIDEN


    The ground rules for Thursday’s debate, the first of two scheduled meetings, are unusual.

    The candidates agreed to meet at a CNN studio in Atlanta with no audience. Each candidate’s microphone will be muted, except when it’s his turn to speak. No props or prewritten notes will be allowed onstage. The candidates will be given only a pen, a pad of paper and a bottle of water.

    There will be no opening statements. A coin flip determined that Biden would stand at the podium to the viewer’s right, while Trump would deliver the final closing statement.


    The next debate won’t be until September. Any stumbles Thursday will be hard to erase or replace quickly.………..

     
    The only explanation for above is delusion....you have to be fing joking.....Trump rambles on about nonsensical stuff in nearly every speech/rally and has never once been suggested he step down.....you have to be kidding with this garbage....

    This board can be really weird. I feel like this entire thread should have happened on the liberal board. Maybe you guys would understand this discussion about Biden's senlity and ability to win is with the Liberal wing exclusively. I don't know why Trump continues to be brought up as whataboutism. That's what you are actually doing.

    "Liberal Media" isn't going to endorse Donald Trump. They are not fans. The media, sitting congressional members, and party insiders are very concerned about Biden's age, and ability to communicate. WhataboutTrump doesn't add anything to this discussion.
     
    Bloomberg isn't a highly rated poll. Still an interesting result, we should get more polling over the next few days.
    Yeah and in addition to that, every poll is basically a one-off anyway.. shouldn't read too much into any single one but rather have to look at the overall trends to ascertain any real value from them.

    But still, thought it was worth posting just to acknowledge.
     
    This is wholly unsustainable for a campaign and I don't see this swirl ending anytime soon.. so.. I dunno if he doesn't step aside.

    On Saturday morning, Rep. Angie Craig, D-Minn., became the latest Democrat and first front-line member to call for Biden to “step aside for the next generation of leadership.”

    Separately, a Democratic lawmaker who previously endorsed Biden told NBC News that they will be breaking their silence on his political future “soon.”

    “It made me sad,” the lawmaker said of Biden’s interview. “Completely out of touch with reality and insulated from truth.”

    A senior aide to another front-line Democrat on the Hill said there have been concrete discussions about top Democrats raising their concerns directly to the president in a public letter. Congress was not in session this past week, and these members decided to wait until they are together in D.C., the aide told NBC News.

    “Front-liners are all pissed, and they are personally ready to pull the trigger to ask Biden to step aside, but politically they are scared s---less,” said the aide, who was granted anonymity to discuss sensitive conversations.

    One House Democrat predicted that there will be more calls for Biden to step aside in the coming days.
     
    Biden's SotU happened.

    G7 happened.

    There was nothing like the debate before the debate or remotely close.

    That is why it was so jarring.

    But now is the time for decisiveness.

    In white water, you are told if you fall out and find yourself under the boat; pick a way and go. Starting and then thinking you picked the long way and turning around is how you drown under the boat.

    We are under the boat. We need to pick a way and go.

    The D brass better be able to read this room without polls. They have to have a contingency plan in case something happens to him - he's 80 for jeebus sakes. Otherwise, what they hell do they do all day?

    If the decision is made to stay the course; so be it. Then tell everyone to Please stop! and get in line or you will pull their funding and primary them next time. Then have him show us - not tell us- he had a bad night. I want to believe you Joe, but once bitten twice shy.

    And if Biden had agreed to step aside; so be it, So have him be the one to tell us he can't do it and introduce either his replacement is his VP by legal succession, or you're having an open convention.

    Regardless, pick a way and go. We will drown for certain under the boat.
     
    Biden's SotU happened.

    G7 happened.

    There was nothing like the debate before the debate or remotely close.

    That is why it was so jarring.

    But now is the time for decisiveness.

    In white water, you are told if you fall out and find yourself under the boat; pick a way and go. Starting and then thinking you picked the long way and turning around is how you drown under the boat.

    We are under the boat. We need to pick a way and go.

    The D brass better be able to read this room without polls. They have to have a contingency plan in case something happens to him - he's 80 for jeebus sakes. Otherwise, what they hell do they do all day?

    If the decision is made to stay the course; so be it. Then tell everyone to Please stop! and get in line or you will pull their funding and primary them next time. Then have him show us - not tell us- he had a bad night. I want to believe you Joe, but once bitten twice shy.

    And if Biden had agreed to step aside; so be it, So have him be the one to tell us he can't do it and introduce either his replacement is his VP by legal succession, or you're having an open convention.

    Regardless, pick a way and go. We will drown for certain under the boat.
    The decision to stay the course with Biden was made by me and the other primary voters. Those votes were counted, Biden won that primary.

    I demand that the party wigs respect the will of the party's primary voters. I'm going to vote for Biden / Harris in the general election.
     
    I just.. do not really perceive that the anti-Trump elements that have existed in the media having now flipped to pro-Trump.

    You are misunderstanding, I don't think they are necessarily pro-Trump, they are pro-profit at any cost including keeping a wannabe tinpot dictator in the news and relevant.....and it would be the height of irony if it led to the downfall of any media that is not totally Trump positive.....

    This board can be really weird. I feel like this entire thread should have happened on the liberal board. Maybe you guys would understand this discussion about Biden's senlity and ability to win is with the Liberal wing exclusively. I don't know why Trump continues to be brought up as whataboutism. That's what you are actually doing.

    "Liberal Media" isn't going to endorse Donald Trump. They are not fans. The media, sitting congressional members, and party insiders are very concerned about Biden's age, and ability to communicate. WhataboutTrump doesn't add anything to this discussion.

    Total BS above.....Trump is a threat to democracy.....full stop.....I could care less if Biden gets elected, steps down and Kamala becomes President, I would also support Kamala if they decide to run her.....this isn't about Biden to me, it's about whomever the Dems run because that's going to be a better choice than a wannabe tinpot dictator.....

    And if you think the media has been nearly as hard on Trump than they have on Biden you really haven't been paying attention or you're just delusional.....
     
    Total BS above.....Trump is a threat to democracy.....full stop.....I could care less if Biden gets elected, steps down and Kamala becomes President, I would also support Kamala if they decide to run her.....this isn't about Biden to me, it's about whomever the Dems run because that's going to be a better choice than a wannabe tinpot dictator.....

    And if you think the media has been nearly as hard on Trump than they have on Biden you really haven't been paying attention or you're just delusional.....

    Let me word this in a better way to you: What does the media going easy on Trump have to do with picking a Democrat nominee for president?

    What your saying is classic whataboutism.

    People in this thread are saying the media is against Biden because of tax's, etc. That's a conspiracy theory.

    There is also an implied belief that if the media treated them equally Biden wouldn't be losing. That's conjecture.

    I don't really care to debate this, and I think it's wrong from the start.

    A more accurate assessment is this:

    "Conservatives have been running a multi-year campaign to question Biden's senility, and age. Biden's debate performance was supposed to dispel these right wing talking points, and instead confirmed them. This has turned into a fever pitch call for Biden to be replaced."

    I don't know if that's the complete truth of the situation, but it's way closer to reality then "The media hates us."
     
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    You are misunderstanding, I don't think they are necessarily pro-Trump, they are pro-profit at any cost including keeping a wannabe tinpot dictator in the news and relevant.....and it would be the height of irony if it led to the downfall of any media that is not totally Trump positive.....
    If you were referring to attention paid to Trump in general by the media as being pro-Trump in the sense that it helps to normalize him and all.. I can definitely understand that.. but yeah, I was just curious about specific pro-Trump/anti-Biden stuff you were seeing and where it was coming from.
     
    Paywalled but Bloomberg polling has Biden narrowing the gap in key states.

    Yes, I still think polling is unreliable. I’m not picking and choosing, just adding this to the mix of news.

     
    I think the biggest difference is that Trump inclined voters eat that shirt up from him and so any calls that have ever happened for Trump to step down have really only come from the left and thus fallen deaf ears.. and are rendered pointless.

    Whereas with this, people inclined to vote for Biden are not eating this shirt up and are extraordinarily concerned that it's about to hand back the White House to Trump on a platter.
    My take is the complaint is about the media, which should be covering both candidates more or less the same. I know they are not, however. It is unclear why.

    It isn’t pro-Trump as much as it is letting him skate for stuff they are absolutely going off on Biden about. I don’t know exactly why they are not beating Trump up about his insane rants, falling asleep every day in court, backing Project 2025 and then saying he doesn’t know anything about it, etc. He is being treated as a viable candidate, and deferred to in so many ways by the press.

    Hell, they aren’t even mentioning his appearance in the Epstein transcripts that were just released at all.
     
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    My take is the complaint is about the media, which should be covering both candidates more or less the same. I know they are not, however. It is unclear why.

    It isn’t pro-Trump as much as it is letting him skate for stuff they are absolutely going off on Biden about. I don’t know exactly why they are not beating Trump up about his insane rants, falling asleep every day in court, backing Project 2025 and then saying he doesn’t know anything about it, etc. He is being treated as a viable candidate, and deferred to in so many ways by the press.

    Hell, they aren’t even mentioning his appearance in the Epstein transcripts that were just released at all.
    That makes sense. Thank you.
     

    To be sure, there are plenty of Democrats who regard the wave of negative coverage for Biden since the debate as a put-up job or a media conspiracy; social media is full of those voices at the moment. But in its natural posture the Democratic Party really cares about its reputation among figures of cultural authority in a way that the Republican Party in its natural posture does not. So Biden’s incapacity, and the wave of elite anger at its concealment, has already created a greater sense of tension for Democratic politicians and staff members and apparatchiks than could ever exist on the Republican side.

    Finally, even after Trump’s most disgraceful moments in 2016, Republicans found ways to reconcile themselves to his candidacy, to take the path of least resistance, by telling themselves that things might get better — that he could hire better advisers, lay off social media, learn to discipline himself, grow into the role of presidential candidate or ultimately president.

    This was mostly self-deception, but it was a story that people could cling to or talk themselves into as a means to avoiding difficult choices. (And there were, in the end, more and less stable periods of Trump’s presidency, depending on which subordinates he hired.)

    With Biden’s condition, though, even the most ardent partisans have to know in their hearts that things will not get any better, that they can only deteriorate from here. Hoping for a moral breakthrough or a sudden discovery of personal discipline from a public figure is generally naïve. But hoping for a reversal of the aging process is a different level of delusion, a higher bar to clear.

    Some Democratic partisans are showing they can clear it. But not enough, I think, for Joe Biden to simply dig his heels in and survive.
     

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