They're eating the dogs, the cats

That was not the takeaway Trump loyalists wanted coming out of the debate.  Not only was he brutally fact checked on the spot, but three days later it still remains a viral meme.  It even spurred the premier "childless cat lady" herself to post on instagram that she is endorsing Kamala.  A move that drove over 400,000 visitors to vote.gov that night, encouraging young Swifties to register to vote!  A petulant Trump could only say she will "pay a price in the marketplace."

I wasn't planning to watch the debate but my dog woke me up at 4 in the morning and so I turned on CNN thinking I might catch the last half hour.  Turns out I caught the whole thing as it came on at 9 EDT.  Everyone was carrying the debate, even BBC and Lithuanian News.  An estimated 67 million Americans and countless foreign watchers.

To say it was an awful night for Donald is a massive understatement.  The only thing stopping Republican leaders from asking him to step down is that the replacement would be JD Vance.  A guy he distanced himself from during the debate by saying he didn't discuss the national abortion ban with him.  This after JD had given Donald the appropriate answer in this situation.

Instead, Donald treated the debate like one of his rallies, appealing to an imagery crowd of MAGA cult members by spouting nonsense like Democratic states allowing the execution of babies.  Even here he garbled his anti-abortion sentiments, first claiming it was West Virginia, and later correcting himself and saying it was Virginia.  FTR, former Democratic governor Northam never promoted "executions," but suggested "a discussion to ensue"  between the physicians and the mother of a severely deformed child delivered in the third trimester as to the fate of that child.  Leave it to the MAGAts to turn it into an "execution."

It wasn't just social issues that undermined his debate performance.  As one conservative pundit put it, he cleaned his own clock when Kamala wasn't doing it for him.  He repeatedly allowed himself to get baited by Kamala on crowd sizes, his imaginary fortune and his record as president.  Each time he took a jab at Kamala's record as Vice-President, she easily countered with multiple jabs that resulted in him eating up valuable time defending himself and usually making it sound even worse.

Joy Behar mockingly called the night "almost like elder abuse," as Trump seemed utterly defenseless against Kamala's jabs.  When Kamala noted that he invited the Taliban to Camp David, he said he sent "Abdul" a picture of his house to show that he knew where he lived, setting off another wave of mocking memes.  Even Kamala got a good laugh out of that one.

One of the weirdest exchanges came when Kamala called him a disgrace and that world leaders laughed at him.  Visibly agitated, Trump claimed that Viktor Orban himself had told him what a strong leader he is and that every leader in Europe is afraid of him.  Then came the big roundhouse, when Kamala said he is weak and wrong and that Vladimir Putin would eat him for lunch, as they sparred over Ukraine.  Once again, he had refused to say if he supported Ukraine, only that he wanted an end to the war, perfectly setting up that big punch in the head.

Yet, the defiant Orange One addressed the spin room afterward, claiming it was his best debate ever and that everyone told him so.  No one is quite sure who "everyone" is?  If this is another one of his imaginary friends or just those in his inner circle trying to tamp down his rage after being outflanked by a woman he has called "nasty" and "crazy" and that her presidency would be an "insult" to the country.  No one was saying he won the debate, not even his friends at Fox.

It is hard to say whether his horrible performance will have any major impact on the polls, particularly in battleground states like Pennsylvania where they are virtually dead even.  You have to think his wild rhetoric would give fence sitters pause, but in surveys afterward many of the undecided said they were still undecided.  They don't seem to know enough about Kamala.  I just think they can't bring themselves to vote for a woman, especially a woman of color.

This has been Kamala's biggest hurdle.  She has cleared all the other hurdles, but for many she remains too "exotic," to put it lightly.  Trump has to truly disgrace himself first.  Not that he hasn't done a good job of that already but give him 7 more weeks.  Maybe then these undecided voters will lean toward Kamala.  

In the meantime, the list of prominent Republican leaders voting for Kamala continues to grow.  The Lincoln Project continues to run one blistering ad after another.  Trump's response is always the same.  They're "irrelevant," as he has taken complete control of the party.  It is no longer the Grand Old Party but the Party of Trump and will sink like the theme song he often uses from the Titanic at his rallies, because he steadfastly refuses to admit he has done no wrong.

This need to always project himself as the victor is his ultimate ondoing.  After repeatedly boasting that 75 million people voted for him in 2020, Kamala said toward the end of the debate that 81 million people fired him and that he has had a hard time processing that.  Indeed he has.