Government

Debate Prep, After A First Disaster

Having too many people in the room is counterproductive.

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Democratic Presidential Hopefuls Attend AARP Candidate Forums In Iowa

(Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Preparing the president for a debate must be hard.

Among many other things, you have to limit the number of people in the room.  Everyone wants to participate in the president’s debate preparation because everyone thinks their own perspective is imperative, and everyone thinks their own ideas are great, and, besides, spending hours in a small room with the president is a career-enhancing move.

But having too many people in the room is counterproductive. The president will hear too many things, from too many people, to remember them all. And some of those ideas will conflict. If you’re going to prepare a president intelligently, you must thin the crowd. I suspect the gang preparing Joe Biden for his debate with Donald Trump didn’t sufficiently cull the herd.

Beyond the number of participants in debate preparation, you have to think about the mental capacity of your student.

There are a very few people in the world who are basically debate machines: You tell them facts and figures; the person remembers them; and then the person later deploys those facts effectively.

Biden was probably never one of those people. He surely is not one of those people today.

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The folks who prepared Biden for his debate with Trump should have thought about this, and they should have tailored their preparation accordingly.

Here’s what you have with Biden: A guy whose mental acuity is in doubt, and a guy whose only job on debate night is to look strong and presidential. How do you prepare him?

Strip it down.

Tell Biden that he doesn’t have to respond to any of Trump’s lies. If an opportunity arises, and Biden could answer a lie effectively, then he should do it.  But that’s optional.

The key is to look strong and presidential; the key is not to win debater’s points.

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Thus, for example, on abortion, remember something like this: “In 2016, Trump campaigned on the promise that he’d nominate only judges who wanted to get rid of Roe v. Wade. He did exactly that when he appointed three justices to the Supreme Court. Those justices then overruled Roe, and Trump crowed about having been the president who destroyed Roe. Are you really going to trust this guy with women’s reproductive rights?”

That’s it.

Say it loud. Say it forcefully. Say it like you’re the president, for heaven’s sake.

That would achieve your goal in the debate.

Everything else is optional: Trump said that Democrats favor abortion even after a child is born. That’s not abortion; that’s murder. It’s illegal in every state, and no Democrat favors it.

That’s pretty good, but it’s a grace note. So don’t even mention this to Biden in debate preparation. This will only confuse him.

Even if Biden could remember the grace note, it wins only a debater’s point, which is irrelevant at this point. The essential part of the answer is to say the scripted paragraph forcefully and thus to establish that you can serve as president. Don’t get Biden distracted. Focus him on the job at hand, and let the rest hit the cutting room floor.

So, too, on every other issue. Tell Biden that there will be a question about January 6.  Say this: “On January 6, Trump gave a speech that caused a mob to march on the Capitol. The building was vandalized; 140 people were injured; and five people ultimately died as a result of that attack. You were the president, and you did nothing — nothing — for the first three hours of the attack. Your primary duty as president is to protect and defend the United States; you failed that job, and you’re unfit to be president.”

That’s it, Joe. No matter what Trump says, you say that. Say it loud, and forcefully, and look at the camera, and don’t drool when you say it. If Jake Tapper says you have 45 seconds left, tell him that you have nothing more to say.

Your sole job is to look presidential — so look presidential.

Since it’s too much for you to remember any more, don’t. Just stop.

Sure, it would be nice if Biden could say that Trump lied about calling out the National Guard, and Nancy Pelosi, and whatever else. But that requires a memory, and we’re uncertain if you have one, so we won’t even mention the other issues in debate preparation. Those other issues would just confuse you; don’t clutter your mind with them. Speak the words that we’ve prepared in advance and then declare victory.

Would that approach to debate preparation have satisfied Democratic loyalists who wanted Trump to be demolished on the debate stage? Of course not.

But Biden isn’t capable of destroying Trump in a debate. Asking Biden to perform beyond his ability risks making him look like a doddering old fool on the debate stage, so don’t take the chance. Instead, take the win, and go home.

I don’t know who was involved in preparing Biden for the first debate, and I don’t know how many people were in the room for preparation. But there were too many people telling Biden too many things. The folks who prepared Biden gambled that he could do more than the bare minimum.

They lost that gamble; shame on them.

I’m of course not saying that handlers should deceive the American public, proclaiming that someone who’s mentally incompetent should serve as president.  If Biden is no longer fit to serve, then his staff should say so.

After all, sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander: If Republicans are hypocrites for saying publicly that Trump would be a good president when they know that he’s an unhinged malignant narcissist, then Democrats are hypocrites for trumpeting Biden’s mental abilities when they know that he’s lost them.

A pox on all of you. Country first, you damned partisans!

Ultimately, please draw two conclusions from what I’ve just written: First, if Biden stays in the race, he should have a different, more competent, team prepare him for the next debate.

Second, if I’m worried about how you could prepare Biden to permit him to bluff his way through a debate, there’s no way he should be President of the United States.

Mark Herrmann spent 17 years as a partner at a leading international law firm and later oversaw litigation, compliance and employment matters at a large international company. He is the author of The Curmudgeon’s Guide to Practicing Law and Drug and Device Product Liability Litigation Strategy (affiliate links). You can reach him by email at [email protected].

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