Two houses, each alike in dignity, because neither has any left. After shouting over each other in their first debate, Donald Trump and Joe Biden shook up the familiar format by talking past each other. At 9pm on Thursday night, Trump addressed a town hall meeting on NBC while Biden addressed a town hall meeting on ABC.
Two channels, two parties, two nations: the politics of America are as divided as those of a small Italian town cast into civil dissent by the improper activities of their ruling families’ children.
Like the Romans who wore blue or a green to mark their faction, America’s television screens, once the great unifier of the republic, have bifurcated into a blue channel and a red. The sensible idea was to watch the two town halls simultaneously. But the effect – instant confusion and irritation, no enlightenment, only a mounting sense of bored dread – was too close to the reality.
Trump met Savannah Guthrie of the Today show at the Pérez Art Museum in Miami. Guthrie attacked from the first, interrupting Trump’s quickfire sales pitches with derision and disbelief, even implying he is a white supremacist. The media have been making this mistake for five years now. It is their gift to Trump. When they speak to Trump as an uncouth interloper, they expose how corruptly close to the Democrats they are. They make Trump, an unreasonable fantasist, look sensible and grounded.
When Guthrie attacked Trump for not taking Covid-19 seriously, he replied, “The cure cannot be worse than the problem.” Compared to the inchoate drivel that was pouring from both sides of Joe Biden’s mouth on this subject over on ABC, this was positively statesmanlike.
As we were now ten minutes into Trump’s town hall, proceedings had already became completely surreal. Would Trump, Guthrie asked, confirm that he didn’t believe in the QAnon conspiracy theory that the ‘Democrats are a Satanic paedophile ring and that you’re the saviour of that’. Trump said he was unable to confirm this – not even the saviour part…
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