What we are, specifically, is partially brainwashed. And I mean that quite literally. A large number of people have been watching "Fox News," a fake "news" entertainment channel specifically designed to brainwash its viewers for literally their entire lives.
All the big news channels are propaganda and entertainment machines in their own way. A majority of voting Americans are hooked into all of that trash TV
Anecdote, his people didn't even watch the debate. If they did watch it, they watched some edited version the next day that only had his answers, basically an edited speech. Then they watched some talking go over all the worst bits of what Harris said and did. Then they read about how the moderators were unfair to Trump, and how Harris must have been given the questions ahead of time. I know multiple people that did exactly this, it's all quite insufferable. Based on the way they talk, it wouldn't surprise me if some people watched it live and just muted the TV when Harris was talking, because they can't stand hearing her.
That's cool. But it doesn't mean much when there are a handful of swing states that will decide the race, and where Trump and Harris are still neck and neck in those states.
Many Republicans were also not convinced about their candidate's performance in the debate in Philadelphia. Some 53% of Republican voters in the poll said Trump won the debate, compared to 91% of Democrats who said she was the victor. Among Republicans, 31% said no one won and 14% said Harris got the better of Trump.
I get partisanship is bad, but I'm glad 9 out of 10 Democrats and 1 of 7 Republicans have their head screwed on correctly. Did a large portion of viewers watch it with the volume on mute?
The polls immediately after a debate don't necessarily measure its full impact. Trump's perception as a strongman who dominates his opponents has now been broken with the entire country watching. There's no way to tell how that's going to shape the race moving forward. And the "living in strange times" X factor is how the loss is handled by Trump himself. He may shrug it off and hit the campaign trail harder, or it may have serious effects on what seems to be an already fragile mental state. Again, time will tell.
This was also my takeaway from the debate. Trump looked weak from the jump when he let Harris take the lead in shaking his hand. He was on the defensive all night. All this capped off by a cringe-inducing "I saw people on television talking about it" when fact-checked on the immigrants eating cats and dogs comment (which was also batshit insane enough to lose some of the 67 million watching). Truly an "okay, let's get you to bed, grandpa" moment.
The substance behind his words has never mattered to his supporters, no matter how vile or dissembling, but the vibe absolutely does. They won't turn around and vote for a Black woman, but there has to be a loss of enthusiasm that comes about from this, if not breaking the spell entirely for a few people. He looked old, small, and weird.