More Takeaways on the Trump – Harris Debate -

 

Facing Off Against Three - The American Spectator

The American Spectator

"When elected, Trump knew what he wanted to do and he tried to do it. After the debate, what Harris would do remains a mystery." 

"The debate over the debate is just getting started. Here are a few takes on the ABC News debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.

ABC Lost

"Everyone knew the ABC News debate would be one-sided. Moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis did nothing to push back against that low-bar expectation as they joined Harris to make the debate a three-against-one affair.

"Harris did not respond to Muir’s opening question — are Americans better off than they were four years ago? Rather than answer, Harris led with her standard talking point about growing up as a “middle-class kid.” The moderators’ failure to call her on her non-answer set the stage.

"I don’t know what ABC brass were thinking, but I know what they weren’t thinking: How could the network make the debate look even-handed?

"One more thing: Trump should have expected as much and brought his A game.

Harris Not Asked About Joe?

"Two journalists had a chance to ask Harris about President Joe Biden’s mental capacity after his dismal performance during a June 27 debate with Trump, which ultimately led Biden to end his reelection bid.

"Biden has blamed a cold, over-preparation, and jet lag from an international trip two weeks earlier for his poor performance during that face-off with Trump. ABC should have asked:

"Does she agree?

"Harris regularly lunches with the president, whom Special Counsel Robert Hur had referred to as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

"Americans have a right to know if the man who will sit in the Oval Office until Jan. 20 is up to the job now.

"The failure to press Harris on Biden’s mental capacity was nothing short of journalistic malpractice.

Trump and Abortion" . . .  More here...

My two shocking statements

 Eric Utter - American Thinker 

. . ."Truth be told, today’s “progressives” claim to worship diversity, but only of skin color, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation. And, perhaps, depravity." . . .

"I am going to make two statements -- here and now -- that will cause woke Marxists to throw a tantrum and scream into the sky. (If any woke Marxists are reading this, please set down your Palestinian flags and the keys to your Prius hybrids … and move to your nearest safe space. For your own good. I care.)

"First, “diversity” in and of itself is not a “value,” nor a good thing. In fact, very often it is destructive. And it is destroying the formerly United States as we speak. 

"Second, tolerance is where nations go to die.

"Diversity of crime, violence, pain, and injustice is not a good thing. Nor is diversity of ignorance, prevarication, apathy, or evil. Truth be told, today’s “progressives” claim to worship diversity, but only of skin color, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation. And, perhaps, depravity. They themselves have zero tolerance for traditional values, conservative thought and opinion, the freedom for others to disagree with them … and anyone or thing that dares to challenge their power.

"We are tolerating our kids being indoctrinated instead of educated in our schools. We are tolerating the mutilation of their genitalia, and the consequent theft of their sexual health in their adult years … often aided and abetted by their “educators.” We tolerated lockdowns and the mandatory introduction of experimental mRNA vaccines into our bodies. And being told we couldn’t attend the weddings or funerals of our loved ones."

What is racism? Everything, according to "The View" ladies and especially Joy Reid of MSNBC

 Arnold Cusmariu - American Thinker

I watched Joy Reid once and it was enough. It's just all her subjective opinion, a total blowhard, a lot of angry blather. Not news. That's not what I watch news for.

Tony Branco

"I enjoyed Matt Walsh’s movie, as did the audience in the theater where I saw it.  He skewers DIE mythology very effectively, showing with example after example that a good deal of what’s going on here is just plain money-grubbing opportunism.  Also coming through loud and clear is the foolishness of whites who take DIE nonsense seriously.  The self-flagellation scene (no kidding) had me howling with laughter.

"Because a movie is not the place for academic analysis, Walsh could not very well include an interview with someone, such as a philosopher specializing in moral theory, who is qualified to explain that “racism” isn’t just a dangerously loaded term; it has multiple meanings that should be distinguished carefully.  Failing to do so will guarantee that the logical fallacy of equivocation is committed.

"A good person for Walsh to have interviewed on the subject of racism is Thomas L. Carson, who taught philosophy at Loyola University Chicago for many years, now retired.  Among Carson’s several books is Lincoln’s Ethics (Cambridge University Press, 2015), to which I contributed comments in draft — Tom and I went to Brown together.

"Eight concepts of racism can be extracted from definitions Carson presented in a chapter titled “Was Lincoln a Racist?”  Carson says (p. 338) that his definitions “draw on important work in contemporary philosophy.” . . .

. . ."Finally, leftists have been known to charge anyone with “racism” who:

• Utters a word of criticism against Vice-President Harris.
• Considers affirmative action immoral.
• Blames violent crime in Chicago on African-Americans.
• Believes that welfare is a huge waste of money.
• Voted for Donald Trump.
• Is a Republican or supports GOP candidates.
• Finds statistics linking I.Q. to scholastic achievement credible.
• Believes that slavery reparations would punish innocent people.
• Wears a MAGA hat.
• Disagrees with New York Times editorials on race.
• Is a member of the National Rifle Association.
• Thinks George Floyd was largely responsible for his own death.

"These are phony charges according to the eight criteria presented in this article.  Anyone who thinks other criteria merit consideration is welcome to formulate them."

A frequent contributor to American Thinker, Arnold Cusmariu is the author of Logic for Kids.  His academic articles can be read at ResearchGate.com.  Also a sculptor, Arnold is currently making pieces that redefine Surrealism.

Bad Blood: Taylor Swift's Endorsement of Kamala Harris May Have Backfired Big Time

  Matt Margolis – PJ Media  

"Sixty-six percent of the poll’s participants said they are not Swifties, while 28% reported being a fan and 6% identified as a big fan. The majority of “big fans” were women, and registered Democrats."

RealityBites by Broc Smith

"According to a new poll, Taylor Swift’s endorsement of Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election might have more of a negative impact on voter support than a positive one.

" 'A new post-debate poll from YouGov released Saturday found that 8% of voters said the pop superstar’s nod is either 'somewhat' or 'much more likely' to convince them to cast their ballot for the Democrat," reports the New York Post. "But a whopping 20% said they are 'somewhat' or 'much less likely' to vote for former President Donald Trump’s opponent now that Swift has spoken."

Celebrity endorsement

"According to reports, Swift’s endorsement resulted in a surge of traffic to vote.gov through Wednesday afternoon. A spokesperson revealed that 337,826 visitors accessed the site after clicking a custom link shared by Swift on Instagram, though it's not entirely clear how many registrations it actually generated or what the party breakdown of those registrations may have been. Some on the left have been jubilant about Taylor Swift's endorsement, which is weird because it's not like the left-wing superstar wasn't going to endorse Kamala at some point.

"I’ve done my own research," Swift claimed, without evidence, "and I’ve made my choice."

"Taylor's political leanings are no secret, and she endorsed Joe Biden back in 2020, so there's no point in pretending she was actually comparing the candidates in order to make a decision. Last month, there were rumors that Taylor Swift would be a mystery performer at the last night of the Democratic National Convention. Beyoncé was another performer linked to the rumor, which turned out to be a con job to boost ratings for Kamala's speech. " . . .

It looks like Taylor is learning the hard way that maybe she should just shut up and sing.

Babylon Bee: Woman Who Made Career Singing About Her Bad Choices Endorses Kamala  . . ."Pop icon Taylor Swift, who has written a veritable library of songs about her being a poor judge of character, made the announcement last night. "I know I'm internationally renowned for regretting every major decision in my life, but this choice will turn out different, I just know it," said Swift. "She's the one!"

"A longtime Democrat, Swift's songwriting is known for chronicling how each man she thought would be the one turned out to be a total scumbag, but she was too blind to see it. More recently, her writing has evolved to explaining how she's mentally unstable and makes terrible, destructive decisions about other things in her life outside of romantic relationships." . . .

Wow. CNN Actually Fact-Checked Kamala's Attacks on Trump and JD Vance

 Matt Vespa (townhall.com)

Their coverage: Fact check: Harris campaign social media account has repeatedly deceived with misleading edits and captions | CNN Politics

"Below are eight examples of false or misleading video posts from the account since mid-August, including three from the latter part of this week. All of them have previously been highlighted by an anonymous rebuttal account called @KamalaHQLies, which itself has more than 268,000 followers."

"No, they don’t deserve a full pardon for their atrocious anti-Trump coverage, but at least, in this instance, they did their job. I have no idea why CNN’s Daniel Dale waited this long to slap a fact-check on Kamala’s social media team for spreading comical, facially untrue lies about the former president, but it is what it is when it comes to this outlet. Dale went through multiple instances where the Harris campaign was lying. Notably, remarks about Charlottesville are included in this list, though it did not delve into the ‘very fine people on both sides’ lie: 

  CNN just nuked @KamalaHQ for their constant lies about Trump and Vance.https://t.co/1UWGpK8fPt pic.twitter.com/lhdeHpLWCt

— Greg Price (@greg_price11) September 14, 2024

. . .  "Dale, Snopes, a left-wing outlet, finally admitted Trump didn’t call Neo-Nazis ‘very fine people.’ The liberal media is forever going to die on that hill, aren’t they? It’s a total lie that many of us already knew since we watched the presser in real-time. So, yes, CNN finally fact-checked Kamala, but that only means a dozen-plus stories that falsely malign the former president are coming."

Matt Walsh and The Daily Wire Strike Again: ‘Am I Racist?’ Is Borat-Style Humor for Conservatives

 Scott Pinsker – PJ Media

One sidenote: Kudos to the editors and producers for making the film Kamala-centric. Numerous scenes were undoubtedly reshot — hastily, I’d assume — after Joe Biden abandoned his reelection campaign just a month ago. The film does a wonderful job at switching the focus away from Biden and onto Harris.

"In certain respects, this film is review-proof: Matt Walsh and The Daily Wire are already big winners. Their new feature film — a mockumentary about diversity education — opened last night in 1,500 theaters. Anecdotally, their fanbase responded enthusiastically, filling 75+ percent of seats in many markets across the country.

"But The Daily Wire already got what it wanted: The visibility of their brand was amplified, and the celebrity profile of one of their biggest personalities, Matt Walsh, was elevated. Regardless of how well it does in the box office, as a vehicle for self-promotion, DEI = ROI.

"The story (such as it is) is fairly thin: Matt Walsh has questions about diversity and racism, which leads him down the DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) rabbit hole. Alas, Wash is so gosh-darn famous, he must don a disguise. And so he does: God-awful skinny jeans, nerd-glasses and an ill-fitting man-bun. The rest of the film is mostly Walsh interviewing mush-brained “anti-racist” educators, slyly — and not so slyly — challenging their most cherished beliefs.

"The parallels to “Borat,” a 2006 mockumentary by Sacha Baron Cohen, are self-evident. Walsh and Cohen are both gifted comedic interviewers with an uncanny knack for maintaining a straight face and perfect composure amidst mayhem and absurdity. Both rely on uncomfortable social moments, cringe-humor, subterfuge, and “gotcha” exposés of self-important tastemakers, influencers and experts. 

“ 'Am I Racist?” veers from the “Borat” formula towards the end, almost becoming a live-action version of “South Park,” complete with a Kyle-esque “I learned something today” speech in the finale." . . .

NEW: Kamala Shows Just How Unfit She Is in PA, As Trump Supporters Come Out to Greet Her

 Nick Arama – RedState  "Kamala Harris had the help of the moderators during the debate, and people have raised questions about whether there was any other assistance there. 

Our newest ad just dropped pic.twitter.com/HGYvK5jNYX

— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) September 13, 2024

"But otherwise, she's largely tried to avoid questions because when she does answer questions, things don't go well. Her first solo television interview was such a train wreck, that the Trump campaign posted the whole thing, calling it their "newest ad." It was that bad. She couldn't even keep it together for such a short period of time: 

"As I previously reported, she got nailed during her Univision radio interview -- you could hear her turning the pages of the notes, from which she was reading. Both interviews were very short, just like the CNN interview. 

"On Friday, she was in Pennsylvania, and she had more problems. 

"She visited Wilkes-Barre. But loud Trump supporters were there, who were getting all kinds of honks of approval, according to the local news: 

Our newest ad just dropped pic.twitter.com/HGYvK5jNYX

— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) September 13, 2024

Violent crime has increased under Harris-Biden admin -- after ABC's David Muir disputed Trump's claim that crime is 'through the roof'

  DOJ report (nypost.com)  

"Friday afternoon, Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt called on Muir, the anchor of ABC’s “World News Tonight” to “issue an immediate public apology to President Trump for wrongly and rudely fact checking him on the debate stage.' ”

David Muir attempted to correct Trump about the number of crimes in the country.

"Violent crime has increased under the Harris-Biden administration, according to data from the Department of Justice published Friday — belying ABC News debate moderator David Muir’s correction of Donald Trump during his showdown with Kamala Harris Tuesday night.

"The DOJ’s survey from the Bureau of Justice statistics is self-reported instances of violent crime over the last six months — meaning that it includes crimes that may not have been reported to police.

"The annual National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) showed total instances of reported violent crime — including rape, robbery and aggravated assault — is up from 5.6 per 1,000 in 2020 to 8.7 per 1,000 in 2023.

"The highest recent rate of violent crime was in 2022, when the survey tracked 9.8 instances per 1,000 people over the age of 12.

"The rate of rape increased from 1.2 per 1,000 in 2020 to 1.7 in 2023, while robbery went from 1.6 per 1,000 in 2020 to 2.6 per 1,000 in 2023, and aggravated assault rose from 2.9 per 1,000 in 2020 to 4.5 per 1,000 in 2023." . . .

. . ."“This new data proves President Trump was right,” Leavitt added. “Violent crime is up and if Kamala is given another four years to implement her weak-on-crime, defund the police, no cash bail policies — America will continue to turn into a crime-ridden hellhole for illegal immigrants, Venezuelan gangsters, and drug dealers. ONLY President Trump will restore law and order. If Americans want to be safe, VOTE TRUMP.”

"ABC News did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Post." . . .

UPDATE:   Shocking Video Exposes True Motives Of ABC Debate Moderators

Comment on this video by @KevinSanderson     "The reported bias of ABC management and anchors being linked to Kamala should be admitted and disclosed. The lawyers of ABC and Disney should investigate and report the results and corrections to the public. The corporate lawyers should investigate The View as well as other ABC news broadcasts. They have a responsibility to the public they serve."

Victory: Israel Wins Battle of Rafah -- Which Kamala Told It Not to Fight ("We've been very clear!")

 Joel B. Pollak (breitbart.com)  

Kamala Harris doesn’t rule out consequences for Israel if it goes ahead with Rafah op | The Times of Israel

 "The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) declared victory Thursday in the battle of Rafah, having destroyed Hamas’s four battalions there over the course of four months.

It was a battle that Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party nominee for U.S. president, told Israel not to fight, warning of the consequences for civilians there, and even threatening to withhold U.S. weapons.

“I have studied the maps,” Harris said, declaring that it was impossible to attack Rafah without hurting civilians.

"Israel, believing it would lose the war without taking Rafah, entered anyway.

"At the time, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stressed the importance of eliminating the last remaining Hamas battalions. As of May 2024, Israel had destroyed 18 of those battalions, leaving four in Rafah and two in central Gaza. Without destroying the final six battalions, Netanyahu argued, it would be impossible to win the war.

"After delaying from February to May, in the fact of opposition from Harris and President Joe Biden, Netanyahu proceeded with battle plans, and IDF troops seized the Philadelphi Corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border before turning toward the rest of Rafah, fighting neighborhood by neighborhood, street to street, and house to house.

"As Breitbart News reported, the prime minister’s office declared Thursday that all of the Hamas battalions had been destroyed, and that Hamas was now reduced to guerrilla warfare and no longer functioning as a coherent military.

"The Jewish News Syndicate added that the IDF formally declared victory in Rafah over the four battalions there: . . ."     Kamala Harris Called an 'Empty Suit'

Linsey Davis Reveals How She, David Muir and ABC News Schemed to Protect Kamala Harris by Ambushing President Trump With 'Fact Checks' After He Crushed Biden in Debate

 The Gateway Pundit | by Kristinn Taylor  

ABC News anchor Linsey Davis revealed in a post-debate Los Angeles Times puff-piece profile how she, ABC World News Tonight anchor David Muir and ABC producers schemed to ambush President Trump with ‘fact checks’ at Tuesday night’s presidential debate in Philadelphia with Kamala Harris after watching Trump crush and knock Joe Biden out of the race in their June debate.

. . ."The day after the debate, Davis proudly gushed to the Los Angeles Times how the scheme to ambush Trump was put in action (excerpt):

...Davis, wearing pink glasses while speaking to The Times over breakfast at the Ritz Carlton in Philadelphia, said the decision to attempt to correct the candidates was in response to the June 27 CNN debate between Trump and President Biden, whose poor performance led to his exit from the race.

“People were concerned that statements were allowed to just hang and not [be] disputed by the candidate Biden, at the time, or the moderators,” Davis said.

Muir and Davis divided up the topics to study, and Davis fully anticipated that Trump’s erroneous abortion claim would come up when she questioned him on the issue.

“That was an obvious thing to get on the record,” Davis said.

In the weeks before the debate, various scenarios were played out in table read-like settings where the anchors and ABC News producers tested their questions and played out the possible responses." . . .

Taunting Trump might not have been what undecided voters wanted to see from Harris - Washington Examiner   "Vice President Kamala Harris is being lauded for her debate performance against former President Donald Trump on Tuesday night, in sharp contrast with President Joe Biden back in June.

"The question now becomes whether Harris’s well-executed plan of irritating Trump and joining with the moderators and Trump himself to draw attention to his negatives was what the voters she most needs really wanted.

"Trump pollsters Tony Fabrizio and Travis Tunis say that, according to their data from the top seven battleground states, the answer is no. “We found that despite the best efforts of Kamala Harris and [the] media to portray the debate as some kind of overwhelming win for her, voters did not see it this way as support for her remained flat,” they wrote in a memo released on Thursday. “The only change we saw was a 2-point bump for President Trump in both ballot configurations.' ” . . . 

BREAKING UPDATE: ABC Debate Scandal Explodes - Whistleblower Reveals Everything

The media war against Israel; Partisan journalists may have subverted American democracy, but over Israel they have blood on their hands

  Melanie Phillips (substack.com) 

. . ."Instead, they have been inciting often murderous hatred of Israel around the world. The media may have subverted and undermined American democracy. But when it comes to Israel, it has blood on its hands." . . .

BBC Broadcasting House, London

. . ."And the picture of Israel that’s been painted over the last few decades — and even more intensely since the October 7 Hamas-led pogrom against southern Israel communities — is a vicious and wildly distorted caricature.

"The impression given by the British media for the past 11 months of this war has been that Israel is wilfully killing huge numbers of Gaza’s women and children, recklessly bombing hospitals and schools full of displaced people, and preventing humanitarian aid from getting to civilians.

"Those claims are the reverse of the truth. Yet a very senior military figure seems to have believed them because this media narrative is omnipresent. Even in newspapers whose editorial line is broadly sympathetic to Israel, the reporting is massively distorted by the promulgation of Hamas propaganda as news reports.

"The most egregious serial offender is the BBC, whose global reach and reputation for integrity and trustworthiness make it the most influential media outlet in the world. For decades, it has sanitised Palestinian Arab terrorism and painted Israel falsely as the aggressor in the region. And during the current war in Gaza, its coverage has been overwhelmingly malevolent.

"A major study published this week by Trevor Asserson, a British lawyer based in Tel Aviv, laid bare the staggering scale of this betrayal of BBC and journalistic standards.

"A dedicated team he set up used AI to crunch four months of war coverage. It identified 1,553 breaches of the BBC’s own guidelines on impartiality and accuracy. It also revealed moderate or strong pro-Palestinian/anti-Israeli sentiment in more than 90 per cent of broadcasts on the network’s flagship shows." . . .

Gabbard Has a Message for Garland After He Vowed Not to Allow the DOJ to Be Used As a 'Political Weapon'

  Rebecca Downs (townhall.com) 

. . ."Gabbard offered, "it's hard not to laugh at his statement where he tried to sound so serious, and so convicted, and so grave about never ever politicizing or weaponizing these government agencies when in fact that is what they are doing currently and what they have been doing for years," including during the Trump administration." 

"On Thursday, as we covered at the time, Attorney General Merrick Garland made some rather tone deaf remarks claiming that the Department of Justice's (DOJ) "norms" are "a promise that we will not allow this department to be used as a political weapon." Garland was promptly called out for such remarks, by the Trump-Vance campaign, as well as former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, once a Democrat, now an Independent who is on the Trump transition team. Gabbard also addressed how her criticism is personal." . . .

. . ."Gabbard brought up how a weaponized and politicized DOJ has been used against former and potentially future President Donald Trump as well, noting that "there's too many to cite," but that they "have been made very clear to the American people and those paying attention with any objectivity, that this is lawfare, this is the kind of thing that happens in dictatorships and authoritarian governments, where those who are in power, Kamala Harris and Joe Biden, are weaponizing and politicizing the [DOJ] and law enforcement agencies, both at the federal level and the state level, to take out their political opponent, the greatest threat to their power in a way that has never been done... before in our country's history. That's where he should start!' " . . .