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First USA presidential debate recap · Kvetch & Release

• 0:04
  Well, we're back, John Lydkey here on AM eight hundred CKLW. Last
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  night's US presidential debate was one for the history books for many reasons. To
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  presidents, one former, one current on stage, it was a rerun a
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  combined age of one hundred and fifty nine, and it was, at least
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  in my opinion and that of quite frankly many, a bit of a train
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  wreck for President Joe Biden. Did not expect a performance like he gave one
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  that was, quite frankly, not smooth, not polished, incoherent at times.
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  I'm really looking forward to getting the opinion of Aaron call The Elee h
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  Hess, Director of Debate at the University of Michigan. Aaron, how are
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  you today? Good? Good? Tell us how you really felt about debate
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  performance. Well, you know, I have no buy in here other than
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  you know, living on the border and with the with the largest country in
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  the world right now in terms of being a superpower. What's your thoughts about
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  what we saw last night? You were there? Yeah, yeah, the
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  the debate itself, there was no audience first time since nineteen sixty, but
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  there was a big press file area and spin rooms, and so I did
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  was thankful to get to participate in that. A lot of intentipation buzz for
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  the debate the earliest on the ear least once since you think mean ever I
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  usually he's occur in September, So just the buzz, given how close the
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  election is, how close it was last time, how different they are,
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  and the prison Biden just failed to deliver. He mostly the incumbents have problems
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  in first debates because they haven't debated in four years. They're in a bubble,
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  and that people don't talk to them, honestly, because the power and
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  balance. He's traveled all over the world. He was in France twice,
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  he was raising money and on the West coast the United States. So but
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  he had been locked down into mad prep for the last week. But whatever
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  they were doing wasn't working. They got him really tight, and they pumped
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  him with a lot of facts figures. He just couldn't couldn't perform in real
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  time. He wasn't loose where contrastely Trump was. You know, he's unconventional.
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  He kind of went back and forth and tested out some lines and was
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  much was much loser and free flowing, and it just the contrast grew very
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  damaging. For the president who's eighty one, who'd be eighty five in the
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  second term. We thought that he'd put past some of these age concerns with
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  his Day of Union address, but last night just increased the scrutiny, and
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  now it's going to dominate our media landscape for the next weeks or months because
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  the next of base until September. Yeah, it really is a tale of
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  two Bidens. Definitely not the polished version that we have come to expect,
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  and that's been presented again the State of the Union, strong Biden. This
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  is not what we saw last night. Typically, you know, and you
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  know, correct me if I'm wrong. As I understand debates, people are
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  coming into them. In most cases, if you've locked in whether you're voting
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  for Trump, you're doing that, you're voting for Biden, you're voting for
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  Biden. You don't really change bates speak to that middle ground of the independents
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  who aren't sure which way to go. I think though last night you might
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  have seen some Democrats decide, you know, I'm thinking of something different,
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  what do you think. Yeah, they had these focus groups that were just
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  you know, listening to that after the debate was must have been very depressing
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  for the Biden campaign. Yeah, so most of the people tune in for
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  debates not because it's formative in their in their minds and decisions, but just
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  to root on they're preferred candidate. But there is a small swath maybe five
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  percent of underside people. Maybe they voted for Trump against Hillary Clinton, but
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  then Biden against Trump, and so they're torn, and debates can frame kind
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  of you know how they have a view things. And anyone that tuned last
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  night, especially at the beginning first fifteen to twenty minutes, would be concerned
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  about present Biden's ability to lead the country for another four years in the right
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  direction, given all the challenges international and domestically with economy and immigration and so
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  so yeah, it would definitely be off putting to them. You know,
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  the polling out after the debate shows that most people thought that Trump had won
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  and that they were more kind of confident in him leading the country. So
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  so yeah, that's soft support. You know, you want a debate to
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  energize that, and President Biden really needed it. Trump has done a great
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  job, ironically, through his criminal issues and convictions and things to rally the
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  base around him, and he's got that locked up. It was Biden has
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  a lot of soft supporters from twenty twenty. You hadn't come home yet because
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  of some things like his policy is in the middle least and inflation and others.
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  So he needed that a good debate. It's kind of a rallying and
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  coalescing, getting them together, and he got the opposite, really a fracturing
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  of the Democratic Party here and there. Do you think that the president President
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  Biden is going to be able to turn the page from this one? And
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  there's a long time again until the next debate, but there are calls now
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  for him to not just potentially stepped down or aside from the ticket. I've
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  been hearing some chattering about potentially even stepping away from the presidency at the moment
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  as a result of what we saw last night. Do you give any creator
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  credence to that. No, it's certainly not the ladder I had. I
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  hadn't even heard that, but no, I mean, you know, when
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  he came in, he he was the vice president for eight years, and
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  he was going to leave politics and uh, his son died tragically bow and
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  then he saw Charlottesville and just the kind of the chaos out of the chaos
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  and the first Trump presidency, and he kind of got roped into running again
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  or you know, maybe went against his even better wishes or judgments want to
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  do that. And when he did run, you know, he kind of
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  framed it as a I'm going to be a caretaker, a bridge the next
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  generation, and a lot of people interpreted that as almost like a one term
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  pledge that he would just serve the you know, the four years and and
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  and that's it. But and then decided, you know, it's a lot
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  of power and it's very hard to uh, the willingly advocate, and so
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  he decided to run again, and you know, most of the people supported
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  him. But now, yeah, it's gonna bring up those questions, you
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  know, because of debate was so so early in June, the convention still
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  you know, we've got a month or two, so it's just going to
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  dominate the cycle about whether he should he should announce that he's not going to
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  run again for the betterment of the party and you know, all hands on
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  deck to the few Trump but just the problem is there's no clear alternative.
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  You have a sitting Vice president, Kamala Harris, who's also unpopular. You
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  know, they rolled her out last night to try to defend President Biden,
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  but she is the kind of air apparent, but no consensus on her,
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  and so you just have dozens of people probably throw their hat in the rings.
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  It'd be the very divisive primary. They would immediately start trying to have
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  debates to separate themselves, and then if they did pick somebody in August,
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  it's just a short You only have a few months to run a general election
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  campaign against Trump, who's been the prohibitive front runner now for our early years.
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  So either way, they're the Democrats had in a very difficult situation no
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  matter who the nominee is. Does sound very precarious for them right now.
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  I don't want to just focus on, you know, the the negativity and
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  the downfalls that happened last night with Biden. Were there any highlights that did
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  stand out for you though throughout the debate, any zingers that stood out or
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  just solid moments project, No, he's uh for Biden, I thought the
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  uh he was empathetic. I thought in a few places, you know,
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  talking about his son, the work he's done for military veterans, So what
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  he thinks about the country, putting country first before him and contrast to Trump,
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  who's kind of seems that sometimes can be more in it for himself.
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  That was that was positive. Uh. He went on the offense against Trump
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  on his criminal issues and the moral failings and uh, business failings and so
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  kind of got energized there in the halfway part of the debate, but missed
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  some things on on abortion and immigration and some other things. But so that
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  was good. Uh, and really just everything about the debate, see the
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  no audience, the cutting of the microphones, the more substantive trying to focus
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  reletively, mellow tone, so many things that they tried to do to correct
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  against Cleveland from twenty twenty, which was just interruptions that nobody liked. I
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  thought was positive and hopefully we'll serve as an emulation of future debates as we
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  return them to the television networks like CNN. Well, I want to thank
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  you so much for your time today for unpacking it. Of course, you
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  know over here in Windsor we got a front row seat at times, but
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  we always appreciate getting the insight and expertise of people who have the lived experience
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  and study this and practice it for a living. Thank you so much for
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  your Time, Today, Erin