The smart analysis of the first — and maybe only — debate of the Trump-Harris presidential cycle is that Donald Trump blew it.
The smart analysis of the first — and maybe only — debate of the Trump-Harris presidential cycle is that Donald Trump blew it.
The former president, winging it as usual, missed numerous “kill shots,” was frustratingly imprecise and allowed himself to be baited by Kamala Harris.
But on the optics, Harris committed far worse self-harm.
If you switched off the sound for the ABC debate Tuesday night and just watched the images, you would come away feeling deep distaste for the haughty flibbertigibbet who kept pulling faces while Trump was speaking.
Harris’ split-screen pantomime made her seem unserious and unlikable and was clearly designed for the sort of viral “Brat Girl” moments on social media her juvenile campaign staff imagines are vote winners. Kween!
In reality, the novelty value is short-lived and even the Taylor Swift demographic will come to see it as unbecoming.
Cool aunt, sure, but president?
Nope.
Margaret Thatcher she is not.
Far from being a masterstroke, Harris’ many faces only reinforced the fatal inauthenticity of the rest of her debate performance, which was a string of memorized set pieces with little relevance to the question being asked and delivered in an odd staccato. Another Sybil
While Trump was speaking and Harris knew her face was alongside his on the split screen, she would flash through a dozen different personas in 60 seconds, like an overmedicated Sybil.
Her expression would switch between narrowed-eye incredulity, smug contempt, pursed-lip amusement, a condescending smirk, a tilted head, a disapproving eyebrow, a thrusting chin, eye rolling, head shaking, a little macho shoulder swagger, and even a ridiculous chin holding pose.
Of course, the media pundits were delighted with the contrived body language.
“She turned to him with an arched brow. A quiet sigh. A hand on her chin. A laugh. A pitiful glance. A dismissive shake of her head,” The New York Times gushed.
But to any normal viewer, her Marcel Marceau shtick was puerile, distracting and very fake.
Harris looked as if she had been practicing her multiple faces in the bathroom mirror for hours during the week she was holed up in a hotel doing debate prep.
Political consultant and focus-group maestro Frank Luntz didn’t seem to realize it was deliberate and tweeted that Harris needs to “train her face not to respond [because it] feeds into a female stereotype and, more importantly, risks offending undecided voters.
