For all Hillary Clinton’s reputation as a policy wonk, her debate performance consisted almost entirely of personal attacks. And while our media is out there proclaiming a Clinton “victory,” their evaluation merely shows how distanced they are from ordinary Americans, who don’t revel in nastiness.
Trump, on the other hand, although he allowed himself to be distracted by her cattiness, was focused on the issues, and in the course of the evening, he made three important points of interest to my readers.
1) The most important issue of our time, or any time – nuclear weapons and the looming possibility of nuclear war:
“The single greatest problem the world has is nuclear armament, nuclear weapons, not global warming like you think and your — your president thinks. Nuclear is the single greatest threat….
“I would like everybody to end it, just get rid of it. But I would certainly not do the first strike. I think that once the nuclear alternative happens, it’s over.”
This is the most under-noticed – and most significant – moment of the debate. Although, to be sure, it was immediately noted by the folks over at The Intercept, who opined:
“That may seem like common sense, but it’s actually a commitment that President Obama has been reluctant to make. The Pentagon argues that unless the U.S. is prepared to threaten a nuclear strike, it is less likely to deter Russian and Chinese aggression.
“Arms control advocates have been pushing President Obama to vow ‘no first use,’ ironically in part to try and reign [sic] in a future president.”
On the other end of the spectrum, neocon columnist and Bush Republican Marc Thiessen declared this a “gaffe,” correctly noting that no President has ever taken this position, i.e. committed himself to abjuring the nuclear annihilation of humankind. It’s interesting to note what’s considered a “gaffe” in the world of the Washington insiders.
As usual, Buzzfeed obfuscated the issue, and Trump’s answer, with “political editor” Katherine Miller feigning confusion over what the GOP standard-bearer actually said. She cited him as saying:
“I think that once the nuclear alternative happens, it’s over. At the same time, we have to be prepared. I can’t take anything off the table.” [Emphasis added]
What she conveniently left out is the rest of the quote:
“Because you look at some of these countries, you look at North Korea, we’re doing nothing there. China should solve that problem for us. China should go into North Korea. China is totally powerful as it relates to North Korea.”
What Trump was referring to in saying “I can’t take anything off the table” is the unpredictability of North Korea’s loony leaders: they could well launch a nuclear first strike if they felt threatened enough. While Trump is not the clearest expositor, when you’re the “political editor” of Buzzfeed misreading the GOP nominee is obligatory.
In a rational world, this no-first-strike pledge would’ve headlined media accounts of the debate: however, in our world, the “mainstream” media – which functions as an unregistered PAC working on Hillary’s behalf – ignored this historic first in favor of what Trump said about some beauty pageant contestant in 1996.
2) On the question of intervention and the costs of collective security, Trump brought to the fore his “America first” foreign policy. When Hillary tried to mock his reluctance to pay for the defense of Korea, Japan, and the NATO counties, Trump replied:
“I want to help all of our allies, but we are losing billions and billions of dollars. We cannot be the policemen of the world. We cannot protect countries all over the world.”
And in the context of discoursing on deindustrialization, Trump averred:
“So the worst of all things has happened. We owe $20 trillion, and we’re a mess. We haven’t even started. And we’ve spent $6 trillion in the Middle East, according to a report that I just saw. Whether it’s 6 or 5, but it looks like it’s 6, $6 trillion in the Middle East, we could have rebuilt our country twice. And it’s really a shame.”
This is a powerful argument, albeit not one the political class finds compelling. It speaks to the frustrations of ordinary Americans, who wonder why we can build schools and bridges in Afghanistan while our own are falling to pieces. Indeed, the Washington crowd hates Trump for his “nationalist” (i.e. common sense) approach to world affairs and the way he links the issue to the specter of industrial decline. After all, there’s no money in it for their friends in the military-industrial complex, and it contradicts Washington’s favorite conceit, given voice by Hillary when she declaimed:
“Are we going to lead the world with strength and in accordance with our values? That’s what I intend to do.”
Translation: The US is going to impose its values on the rest of the world – and never mind the costs, in blood and treasure. This is just another variation of the old neoconservative project, perhaps dressed up in the garb of political correctness to make it more palatable to “progressives.”
Another first in this debate was Trump’s denunciation of the Saudis, long a bipartisan sacred cow:
“I mean, can you imagine, we’re defending Saudi Arabia? And with all of the money they have, we’re defending them, and they’re not paying?”
As Michael Tracey put it in the New York Daily News: “This may well be the first instance of a candidate criticizing the Saudi government in the heat of a nationally-televised presidential debate — a clear departure from bipartisan norms. (The Clinton Foundation has taken as much as $25 million from despotic Saudi royalists.)”
