Lea Feiger: I think it adds to that. This is it, it’s stolen value. Even when you are analyzing its details, is it that terrible?
Tim Marchman: I don’t think it turned out very well. I don’t think it’s…
Lea Feiger: Yeah, he didn’t get off lightly due to the fact that he called himself an idiot. That was hard to watch. That was definitely a JD Vance smirk moment. I just couldn’t stop looking at it that whole time.
Tim Marchman: Yeah, and it’s something that really… If the guy was gilding the lily a little, everyone gilding the lily a little, at least at this level of politics, and you should really have an answer for that. I think there was a bit of confusion. I was in the region during that period, I was not in Hong Kong at the time of those specific protests. He was not in Tiananmen Square when the man was standing next to the tank, but he was there at the time. It was a time of great change, as we all remember, the Berlin Wall. There is a way to do it. He seemed completely unprepared, which was just strange.
Lea Feiger: Obviously, we should point out, and perhaps our lovely moderators could have as well, that Trump is a serial liar, and compared to his many, many, many lies over the years, he could have seen a fun turning point in which Walz said, “This is nothing. Let’s talk about some greatest hits.” For a campaign that is so focused on the moment of creating memes, on the turn to social media, on the turn to TikTok, they didn’t manage to get much out of this. Of course, we’re not even talking about Springfield. JD Vance was one of the big instigators of all the Haitian immigrants, illegal Haitian immigrants are eating the friendly neighborhood pets. They are eating your dogs and cats. When Springfield came up in the debate, it was a great opportunity for Walz to enter, and he did. He mentioned that some of this rhetoric had led to schools having to have a lot of extra security, or having to have all these extra drills, but he didn’t specifically attack Vance. He barely attacked Trump specifically.
Makena Kelly: This would also have been a twist for Walz to say, “Okay, let’s talk about lying and telling lies. You’re the person who was literally on the news last week or whatever week it was, saying we can embellish these stories.” “To really convey everything that’s happening in rural America right now because of immigration.” That would have been an incredible turning point and of course it just didn’t happen.
Tim Marchman: He also had the opportunity to say that what Vance was saying was still flatly false. Vance, as he did throughout the debate, basically took this rhetorical position, distancing himself from Trump or treating Trump like some crazy guy who says, “Hey, we all know what he’s saying, but let’s not worry about it.” says a lot of things.” He walked back claims that illegal Haitian immigrants are kidnapping people’s pets and grilling them, but presented it as his attempt to draw attention to the serious problem of immigrants flooding Springfield and they’re overwhelming hospital systems, overwhelming school systems, something that there’s literally no evidence of. People have looked at death rates, 911 wait times, all these different metrics. There’s no evidence that immigrants are overwhelming the. hospital system. The school system needs more ESL teachers, it needs things like that. Those are legitimate issues to raise. There is a very easy way to raise those issues without falling into a blood libel. Walz missed the opportunity to get offended when this whole thing came up. issue, affirmatively defending these people and saying, “These are people who are here legally and who are in this city because the city has jobs and they don’t have people.” to do them and that’s it.” He was very blunt in pointing out that Trump and Vance’s rhetoric has led to bomb threats and all kinds of horrible things, but it was, again, to me, an example of how he just planted the premise a little bit .This is not a problem. This is really not a problem. I thought it was allowed to be presented as a huge existential problem for the country in a rather ridiculous way.