So the reporters, the commentators and pundits were nearly unanimous in providing the wish-fulfillment headline: Harris Destroyed Trump in their debate. Some said it was the greatest performance in presidential debate history. The instant polls said Kamala Harris won by a lot, and the first audience figures said a lot of people watched.
So the next day, whose picture do we see on front pages above the fold? In the NY Times it was Trump. In the Washington Post it was...J.D. Vance. No politican made it atop the San Francisco Chronicle. Whose picture did we not see? The unanimous winner of the debate the night before, Kamala Harris. She earned the moment to let people see her with new eyes, to get used to the idea that this might be the next President. Just not on the front page, apparently. (These are the online front pages, late in the day, the only ones I can access.)
It's more than the predictable bait and switch of the new media. On her post-debate podcast, WPost columnist Jennifer Rubin nailed it: after pumping up the significance of the debate for a week, the story the next day would be that it may not matter all that much. That conclusion may be prudent--but the contrast with the preceding hype is stark and totally predictable.
And it's not even the usual ego first. Like Thomas Friedman writing that there are 23 words that Harris has to say to be assured of winning. And by writing them, making it impossible for her to say them.
No, what I see is the continuing knee-jerk addiction to pictures of Trump. Between the Harris triumph at the Democratic Convention and the debate, it was Trump's face on the front page way more often than hers. ("way more often" being a technical term in statistics.) These outlets are so used to using Trump to sell papers and attract clicks that it's become mindless second nature, and an addiction that's hard to kick.
And much of the time, the story highlights something awful that Trump has said or done. Even the leftish Guardian does it regularly. The day after the debate they did have a photo of people watching the debate with a split-screen of the two candidates. But the only solo photo above the fold was...Trump. And that's pretty typical of the Guardian.
Why is this potentially important? Because after his thoroughly discrediting debate, Trump and his campaign are going to go on the attack with new and more scurrilous lies, probably about Kamala Harris personally. The question is: will the news media give them prominence, or are they finished pretending that Trump's outrageous lies--so clearly untrue and vicious from the start--need to be aired and evaluated, like the charges by a normal candidate? They've always done it. Will they keep doing it?
The few instances of fact-checking during the ABC debate were a heartening precedent. The general refusal so far to repeat some of the ugliest assertions Trump is making at his rallies is also hopeful. But Trump's Big Lies attract eyes, they sell papers, they get clicks. It's the media version of a high.
Apart from reviving latent racism and sexism we'd hoped wasn't there anymore, Trump won in 2016 by successfully making Hillary Clinton the issue. (The director of the FBI helped alot with his late campaign announcement of a re-investigation of Clinton that quickly exonerated her, again, but too late.) His only chance now, other than suppressing votes and causing chaos at the polls and afterwards, is to make Harris the issue.
Nobody knows what's going to happen; they don't even know what's happening now. The polls are so full of different methods and political skewing that even an average is not reliable. The "undecided" voters interviewed on TV are professionally undecided--it's the only way they can get anyone to pay attention to them. So they don't represent anyone. We can be pretty sure that there's a core of voters who could watch Trump eat a dog and a cat on television and still vote for him. On the other hand, I don't think Harris loses a swing state where there's a choice amendment on the ballot. Apart from Taylor Swift, I think Harris is going to have to talk about climate distortion to win the youth vote big. In general she's making it easier for people to take a chance on her.
The Democrats look focused, and the campaign is well-funded. There's enthusiasm on the ground. Trump will be aided by Putin's army of trolls, which is why Trump won't publicly support Ukraine. He wants Putin to be sure that supporting him is the easiest way to win that war.
But things happen in a campaign, and exactly what they will be is always unknown until they happen. The news media has said before that they've learned from their mistakes (Willy Horton, the Swift Boat, etc.) but then they do it again. If this election is as close as everyone says it is (which may be as reliable as the 90% chance that H. Clinton would win in 2016) even the news media could make the difference.
