Post Debate Spin Cycle

Debate-watchers say Biden won first debate — CBS News poll

In the first presidential debate between President Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden, voters who watched Tuesday night said Biden won the debate, but overwhelmingly called the debate's tone negative, and most said they felt annoyed watching it, according to a CBS News survey.

Forty-eight percent said Biden won, while 41% thought Mr. Trump was the winner. Biden's margin here is not too different than his lead in national polls. Ten percent called the debate a tie.

/snip/

Few voters who watched found the debate informative. Just 17% said it was. Most came away feeling annoyed: it was the top feeling expressed by each candidate's supporters. A third of voters felt entertained — more of Mr. Trump's voters felt this way than Biden's.

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Even this MSM article points out that the result of the poll reflected prior preference rather any shift in sentiment coming from this farce. And if Biden can only "win" 48% of the electorate as of now, he is the one in electoral trouble (assuming the votes will be counted honestly.) The Republican Electoral College advantage makes this a close race as of now.

Note how the Trump supporters told the pollsters that they were entertained by the show. This reflects something discussed at the bottom of a thread about Trump and pro wrestling just yesterday:

From yours truly:

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I sincerely believe that this biographical detail is the key to understanding the Trump Phenomenon in American Politics. The basic marketing strategy of wrestling is a mock battle between Good and Evil, with Evil characters always making transparent rationalizations of their Evil Behavior as they claim the Good Guys are really the Bad Guys.

Trump took this schtick into the 2012 GOP Primary, ostensibly backing Newt Gingrich, while promoting himself.

I get nothing but blank stares whenever I bring up this detail to a TDS sufferer. I find this amusing. In the world of wrestling, they divide the audience into two distinct groups -- the Marks and the Smarts. The Marks believe they are watching a real fight between characters who really hate each other. The Smarts realize they are watching an exhibition of fake mayhem, but enjoy both the spectacle and the histrionics of the Show.

It is so ironic that the upper middle class liberals are the Marks and the unsophisticated and unknowledgeable wingnuts in the empty states are the Smarts -- who see how well Trump's villainous act drives liberals beyond the bend, and love it.

I have friends and relatives in real life who are literally immobilized with loathing for this jerkoff. Virtually everything that bothers them is stuff he says -- rather that anything that he actually does.

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And this reply from Travelerxxx:

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I know and have worked alongside many, many hardcore Trump supporters. My guess is that 90% of them fall into the Smarts category. They fully understand what's going on and get great satisfaction from watching Trump "make lib'ruls cry." In a way, it's all they've got. Many of these voted for Obama, and had to watch as he screwed them over. In a way, they've given up, but they are going to at least go down laughing. I've seen that attitude over and over and over again.

I've watched some of these folks sitting in front of a television while Trump was speaking or at a press conference -- much of the time they would be practically rolling on the floor laughing. They know Trump is a liar, they know he's a con man, they know he's a philanderer, they know he's a tax cheat, they know he's a draft dodger, but they don't care any longer. He's as deplorable as they've been told they are, so he's their guy.

Here's the sad part - and I've mentioned this before on C99: Many of these same people, these deplorables laughing with Trump, came to me during the 2016 election with very serious and heartfelt questions about Bernie Sanders. It was as if they were going to get the chance to vote for FDR again.

And they would have.

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I do not have any confidence that the votes are counted honestly in the USA and the clusterfuck of this election I think obliges everybody to consider the possibility that the mutual accusations of vote stealing by the two parties might have some mutual validity.

I cannot for the life of me imagine why we are heading toward civil war, but last night's debate was yet another log on the fire of that conspiracy theory. Ninety Minutes of Chaos as the two top political figures in the country try to "win" votes. Instead they annoyed the piss out of anybody foolish enough to watch their exercise in Annoyance.

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Although Biden does seem to have quite a popular vote lead, the electoral college looks a hell of a lot closer.

I did a count of electoral votes for states that will almost certainly be won by Trump, plus 4 'purple' states where Trump has won at least one poll in the past 3 weeks. These 4 included North Carolina, Iowa, Michigan, and Florida. Keep in mind at least some polls in these states show Biden with a lead as well.

If Trump wins all the expected, always Republican states, plus those 4 above, he has 257 electoral votes--only 13 away from victory (270 needed to win). If either Ohio (where the latest poll puts Biden and Trump only 1% point apart), or Pennsylvania (where Trump is dumping campaign money into), or Virginia (which has historically been a Republican state) is won by Trump, as well as those above, he'll win a second term.

Very. Freakin. Close.

Not sure this debate did anything to move polls, but I don't think it sunk either one.

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18 users have voted.
Shahryar's picture

@apenultimate

he's been ahead in at least 1 poll? and which poll?

I'm gonna vote for Biden just because I live in Portland and screw Trump and Chad Wolf for all of that. I'm fully aware that it's mostly just a politer face but the minor improvements (no Fed troops in town) work for me. And then I want a real 3rd party, starting immediately.

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10 users have voted.

@Shahryar
because Biden needs you. you will never vote third because some blue scumbucket needs you.

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2 users have voted.

I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

Shahryar's picture

@The Voice In the Wilderness

and will again or some other 3rd party. When you have spy planes flying over your head on a daily basis you get to understand that horrible comes in degrees.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Shahryar

They keep a constant distance apart from one another, so that the essential point can always be made: The Republicans (or this particular Republican) are worse. But the "worse" keeps getting worser and the "better" keeps getting worse. So a few years from now (or less) Biden will be doing what Trump is doing now. Either Trump will move further to the right to remain the Demon Villain Big Threat, or he will be welcomed into the fold like George W. Bush has been. Either way, his evil behavior and policies will have been normalized. We just watched that happen with Bush. He used to be the Demon Villain Big Threat and the elections against him The Most Important Election Ever. Now he's the Democrats' best friend and Obama, having replicated and extended all his policies, has normalized them. It's a shell game of sorts; a terrible right-wing guy does terrible things, and so you'll accept anything from the lesser-evil Democrat. But it won't stop there. Next time it'll be the lesser-evil Democrat who's doing the terrible things their erstwhile opponent was doing before they defeated him. Rinse, and repeat.

It's your vote, and I never tell anybody how to vote--not since I used to go door-to-door for the Dems, about ten years ago now. But if you believe you're going to stop the bleeding--or the pain--by voting for the Democratic opposition to the evil right-wing guy who's been hurting people in your town, you're wrong. I wish you were right. But you're not.

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10 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Shahryar's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

getting rid of one doesn't get us where we want to be but we have to get the first out of the way, then the next, then the next. It's not going to be a one step process. I want Trump out and then I'll do what I can to get "Biden" out. Right now I think counting on Bernie was a mistake because we waited until late 2019. The third party, a real third party, needs to begin now.

And nobody should think that I believe Biden getting in solves anything other than getting an out and out fascist out of office. Yes, I could list all of the things that Biden is. That's why I'll be against him immediately.

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@Shahryar
Complaining is not opposing when you vote him.

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2 users have voted.

I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

@apenultimate This one isn't close. With the candidates nearly tied in Texas, we at least get a reprieve from onrushing fascism when the voters throw out the Orange Ape.

Now, will Biden become our salvation? Most likely not, though Kamala Harris is the first veep pick in ages to the left of the nominee. But at least we will have a chance.

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Lookout's picture

the same corporate overlords will win and we will lose.

My hope is that it will be a landslide (one way or the other) to preempt an actual armed rebellion. I think things are leaning Biden, but it isn't how the people vote it is how (and how fast) the votes are counted.

We simply will see when we see.

Meanwhile it is just kabuki theater...nothing to get worked up about, IMO.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

TheOtherMaven's picture

@Lookout

The state to watch is Pennsylvania. Biden cannot win without it, and maybe not even with it. Trump has several different ways of racking up Electoral College points - Biden is much more limited.

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10 users have voted.

There is no justice. There can be no peace.

enhydra lutris's picture

Sounds like a good choice. "Full of sound and fury and signifying nothing" comes to mind.

be well and have a good one

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11 users have voted.

That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Cassiodorus's picture

120405220_10157664442731367_4825915466053341741_n.jpg

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13 users have voted.

"I'm starting to believe that they want Donald Trump to get elected." -- Compton Jay

@Cassiodorus Definitely down for "Neither" here. Glad to be with the majority, you'd think that would be neither Biden or Trump wins, wouldn't you?

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5 users have voted.

@Cassiodorus otherwise known as (according to Dave Barry in 2000) "voters most likely to play in traffic."

And yet, a 3-1 lead over Trump is better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

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1 user has voted.

The Blue Spin is that Trump fucked up the debate and there was nothing that Joe Biden could do with that Orange Thing yelling over him. There are now suggestions floating around the Politico/Huffpost orbit about how to "fix" the "problem" of Donald Trump in future debates by giving somebody the power to put a sock in his mouth.

Talk about fantasies of power.

Trump's derangement is a major theme as well. Yet it appears to be a calculated derangement as his utterances are combed for "signals" to Trump's legions of hooligan-ideologues who will be helping him stuff the ballot box on election day.

What a Great Campaign Slogan -- "Poor Joe. Up Against a Deranged Orangutan."

If you bought Super Tuesday, you will probably buy this line of crap as well. But running for President as Victim strikes me a both hilarious and pathetic. Poor Joe, he just could not cope with a non-human opponent. What do you want in a President anyway? A guy who keeps his cool under pressure? I suppose you want unicorns and rainbows, too.

Joe is as good as you can hope for in this Banana Republic.

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5 users have voted.

I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.

I could not agree more with your assessment. I feel most people don't give a shizz any more and since clearly nothing is going to change regardless, they just enjoy making people better off than they are suffer "emotionally".

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4 users have voted.

If it was easy, everyone would do it.

The Liberal Moonbat's picture

...would anything actually be WORSE under Biden, policy-wise, than it would be under Trump?
Possible, but unclear.

This is the LEAST consequential election of our lifetimes.

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2 users have voted.

In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.

Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!