;)
The Commentariat -- Sept. 5, 2016
The Way We Were.
Presidential Race
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd.
In his first turn as a presidential debate moderator, Fox "News"'s Chris Wallace does not intend to commit journalism, as MAG points out in today's Comments. Sarah Burris of the Raw Story: Wallace said on Howard Kurtz's Fox "News" show: "'I do not believe it is my job to be a truth squad. It's up to the other person to catch them on that. I certainly am going to try to maintain some reasonable semblance of equal time. If one of them is filibustering, I'm going to try to break in respectfully and give the other person a chance to talk. But I want it to be about them -- I want it to be as much of a debate, people often talk that it's simultaneous news conferences.' Wallace said that he hopes the event will become more of a debate between the candidates and not a debate between the candidate and moderators armed with facts." ...
... CW: Wallace prefaced his promise to let the candidates lie by making this analogy: "I view it as kind of being a referee in a heavyweight championship fight." Referees, Wallace must know, are charged with enforcing fight rules. Wallace is saying then that lying is not an infraction, thus the ref/moderator does not need to call out the candidates' lies. He also is admitting something we all know: that the Fox "News" standard sanctions lying. The debates committee would have done better to employ some print journalists to moderate the debates rather than the pretty teevee-star kind.
David Edwards of the Raw Story: "Former CNN host Soledad O'Brien blasted the cable news business over the weekend for profiting off the hate speech that has fueled Donald Trump's political rise. According to O'Brien, the media had gone through 'contortions to make things seem equal all the time' when comparing Trump to ... Hillary Clinton." O'Brien slammed the she-said/he-said "journalism" employed where there's no equivalency. She said the cable news networks have "normalized white supremacy" by "softening the ground for ... white supremacists..., white nationalists, who would self-identify that way...." -- CW ...
... digby: "The idea that Clinton and Trump surrogates are equally dishonest is bullshit. Simple bullshit. But they have to do it. You can see the reflex there at work perfectly in Mark Leibovitz's obvious discomfort [in the segment above] at presenting Trump as something uniquely outrageous." -- CW ...
... Paul Krugman: The press is grading Donald Trump "on a curve. If he manages to read from a TelePrompter without going off script, he's being presidential. If he seems to suggest that he wouldn't round up all 11 million undocumented immigrants right away, he's moving into the mainstream. And many of his multiple scandals, like what appear to be clear payoffs to state attorneys general to back off investigating Trump University, get remarkably little attention. Meanwhile, we have the presumption that anything Hillary Clinton does must be corrupt, most spectacularly illustrated by the increasingly bizarre coverage of the Clinton Foundation.... If reports about a candidate talk about how something 'raises questions,' creates 'shadows,' or anything similar, be aware that these are all too often weasel words used to create the impression of wrongdoing out of thin air." ...
... CW: That's Krugman biting the hand that feeds him. Good for him. ...... Judd Legum of Think Progress: "Hillary Clinton has faced consistent scrutiny for her role in the Clinton Foundation.... Much of the controversy about the Clinton Foundation focuses on ... whether [Secretary Clinton] was complicit in 'selling access' in return for donations to the foundation. These charges were elevated to prominence by Peter Schweizer, president of the Government Accountability Institute..., the non-profit arm of Breitbart.com.... Schweizer's book failed to uncover any clear evidence of wrongdoing -- and was rife with errors -- but it did succeed in focusing mainstream media attention on the alleged issue.... Meanwhile, on September 1, news broke that the Trump Foundation 'violated tax laws by giving a political contribution to a campaign group connected to Florida's attorney general.' It was required to pay a $2500 fine to the IRS. The details of the case are even more unseemly.... The story has something that none of the Clinton Foundation stories have: Actual evidence of illegal conduct [and] a formal finding of wrongdoing by the IRS. And yet, coverage of the Trump Foundation, even in the few short days since the story of the IRS fine broke, has been scant." ...
... CW: Take a look at Legum's chart to see the difference in coverage of the Clinton & Trump foundations. ...
... Steve M.: "... the Clinton campaign should make an ad about the Trump Foundation. It may not be a message that wins over voters in key states, but ads become news of their own these days, and maybe the slap in the face the media needs on this subject is a Clinton paid ad. God forbid the press should do its job without that prodding." Also, Trump has said he won't talk about birtherism, "and the press has been completely deferential to his wish to avoid the subject." -- CW ...
... John Ziegler in Mediaite: "... perhaps the most amazing example of the news media largely letting Trump off the hook regarding a topic which should be a clear disqualifier for the presidency is his 'Birtherism' crusade against President Barack Obama.... Trump, according to The New York Times, lied about having investigators which had uncovered important new data on the topic." -- CW ...
... Stephen Brown of the New York Daily News: "Donald Trump has blasted Hillary Clinton for accepting money from Saudi Arabia through her foundation, but a Daily News investigation reveals he has padded his bank account with cash from the same country. Trump sold the 45th floor of Trump World Tower to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for $4.5 million in June 2001, according to a city Finance Department spokeswoman.... Rebecca Ocampo, who alleged in court papers she helped broker the deal between Trump and the Saudis, said the apartments were about more than money -- they were also about 'access' to a new, potentially lucrative market in the Middle East.... In 1985, Osama Bin Laden's half-brother Shafiq Bin Laden paid an $8,500 security deposit for an apartment in Trump Tower." ...
... CW: So it's horrible for the Clintons to take Saudi money for charity, but A-Okay for Trump to take Saudi money for profit.
Kathleen Gray of the Detroit Free Press: Bill "Clinton will march with organized labor down Michigan Avenue in Detroi this morning and greet union members along the way. He's not scheduled to speak at the end of the parade." ...
... CW: Probably because Hillary Clinton's health is so precarious she can't walk down the street, so she's sending her husband, who has had quadruple bypass surgery, out in the noonday sun to do her job. Oh, wait, "Hillary Clinton and her running mate -- Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine -- are participating in a Labor Day Festival in Cleveland today. Clinton also plans on attending a Salute to Labor program in Hampton, Ill., while Kaine will be joined by [Vice President] Biden at a Labor Day parade in Pittsburgh."
I think that anytime that we hear intolerance, anytime that we hear policy measures that are contrary to our values, banning certain classes of people, because of who they are or what they look at, what faith they practice, then we have to be pretty hard about saying no to that. And I think that America will do that this time as well. -- President Obama, in an interview ...
... Obama: Trump's a Jerk, But He's a Copycat Jerk. Louis Nelson of Politico: "The America-first, nationalistic tones upon which Donald Trump has built his campaign are nothing new, President Barack Obama said in an interview that aired Sunday morning...."
By Driftglass.Cyra Master of the Hill: "... Donald Trump took to Twitter Sunday night to again attack rival Hillary Clinton over her use of a private email server.... 'Lyin' Hillary told the FBI that she did not know the "C" markings on documents stood for CLASSIFIED. How can this be happening?' he tweeted.... However, several people on social media noted that FBI Director James Comey has said the 'C' stands for confidential." CW: That is, Trump lied in a tweet in which he called Clinton a liar. SOP.
Cyra Master: "... Donald Trump lashed out at Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) Sunday on Twitter. He tweeted that the Republican Party needs 'strong and committed leaders, not weak people such as @JeffFlake' in order to address illegal immigration.... Earlier Sunday, Flake reiterated on CNN's 'State of the Union' that he would not be voting for Trump in November." -- CW
Louis Nelson"... Chuck Todd worked hard to nail down Republican vice-presidential candidate Mike Pence on his running mate's immigration plan, asking the Indiana governor more than 10 times during Sunday's installment of NBC's 'Meet the Press' what would happen to undocumented immigrants who had not committed a crime in a Donald Trump administration. But each time Todd asked a variation of the question, Pence demurred.... In an interview on ABC's 'This Week,' Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway similarly declined to offer a concrete answer to the question of what the Manhattan billionaire would do with undocumented immigrants who have not committed a crime...." CW: Might be the only time we read the clause "Chuck Todd worked hard".
"Trump Card." Donald Even Rigged His Stupid Beauty Pageants. Lucia Graves of the Guardian: "Miss Universe judge Jeff Lee admitted in GQ that Trump -- who from 1996 to 2015 owned or co-owned both Miss Universe and Miss USA -- frequently had a say in which women made the final round. According to the story's author, Burt Helm: 'Lee will tell you that from 2005 until Donald Trump sold the Miss Universe pageant last year, the billionaire quietly handpicked as many as six semifinalists -- "Trump cards", they were called.'" But when Trump contestant Sheena Monnin wrote about the fix on her Facebook page, Trump disparaged her character, then sued her for $10MM. "... last year, Trump's lawyer Michael Cohen bragged to the Daily Beast about the time he 'destroy[ed]' Monnin's life. Because her lawyer didn't show up or even tell her about a scheduled arbitration meet, a judge ruled for Trump, ordering Monnin had to pay Trump $5MM, though Monnin ended up paying nothing after she sued her incompetent attorney.
Wayne Barrett, in the New York Daily News, on the long, seamy relationship between Donald Trump & his top surrogate Rudy Giuliani: CW: It's impossible to decide which of them is more despicable.
Vincente Fox (former president of Mexico) in the Guardian: "The Republican presidential candidate arrived in my country offering diplomacy as fake as a $3 bill...[W]ith this visit to my country he has confirmed that he is without a doubt someone who cannot be trusted...He used the president of Mexico and all of the country's citizens to his own benefit...Well, even though I'm against walls, I’d gladly build one around Trump, to spare the world from people like him. We don't need you." --safari
**The Other Terrorism. Contributors of Juan Cole: "[A] study from The Program on Extremism at The George Washington University analyzed accounts from prominent white nationalist organizations such as the American Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan. It found that from 2012 to 2016 these accounts had a 600 percent increase in followers, now estimated to stand at around 22,000 up from around 3,500 in 2012...The study also found that people who follow white nationalist accounts were unsurprisingly 'invested in Donald Trump's presidential campaign.' White nationalist followers used Trump hashtags more than any other white nationalist related hashtag except for #whitegenocide." --safari
James Kirchick of The Daily Beast: "Trump is a living repudiation of everything religious conservatives claim to believe in. A thrice-married, epically greedy, congenitally dishonest serial adulterer who brags about his sexual conquests and exalts the rich and powerful while heaping scorn upon the weak and vulnerable, Trump is the villain of Sunday school parables made real...[Yet] according to a July Pew poll, 78 percent of white evangelicals have expressed support for him, compared to just 73 percent who backed Mitt Romney at the same time in 2012." --safari
Other News & Views
Dana Priest, et al., of the Washington Post: "U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies are probing what they see as a broad covert Russian operation in the United States to sow public distrust in the upcoming presidential election and in U.S. political institutions, intelligence and congressional officials said.... The effort to better understand Russia's covert influence operations is being spearheaded by James R. Clapper Jr., the director of national intelligence." -- CW
William Wan & Karen DeYoung of the Washington Post: "President Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin failed to reach a deal Monday on a cease-fire for Syria, but the two sides have agreed to continue negotiating even as Syrian government forces close in on the beseiged city of Aleppo. Meeting with Putin on the sidelines of the G20 meeting [in Hangzhou, China], Obama emphasized the humanitarian importance and urgent need for a ceasefire but was adamant about not striking an agreement that wouldn't meet his long-term objectives in Syria, a White House official said...." ...
... Rebecca Morin of Politico: "President Barack Obama 'wouldn't overcrank the significance' of the altercations between Chinese and White House officials over press access that greeted Air Force One on Saturday after it landed in Hangzhou, China, for the G20 summit. At a news conference Sunday with British Prime Minister Theresa May, Obama said this is not the first time there have been issues with security and press access. The president said the U.S. provides access to the press pool that "other countries may not insist on.... After the arrival of Obama and White House officials, Chinese and White House officials had several disagreements, such as whether the press pool could be on the tarmac for the president's arrival." -- CW ...
... Mark Landler & Jane Perlez of the New York Times have the backstory on President Obama's bumpy arrival in China, which is more complicated that previously reported. -- CW
Way Beyond
Tom Phillips & Eric Cheung of the Guardian: "Two years after tens of thousands of young people poured on to the streets of Hong Kong to issue an unprecedented call for political change, a new generation of pro-democracy activists has gained a foothold in power in the former British colony. At least four radical young activists who support greater political autonomy or outright independence from China claimed seats in Hong Kong's 70-member legislative council, or Legco, after a record 2.2 million people went to the polls on Sunday." --safari
Juan Cole has a good summary of the ironclad rule of the recently deceased Uzbekistan president Islam Karimov. A little taste: " Karimov was only one dog-eaten uncle short of running a North Korea." --safari
News Lede
NBC News: "Storm warnings were in effect Monday from Long Island to Nantucket as post-Tropical Cyclone Hermine drifted slowly up the Atlantic, promising near hurricane-strength winds, floods and beach erosion. The National Weather Service said large waves will pound the East Coast from the mid-Atlantic states to southern New England through the end of Labor Day. Life-threatening rip currents are expected at least into the middle of the week, it added. At 5 a.m. ET, Hermine was about 305 miles southeast of the eastern tip of Long Island, N.Y. The storm was 'drifting northward' at 3 mph and 'expected to meander off the mid-Atlantic coast during the next day or two,' according to the National Weather Service." -- CW
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Reader Comments (22)
Maybe, just maybe, the media will finally start to tell the truth. Trump is a for real criminal.
Here's an interesting piece from TNR: "The Birth of Conservative Media as we Know it."
It started in a small apartment in Washington, D.C.in 1953 although decades before the seeds were sown.
This article was taken from Nicole Hammer's "Messengers of the Right."
https://newrepublic.com/article/136390/birth-conservative-media-know
Appears that Sean Hannity and Chuck Todd have welcomed newest member, Chris Wallace, to their ""I'm not a journalist Club"" — "Wallace says it won’t be his job to separate truth from fiction in his historic role as moderator of the final debate before the November election."
Speaking of journalists, I have another bone to pick. Following various LiveBlog reports often leaves me wondering what the real message is from the reporters.
How about some neutral facial expressions in their photos? Usually follow the NYTimes live-blogging, but it's awkward. Maggie Haberman's grinning photo suggests she's having the most hilarious time, Adam Nagourney looks delighted as though he just heard his favorite sports team made the playoffs...so, when I read their posts, there is such a disconnect between their ha-ha image and their serious-or-not? remarks.
MAG,
At least the picture of Donaldo that accompanies his Tweets of a Twit accurately portrays his typically dark, dyspeptic, and lying comments. That picture looks like he has just swallowed a suppository, no doubt mistaking one orifice for the other. Very likely his GI, that one who had examined all previous presidents in order to proclaim Trumpy the fairest of them all, likely told Tiny Hands to stick that suppository where the shit comes out.
Good to know that Trumpy is not completely incapable of following directions.
I'm probably nit-picking here, but we ought to be more careful about the terms we use.
There is no such thing as an "undocumented immigrant who (has) not committed a crime." Someone who is in this country illegally has, by definition, committed a crime (an action or omission that constitutes an offense that may be prosecuted by the state and is punishable by law).
The question is, what should we do with the 11 million people who have committed only this particular crime? Not all crimes should be crimes, nor do all crimes deserve punishment.
The answer, of course, is to pardon them for their offense and offer them a way to remain in the country legally. We should do this not only because it is the only morally defensible thing to do, but also out of enlightened self-interest.
Rounding up 11 million people and deporting them simply because they didn't follow proper protocol when entering the country would be inhumane and would devastate our economy. The only interests it would serve are the empowerment of white nativism and the creation of an even larger police state.
In yesterday's comments, @Ken Winkes wrote:
"Had much the same thoughts as Davidson and the CW about the "merit, skills and proficiency" tests for admission to the U.S.....and a few more.
Immediately occurred to me that in Trumpworld merit would be measured exclusively by money. After all, what else matters but one's bank balance?
Skills would surely be defined as the artfulness of the deal...and proficiency as intimate knowledge of bankruptcy law and tax codes and the demonstrated willingness to use both to personal advantage, Devil take the hindmost."
I too immediately thought of money-making criteria being numero uno in any Trumpian vetting process. I can only imagine the interviews while interviewing the potential candidates:
"So, you studied art & literature? Get the fuck out of here pussy."
"So, you have a PhD in History? If you promise to adhere to our own alternative narrative, you can come. If you diverge, you'll be hit with a lawsuit."
"So, I see you have a Master's degree in advanced mathematics? How are your accounting skills?"
Liberal arts would vanish in a Trump world, all its forms being replaced by a pseudo reality t.v. format. Nobody needs an education to paint, everyone can do it! Hand a paint brush to Joe Six Pack, give him a six pack, and roll film! Acting school? Waste o' time! Perfect the sneering lip curl in the bathroom mirror, practicing gesticulating while pronouncing words, and get on stage! Kinda like journalism!
Business School is where it's at, indeed. But I'm afraid Ken forgot about one essential character trait of the Donald that can't be forgotten: “Always be around unsuccessful people because everybody will respect you.”
http://www.politico.com/blogs/2016-gop-primary-live-updates-and-results/2016/03/trump-advice-wisconsin-college-students-221383
That's right. Trump's vetting process would be even worse than we could imagine. Not only would he only accept corporate shills and culture-less robots, but they would have to be slightly STUPIDER than Trump, otherwise they might outdo Trump in his own game. And we all know, at the end of the day Trump's last action before hitting the hay every night is popping open his Iphone, checking his bank account numbers, and smiling greedily thinking about tomorrow's con job.
Can we skip the middle man and replace Chris Wallace with a stop watch already?
Also Hillary keeps taking flak for "only meeting with rich people." Yet as SoS she had the opposite problem. "Secretary of State Clinton meeting with too many nobodies, poor people, and above all persons of that other possibly Not Quite Serious gender."
http://yastreblyansky.blogspot.com/2016/08/a-disturbing-pattern-of-meetings-with.html#more
It's very likely that Chris Wallace's determination to moderate a presidential debate as not-a-journalist, ie as a Fox "journalist", stems from several sources. First, Fox countenances, indeed encourages and supports lying by Confederates. Second, he cannot overlook the vicious attacks leveled against Candy Crowley, a real journalist, for correcting one of the Rat's more outrageous lies in '12.
The Daily Cholera called her fact check on their candidate "interference". Other wingnut sites predictably had much more insulting things to say. Wallace, who has felt the sting of winger antipathy for occasionally asking follow up questions of a Confederate hero wants none of that.
Finally, calling bullshit on Trump's wall to wall lies during any debate will be a lot of work since he'll be lying from "Happy to be here..." right up until "...and god bless America."
None of which, we should acknowledge, will prevent him from treating Clinton as a conspirator and traitor.
I'm not so sure I disagree with Wallace's position. I sure as hell am not ready to rely on Wallace/Fox to pronounce that Clinton is lying or that what Trump has to say is true. Fox and hen house... I'd much rather rely on Clinton to destroy Trump's positions.
But it is a hell of a choice when the commission know that Ailes and Wallace have a close relationship and Ailes is prepping Trump on debate strategy. How did they justify such a choice? If they select Wallace (and on the last debate before the election!), why not Maddow as moderator on one of the other debates? And why no push back from Clinton on this choice?
Marie, thank you for the poignant reminders of Labor Day in the United States. When I "researched" child labor a few minutes ago, I relearned, 60 years after studying the legislation in a high school civics class, that the federal Fair Labor Standards Act was not passed until 1938. https://www.continuetolearn.uiowa.edu/laborctr/child_labor/about/us_history.html.
And as I took a sunset walk this evening, around the simple, sturdy old buildings on our island farm, I was again reminded of some beautiful writing attributed to D. H. Lawrence which seems to me to highlight the real, enduring wealth that is sometimes the product of human labor, by women as well as men:
"Things men have made with wakened hands,
and put soft life into
are awake through transferred touch,
and go on glowing for long years.
And for this reason, some old things are lovely
warm still with the lives of the forgotten men who made them."
Of course the other message Wallace is signaling is that she-said-he/said "journalism" is perfect. "It’s up to the other person to catch them on that," sez he, meaning it's up to the candidates to fact-check each other.
One doesn't have to be the Oracle of Delphi to predict how that will go -- just like the reports on the "Who's a Racist?" debate. Clinton says, "Trump did & said this, this, this and this." Trump says, "She's a bigot." Check and fact-check. Next question.
Marie
@Islander: I'm certainly not as poetic as Lawrence, but I have literally experienced the "transferred touch." I tend to live in old houses because I like them, and I have run my hand over old plaster walls in a tribute to the long-ago workman who made them. And there is not much that impresses me more than a tight corner on a crown molding that remains tight decades after a carpenter cut & installed it.
I should recommend that in many a thing you think you need to have done, you give a try -- up to your level of incompetence -- to do it yourself. If you succeed, and succeed well, good for you. If you have to give up -- as I often have -- you will likely have new respect for the person who makes or fixes it.
Marie
Has everyone seen this Mother Jones/Kevin Drum article on the FBI report on Clinton's emails? I think it is awfully good - especially since it reassures me that this email thing is really (almost) a big nothing.
http://m.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/09/14-excerpts-fbis-report-hillary-clintons-email
Marie,
But is a debate 'journalism'? Isn't the reporting/analysis done after the debates when journalism begins? Aren't the debaters the ones to present the arguments and counter their opponent? I haven't seen many debates besides the presidential ones, but the occasional Oxford debate I have seen have never had a moderator interject their opinion. Of course I agree that he said/she said journalism is lousy journalism, but I do think the debates are something different.
Here's an interesting comment made by Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo when he was asked if he thought Comey was deliberately trying to damage Clinton.
https://twitter.com/joshtpm/status/772629410973384705
@Haley Simon: You raise some interesting questions. Hmmm, when should a journalist not behave as a journalist? Perhaps one should ask why are 'journalists' used as the moderators for these debates in the first place? Why not a professor, a political scientist, or someone other?
If the journalist/moderator interjects when recognizing blatant misstatement by any debater, I don't see such a call-out for factual substantiation as mere moderator's opinion.
Heard on The New Yorker radio podcast yesterday and it may provide your laugh of the day...
David Remick asked Gary Johnson, Libertarian candidate for president, what was the most influential book he had read. Answer: The Fountainhead.
http://www.wnyc.org/shows/tnyradiohour
Crazy Gary also had an interesting idea concerning automatic rifles in teacher's classrooms.
Isn't Gary polling about 10% these days?
@Haley Simon: We've never had a candidate like Trump who has no acquaintance with the truth.
If you recall, Mitt Romney made a misstatement, & Candy Crowley corrected him. But Mitt wasn't lying; he & his staff were just so imbued in Right Wing News that neither he nor his debate preparers knew that Obama had referred to the Libya attack on U.S. diplomats & others as "terrorism" in his initial report to the country.
If Clinton says something truthful about whatever, and Trump says she's lying again or calls her "Lying Hillary" in response -- as he is likely to -- how is public to know if she did lie?
While I agree that the moderators can't be expected to have all the facts at their disposal, when they know a candidate's assertion is not truthful, they owe it to the public to say so. (After all, they have people talking in their ears who can feed them the facts.) In the case of Trump, they will likely have to do it often. This is not an academic debate; it's a high-profile moment in the race for POTUS. Clinton is prone to shade the truth & Trump makes up shit; listeners should know if they do it during the debates.
Marie
Re: the debate about the debate moderators. I'm inclined to agree with Marie on this one. This debate is Not academic–-the public needs to know when bullshit is spewed and it is up to the moderators to hold the debater's feet to the fire. This means, of course, these moderators know their stuff and they don't proceed with an agenda or if they do they need to leave it at the door.
Re: Marie's response to Islander who always gives us such a breath of fresh air. My husband built beautiful stone walls at two of the homes we had under the Sleeping Giant in Hamden, Ct. He'd take his wheelbarrow up the mountain side, collect the stones, and put together high, sturdy walls. We think of those walls sometimes, knowing they will survive generations, and know too that no one will know who built them, but we like to think those stones remember––-the labor and the love that went into their magnificence.
Marie,
I completely agree with your assessment of what is likely to happen in the debates. However, I am unwilling to want, or depend upon, a Fox employee and close friend of Ailes, to correct any 'misstatements'. Hell, we can't depend upon the paper of record to get the story straight - should we now depend on Fox News to correct the record?
But more fundamentally, so much of our political and social history is subjective - most especially our recent history. I know you all know this.
I am sure most everyone here can agree to the truth of the grave injustice of the Trayvon Martin verdict. Do you suppose Wallace agrees with us and he will inform the public of the truth if Trayvon's death is a topic? How about Benghazi? Will Wallace call out Trump if Trump says Clinton is responsible for the American deaths? Will the public then know the truth about Benghazi? How about the Clinton Foundation? Does Wallace call out Trump if Trump says it is pay-for-play? Will the public then know the truth?
How about the email server? Was it a gross national security risk and Clinton lied, the FBI report was rigged? Will the public at last know the truth because Wallace got the facts from that little ear piece?
If we are going to look to Wallace, or any moderator, to correct the record on any of those topics, they better add a little more air time and add a third podium.
Voting for Gary Johnson was not something I was remotely considering, unless I suffered a blow to the head hard enough to trigger a bout of amnesia/stupidity and woke up thinking "Hmm...Gary Johnson. Why not?" And even though the chance of such an eventuality is on a par with Donaldo making it through the debates without referring to his dick, I'm considering giving all my friends permission to try another hit in the head should I think of voting for someone whose personal philosophy is influenced in the most incremental manner by Ayn Fucking Rand.
If moderators decide reining in Lyin' Donnie is above their pay grade, it being a full time job, it will be up to Hillary to set the record straight, which, given the blizzard of lies, sleazy "people are saying" innuendo, and exaggerations that would make a snake oil salesman look like Socrates, could take up all her alotted time. And although, as Marie points out, Clinton is prone to shading the truth, any comparison with Trump is like comparing an amateur skeet shooter with a mafia hitman. Nonetheless, the media will paint her as no better than Lucky Trumpiano. Policy explication is good and necessary but she needs to land some body blows, early and often.
One other thought. Will the Coward Factor enter into the debates? Trump, like many bullies, is most aggressive on his own turf. So far his most egregious insults and lies have been delivered in front of audiences of howling supporters, not blacks or Latinos or women. When he finds himself in a position to scream in the face of one of his chosen villains, he backs down in a most obsequious way .
Will actually facing Hillary Clinton, well prepped and loaded for bear have an effect on the size of the Trumpesticles?
Oh, Ak, I love that - well prepped and loaded for bear!