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In a recent survey of investors by Evercore ISI, 48% picked Trump to win the presidential debate on June 27, while 16% see Biden as the most likely victor. Some 36% expect “both to lose.”
A USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll also predicted that former President Trump would win the upcoming head-to-head, with Independents giving Trump a 10-point advantage. Meanwhile, a “supercomputer”, orchestrated by betting odds site Oddspedia concluded, after 1,000 simulations, that President Joe Biden had a 65% chance of beating Donald Trump on Thursday.
The CNN Presidential Debate promises to be the Super Bowl of politics, with 60% of voters saying they intend to tune in and 30% saying the debate could determine their vote. It is not hyperbole (as Biden might say) to suggest that the future of the United States – and perhaps the western world — could rest on the outcome.
Winning, meanwhile, may be in the eye of the beholder. Unlike in past debates, this encounter will likely be judged more on presentation than policy.
IN WINNING DEBATE COIN FLIP, BIDEN PRIORITIZES PODIUM POSITION OVER CLOSING STATEMENT
If incumbent President Joe Biden can remain standing and be even vaguely coherent for 90 minutes, he will be declared victorious. That is how low a bar Americans have set for the leader of the free world; that is how concerned voters are that our commander-in-chief is not mentally fit for four more years.
Democrats and their media allies know this, which is why they have launched quite possibly the stupidest argument in U.S. history, charging that videos taken of Biden wondering lost at world gatherings or being led offstage by former President Barack Obama are, to use the words carefully planted by White House spin doctors, “cheap fakes.”
Biden’s handlers, including his protective wife Jill Biden, are aggressively trying to convince the American people that behind closed doors Joe is sharp as a tack, and that it is “disinformation” to suggest otherwise.
Sorry, Joe, that doesn’t wash. Countless episodes of muddled messages, forgotten names, blank stares and confusion (like trying to sit on a non-existent chair at recent D-Day ceremonies), don’t lie. Special Counsel Robert Hur, who declared you mentally unable to stand trial for illegally mishandling classified documents, didn’t lie. If he did, you’d be releasing the tapes of the interviews that led to Hur’s assessment, as Republicans have demanded, but you won’t.
BIDEN’S ‘PERPETUAL STATE OF CONFUSION’ ON DISPLAY IN NORMANDY AMID RISING COGNITIVE QUESTIONS
The White House could easily squash all this nay-saying about the president’s cognitive capabilities by allowing Biden to do some press conferences, without the notecards and the prepared questions, or meet with the editorial board of the New York Times, as every prior president has done.
Better yet: have an independent medical team administer a cognitive test! They won’t because they can’t.
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For Donald Trump, the bar is much higher. Trump must convince Americans he has the temperament to govern, that his policies will put the nation back on course and deflect concerns that he poses a “threat to democracy.” To win, he must:
- Show Americans his sunny side, which he failed to do in the first 2020 debate. If Biden falters, show empathy for a man in decline.
- Trump must relay facts – they are on his side. Remind voters of the good times – that he left the White House with inflation at only 1.4%, and created an economy (pre-COVID-19) which narrowed the wealth gap and drove real incomes higher. Tell people how you can do it again.
- Similarly, he must convince voters that he, not Biden, has the better plan on immigration. Talk up his new plan to give foreigners graduating from college a green card, and his old proposal about merit-based immigration; emphasize the damage done by Biden’s open border, including tens of thousands of fentanyl deaths, terrorists entering the U.S. undetected, and cities collapsing under the weight of the migrant surge. Note the horrific murders of Jocelyn Nungaray and Laken Riley, allegedly by people who were in the country illegally. Bring the victims to life.
- Trump must counter accusations that he poses a threat to democracy by asserting that trying to lock up your political opponent, who is leading in the polls, is the worst conceivable undermining of our democracy.
- Overall, he must look to the future, and not just review his past accomplishments. Consumer sentiment surveys show Americans have been in the dumps since Joe Biden became president; they want hope and optimism, and Trump must give them that.
For former President Donald Trump the night is full of risk. He is winning on important issues like the economy, inflation and the border, but he will be squaring off against not only Joe Biden but also two moderators – Jake Tapper and Dana Bash — who have no love for the former president. They will undoubtedly tilt the questioning towards abortion access and January 6, hoping not only to buttress Biden’s two main lines of attack but also provoke Trump into being combative – and, as in 2020, unlikeable.
Democrats have spread the alarm that Trump is out for vengeance, portraying him as obsessed with past wrongs — think Russiagate and Alvin Bragg. He must table his (rightful) anger about Democrat lawfare and the 2020 election and instead remain calm and talk policy.
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How both men perform could determine the election in November. Voters will either give Joe Biden a blank check to continue America’s path towards socialism, enabling more Big Government spending favoring takers over makers, or they will choose common sense, lower taxes, law and order, and an “all of the above” energy policy.
After winning a coin toss, Biden chose the right to stand at the podium on the right rather than be the last speaker, which seems odd. Perhaps his handlers expect the president to run out of gas over 90 minutes; they don’t want voters’ final impression to be Biden lost in his own words. After all, as part of his debate prep, Biden is reportedly practicing standing up.
Stay tuned, literally.
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