By Hillary Clinton simply refuses to go away. Despite losing to Donald Trump, the former secretary of State, as part of raising publicity for her new book, has taken to one of America’s largest newspapers to offer debate advice to Joe Biden.
After all, she debated both presidents as she missed two layup attempts at landing the Oval Office.
Calling Joe Biden a “wide and decent man” in a New York Times oped, Clinton again revealed that she will never get over losing to Donald Trump. This time, attacking the former president under the guise of providing “what to watch for” at the upcoming debate.
I am the only person to have debated both men (Mr. Trump in 2016 and, in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary race, Mr. Biden). I know the excruciating pressure of walking onto that stage and that it is nearly impossible to focus on substance when Mr. Trump is involved. In our three debates in 2016, he unleashed a blizzard of interruptions, insults and lies that overwhelmed the moderators and did a disservice to the voters who tuned in to learn about our visions for the country — including a record 84 million viewers for our first debate.
It is a waste of time to try to refute Mr. Trump’s arguments like in a normal debate. It’s nearly impossible to identify what his arguments even are. He starts with nonsense and then digresses into blather. This has gotten only worse in the years since we debated. I was not surprised that after a recent meeting, several chief executives said that Mr. Trump, as one journalist described it, “could not keep a straight thought” and was “all over the map.” Yet expectations for him are so low that if he doesn’t literally light himself on fire on Thursday evening, some will say he was downright presidential.
Mr. Trump may rant and rave in part because he wants to avoid giving straight answers about his unpopular positions, like restrictions on abortion, giving tax breaks to billionaires and selling out our planet to big oil companies in return for campaign donations. He interrupts and bullies — he even stalked me around the stage at one point — because he wants to appear dominant and throw his opponent off balance.
These ploys will fall flat if Mr. Biden is as direct and forceful as he was when engaging Republican hecklers at the State of the Union address in March. The president also has facts and truth on his side. He led America’s comeback from a historic health and economic crisis, with more than 15 million jobs created so far, incomes for working families rising, inflation slowing and investments in clean energy and advanced manufacturing soaring. He’ll win if that story comes through.
Hillary also aimed to set the bar low for Biden, writing that he “starts from a disadvantage because there’s no way he can spend as much time preparing as I did eight years ago. Being president isn’t just a day job; it’s an everything-everywhere-all-at-once job. Historically, that has led to weaker first debate performances for the incumbent.”
Biden has spent a week on vacation from the rigors of the presidency as he prepares for Thursday.
Hillary’s oped also serves as a reminder that liberals will never accept Trump simply beating her in 2016. Although she thinks she did great in the debate against Trump, a study after the election revealed that when genders were reversed and an audience compared the two candidates, Trump came out ahead.
The Guardian explained: “’When we cross gender but stay authentic to speech pattern, the audience is shaken awake and sees it differently,’ said Salvatore, noting Bertolt Brecht’s belief in the need ‘to make the familiar strange‘.‘
As a man, Clinton seemed like a cliched and sleazy politician, overly polished, making grand promises. Her constant smiling felt more forced when a man did it, since it’s rare for men to fake smiles.
When Embry read out Clinton’s website address and book information, mid-debate, he seemed overwhelmingly smug.
Hearing someone else read Trump’s lines made it easier to focus on the content of what he was saying. Perhaps for the first time, I heard the clear messages: “more jobs” and “lower taxes”, criticisms of Clinton’s lack of action.”
Reports have claimed that Biden will likely not take Hillary’s advice. America’s News Brief noted that the president’s advisers are asking him to run away from his own policy record and instead focus on Donald Trump personally.
In short, expect a lot of “felon, felon, felon” from the left side of the table.
[Read More: CNN Melts Down In Face Of The Truth]
