Ruthie, a member of a Frank Luntz focus group, became something of a folk hero when she said that debating Trump was like trying to 'win an argument with a crackhead'. Yes, it was like debating a crackhead, or arguing with a drunk, or dealing with a behavior-disordered child.
Earlier in the week, I posted a psychiatrist's advice on how to debate a liar, which was advice that made sense. However, Trump's debate performance suggests that the author underestimated the depth of Trump's pathology. The author's assumption was that Trump would minimally conform to the rules of the debate, but Trump did the equivalent of agreeing to play a board game and, instead of attempting to cheat, he simply threw the board in the air, scattering all the game pieces every time the other players attempted to set up the board for play
The result was that there was no debate. Trump rejected the debate the way a disturbed child would stop the play of a board game: by creating chaos with a non-stop tantrum. At the end of such an episode, no one asks "Who won the game?"
Donald Trump is an abuser. His supporters wouldn't abide a friend, neighbor or coworker who behaves like Trump, but Trump abuses people on their behalf. That makes them accomplices to abuse.
Posted by: Sue Deroche | Thursday, October 01, 2020 at 01:15 PM