Biden aides plotted debate strategy for months. Then it all collapsed.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/30/how-biden-debate-prep-led-to-damaging-event/
Biden aides plotted debate strategy for months. Then it all collapsed.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/30/how-biden-debate-prep-led-to-damaging-event/
27 comments
How did Biden’s aides qualify for their jobs? They spent weeks preparing for the “are you too old to be president” and the answer they came up with was “once I was the youngest member of the Senate.” An irrelevant data point. Fire them all.
EDIT: Article claims Biden went rogue on his answer: “And they did not understand why he gave an entirely different answer on the age question than the one they spent more than a week perfecting.”
I was watching Jon Lovett’s show yesterday. He played several clips of the debate. At a little past 6 minutes, he starts to play another one, and the audience shouts it down:
https://youtu.be/lkdxg6IzJDE?si=eqFlsuOfaDxGJUi6&t=376
It would be hard to find an audience of people that dislikes Trump more than this one, and they could not bear to watch Biden stumble through another debate answer. That is how bad it was.
Face reality, people. Biden is going to lose. We can’t go forward like this.
Why are mods deleting links on the 72% number just released by CBS/CNN?
I guess we’re just not gonna talk about all the crazy shit Trump said?
If his aides helped prepare that awful closing statement, then it’s like his aides wanted him to lose the debate.
I can’t read the article, but I think there was an NYT opinion piece suggesting that the Biden team was trying to ramp up activity to show everyone that Biden was capable, and that instead what he should do is slow down and make the events he did do count. It ended up seemingly being a metaphor for this debate
Trump sounds articulate* because he doesnt have to remember anything. He just lies and those are formulaic. Remember what he said about the environment? “Someone just came up to me before I got on stage and said my environmental numbers were the best of all time”. Like what? What fucking numbers lol
But then Biden would talk and he’s trying to recite data points from the past 20 years and can’t remember everything he’s supposed to be saying. My suspicion (again cant read article) was that they practiced all of these memorized talking points to the point where when he got asked a question he would just recite them as fast as he could to sound like he wasn’t old. He couldnt remember everything and flubbed his lines, and left no room for himself to listen to Trump and respond to his very predictable and idiotic responses.
What should have happened is they picked a couple general points per topic – no need to go in depth – and keep answers short and simple. Pick some of Trump’s most predictable lines and attack him on how ridiculous his bullshit is. Then don’t fill Biden’s head with any more and have some catchphrases that are going to make good sound bites. More than anything he needed to slow down and talk like a person not a 10 year old trying to recite something he memorized the night before, quickly before they forget what they memorized
I mean there’s only so much you can polish a turd but you have to work with what you’ve got but the DNC just continues to suck at their jobs and are on a path to losing twice to the most unpopular presidential candidate of all time
*EDIT maybe not articulate but I can understand the individual words he was saying and he said them confidently, even though I think he is also in cognitive decline not to mention full of shit
You can’t argue with trump, you just got to keep calling out all his failures- no shame, just keep putting him on defense for shit he has done
Edit: also talk to the audience on what you plan to do to / continue to do to make life better
Fire them all.
Well, it was a shit strategy. You have an 81-year-old candidate and the last thing you need to do is be filling his head with complex talking points. It’s really simple, you know Trump is going to lie, address the lie first, then say something positive about your presidency and reelection plans. That’s it. Obviously, you want Biden to review and understand his accomplishments, but not in great detail. Keep it simple, stupid.
Biden’s aides and advisors should be embarrassed. Professionally humiliated.
It’s clear they’ve been hiding him.
And I’m voting blue regardless.
People don’t want facts and figures. They want to see how much he cares.
This was so simple. All Biden should have done is say, over and over again, “I don’t matter. I am part of a team of responsible, career lawmakers, leaders, and diplomats. That man is a serial liar, a felon, a racist, and surrounds himself with career con artists, racists, and fascists.”
He should have done what trump did and ignore every single question and just say that over and over again.
Strategy means nothing if you can’t talk coherently. I assume the aides thought he was gonna be all jacked up on Gfuel like he was at the SOTU.
All he had to do was say:
“Listen to the rapist everyone!”
“Felon says what?”
Then laugh at trump and make a few points about abortion and supporting our allies. That’s it. They really overthought this.
Keep it simple stupid. This should be the plan. Emphasize your wins, emphasize trumps flaws(of which there are many).
Dude, Trump straight up said dems kill babies and Biden didn’t push back on that like at all. What the fuck???
Bidens advisors failed him miserably.
Bidens advisors should have used Mohammed Ali’s tatic of:
“The ropes are a beautiful thing,”
Knowing Trump was going to be punching out lie after lie to defer the cards away from Trumps track record of 4 years as president.
Biden was overwhelmed by internal idiots with trying to prepare Biden to have an answer for everything and anything that could be asked.
Biden is the one to bet. Everyone knew Trump was going to be offensive intimidating Trump.
Not one moderator nor Biden called out Trump on any of Trumps lies – buffs fearful of getting snared into Trumps boxing ring.
Trump is a casino guy, remember? He failed at that.
Mary L. Trump should have been the chief advisor who knows first hand how much Trump lost in the casino business.
It is like Bidens advisors trained him for Blackjack when it was a poker match.
In poker, you play the player, not the house.
In blackjack, you play the house, not the players.
What I don’t understand is it had to be obvious in hours before debate that Biden just wasn’t right. Whether it was age, illness, medication effects or other reason his staff should have delayed/cancelled the debate with whatever excuse they could use. There would have been damage but nothing like letting him go out there and bomb so badly. Some people should be fired.
They set the debate at 9 PM. I am 20 years younger than Biden and that is my bedtime. Trump did a line of coke and he was good to go.
World class stupid move to coach an octogenarian with a speech impediment to answer questions by recalling lots of numbers. Like fucking hello?
Questions like the one about Roe should’ve been a free home run, one-sentence answer. “Women should have the freedom to choose, so I will work to reinstate Roe.”
But he starts describing this fuckin 3 trimester thing??? Apparently it’s the nuance of the law itself. Fucking insane
The strategy for the debate was absolutely terrible. It would have been better to use the Stone Cold Steve Austin strategy of yelling “What?” after everything Trump said. Trump is not a serious person. It doesn’t make any sense to try and debate him with facts and figures. The only way to win a debate against Trump is to make him look like a fool. Treat him like the joke that he is and watch him melt down.
Data smog
Any debate prep should have had a bullshitter stand in to anticipate what Trump did, and I’m sure they probably did that, but they’ve chosen the strategy of countering lies with facts and figures. The no-notes debate rule is what made it hard, because any facts to counter lies had to be memorized and recited. But there were too many lies too fast, and Biden didn’t call out the lies often and quickly enough.
Biden needed to show that his administration has been cleaning up after the Trump administration bad decisions. But this debate outcome feels so much like the “when they go low, we go high” strategy the Dems took in 2016 that failed so spectacularly.
There is supposed to be mock debates as well as “non verbal self awareness” debate prep. Things like looking at your watch and excessive sighing are no- no’s. Another no-no to add to list… keep your mouth closed and avoid looking like it is feeding time at nursing home.
Biden should have just spoken slowly and said much much less. The average American voter is just looking for soundbites. When asked about the economy he should have simple and slowly said “We had to clean up Trumps mess and still hit an all-time high in the stock market”. People can digest that. Instead Biden sounded like he was trying to read his entire resume in 2 minutes. No one heard anything.
Trump put the ball on the tee when he brought up golf, should have been an immediate ah yes you did spend more time golfing than doing your job that’s right. Just missed opportunity after opportunity
I did not think he was as bad as people are saying. That said, obviously the debate as a whole was ridiculous.