The scene of the U.S. presidential debate between former president Donald Trump and vice president Kamala Harris moderated by ABC hosts David Muir and Linsey Davis; Photo: Michael Le Brecht II/ABC News

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/09/10/politics/gallery/debate-trump-harris-photos/index.html

The ABC news agency hosted a debate between the two U.S. presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris on 11 September. It was a debate about whose policy approach, Trump’s or Harris’s, could possibly work out better to help address the challenging issues in a number of areas facing the U.S. government, American people, and beyond. After the debate, the media outlets had reported some claims about who won or who lost the contest. This short piece doesn’t tend to offer an opinion on which candidate won the debate, rather, it only seeks to reflect some realities of the debate itself.

Obviously, both nominees had their advantages and flaws. The biggest advantage for the Democrat candidate Harris was “being nice” to the public and “doing good public relations” including by getting a star singer to support her; while the biggest advantage for the Republican nominee Trump was “being practical and substantive”. The following is a summary of some flaws in the performances made by both candidates.

From the media recording, the Democrat nominee had spent more time on either attacking her Republican counterpart or making empty talks than the other way around. For instance, Harris accused Trump of being a criminal and a dictator, and meant that a criminal’s words shouldn’t be that convincing. As we have seen, this kind of image of Trump is exactly what the democratic campaign team has intended to create and enhance so far throughout the campaign trail.

As for the matter of empty talking, the Democrat candidate claimed that “let’s do this and that...raise the U.S. standing...uphold our values...” - something like that. Apparently, Harris was more inclined to use slogans occasionally in the debate rather than engaging in a real debate or conversation to convince.

Further, Harris had tried to avoid facing and talking about some serious problems created or deepened under the current U.S. government. For example, on the issue of climate change, the former U.S. government left the Paris Climate Pact, and then the current administrative returned to it immediately after assuming office. Nevertheless, the Biden government over the past three and haft years hasn’t done much contribution to the international efforts in fighting climate change, as reflected by the fact that, in both 2022 and 2023, the U.S. was the largest oil producer and consumer in the world, and that the country’s production and consumption of gas also hit a record high in these two years. Obviously there is a clear gap between what the current government had promised in early 2021 and what it has actually done concerning the climate issue. Harris in the debate had tried to avoid talking more details about this.

Besides that, on the trade relations with other countries, the Trump government launched a trade war against other countries, especially, China. The Biden government, instead of fixing this matter and improving the trade relations with China, has in fact deepened the problem. Harris had attempted to avoid talking about the repercussions created under the current government to the China-U.S. trade relations and also to the American consumers; and she had no new idea offered as well on how to deal with this matter, meanwhile, by briefly criticizing the Trump government of selling microchips to China.

Moreover, Harris had obviously played a double standard on the spending of American taxpayers’ money. For instance, on the issue related to Afghanistan, the Democrat nominee stated that she supported the Biden government’s decision to withdraw the U.S. forces from Afghanistan for the purpose of not wasting taxpayers’ money anymore; while on the issue of Ukraine, she claimed that the support of the U.S. and a number of other countries to Ukraine in various means has made Ukraine stand as an independent country - who nowadays would truly believe that Ukraine is still an independent country by the way? - Comparing these two cases doesn’t tend to mean that the U.S. should completely suspend support to Ukraine in humanitarian terms as a matter of responsibility. The Ukraine issue to the current stage is mostly about whether the U.S. has a better solution to bring this war to an end and how likely it can be ended. Apparently, from the claims made by Harris in the debate concerning this matter, apart from standing and continuing with the current U.S. policy - a non-solution approach, she hadn’t offered anything new and different.

In addition, concerning the U.S. engagement with the Taliban, as well as with the so-claimed “dictators” like Russian President Putin and North Korean leader Kim, the two candidates obviously held a quite different approach. Harris criticized Trump’s approach in handling the Taliban for saving American soldiers as well as in engaging with the “dictators” like Putin and Kim. From her stand, interacting with “dictators” in Trump’s way is against the basic rules of America, as it is a matter of American principle; while in the meantime, she had no idea provided on how to deal with the so-called “dictators” in order to address the issues related to these “dictators”.

As for Trump, given that he had ever served as the president of the United States, he was intended to be direct, more substantive, and result-driven. Also he appeared to be quite firm and confident about what he wants to do and achieve. These aspects of his character can be an advantage of him, compared to his Democrat counterpart. Nevertheless, in the meantime, the audiences may also cast a doubt that whether he might have underestimated the challenges on certain critical issues facing him such as the Ukraine issue. Trump stated that he would be able to quickly get this matter solved, should he get elected. Apparently, at this stage, it is far too early to assume that he can quickly get this issue addressed. In this regard, it can be only assumed that, his intention, character, and approach toward handling this critical issue would at least allow him to have a higher probability to settle this matter but maybe not in such a short period of time as he claimed.

When talking about the economy, Harris claimed that Trump only has a plan for the rich, not the middle class and small businesses, whereas she would have a plan for investing in the small businesses and for lifting up the middle class. These talking points can be an advantage of her. In fact, no presidential candidates would have a plan only for the rich. The rich in a society is the minority, and the large middle-class is always the main force in driving the advancement of the society as a whole. In response to Harris’s accusation concerning this matter, Trump needed more elaborations obviously.

In contrast to the current U.S. government, the Trump administration has a better record, from a foreign policy perspective, typically in handling the U.S. relations with the so-called U.S. competitors/rivals as well as with the small countries which are considered hostile to the U.S., as reflected by the fact that there were no U.S.-involved wars ever taken place during Trump’s tenure. This fact is substantive and historical and already proved that which candidate’s approach will more likely be able to prevent a major power conflict or a widened war in the Middle East or Europe. This fact needed to be highlighted when debating about whose approach, Trump’s or Harris’s, would work out better for dealing with the so-called hostile “dictators”, achieving peace, and meeting the interests of the U.S., others, and the world.

On the matter of climate change and also of the U.S. trade relations with China, like what Harris had done, there were no substantive talking points made by the Republican nominee. The two issues are sensitive and critical. Both candidates had avoided giving more talks, apart from briefly making accusations.

Lastly, on debating the domestic issues such as immigration and the abortion rights of women, the two candidates had given more details, and their performances appeared to be roughly at the same level over these matters.