About that first debate...

So... the first Trump/Biden debate was about the sh*tshow that I figured it'd be. The moderator leaned lib with most questioning, the opponent nastily lied in systemic fashion, and the President muscled his way into every topic.

1. Biden got away with endless lies and cheap shots. The questions were mostly asked from a left perspective ("the science of climate change," what's wrong with "critical race theory" training," etc.) and Biden went unchallenged by the moderator far too often.

— Mark R. Levin (@marklevinshow) September 30, 2020

3. The president had to force his way into the discussion at times, he was quite good on specifics and getting his issues into the debate. Biden unleashed repeated personal attacks, including resorting to name-calling, like "clown," "racist," "shut up," etc.

— Mark R. Levin (@marklevinshow) September 30, 2020

Do I wish that President Trump would've focused a bit more on the topics? Probably. Just like I wished Biden could make a statement without lying his ass off about his record, his future capabilities and blaming everything on the President! Even so, as Andrea Widburg points out, we did begin to unravel a couple of things...

The short version of the debate is that Biden did well if one ignored that almost every other statement he made was a lie or fantasy; Trump dominated him, almost too aggressively; and Chris Wallace may have been the worst and most obviously biased moderator since Candy Crowley. Most significantly, though, Biden and Trump each made a critical point. Biden's was a tacit admission that if he is elected president, he will preside over the end of the filibuster, allowing Democrats to pack the courts and add two new Democrat-majority states. Trump's point was that he's holding damning evidence about the Democrats' coup attempt.

And Stanley Kurtz highlights that, actually, the debate was about issues...

I know. A lot of folks are saying the debate was an ugly, insult-filled shouting match that barely got down to cases. Actually, I thought it was a highly entertaining exchange that helpfully spotlighted the candidates’ differences on issues. An ugly, angry exchange? Well, at least it looked like America. If you took all the people who bite their tongues instead of saying what they really think of folks on the other side, put them in a room together and let them loose, this is what we would sound like. Pretty? No. Honest. Yes. The debate’s decorum was a snapshot of where we are as a country. I think that’s less because of the president’s personality than because we don’t agree with each other about some pretty fundamental things—and because much of what we disagree about is the motivation of the other side.

While I agree with Dan Bongino that this is very much a base election, for the life of me, I don't understand how we are where we are with two diametrically opposed visions for America, and anyone could still be undecided. That being said however, Kurtz had some encouraging words for those individuals too...

Some say the shouting match must have put off persuadable voters in the middle. I have a different take. Voters who haven’t decided yet aren’t likely waiting for a nuanced policy debate. If they were, they’d have already made up their minds. Instead, undecideds haven’t yet focused as much on the issues as we political junkies have. Undecideds are looking for the big-picture on the candidates’ differences, and that is what they got. ...I think this debate has reminded the relatively few voters who may have only recently tuned in to this election how profoundly the candidates differ on the direction our country should take.

Levin had much more to say on last night's debate both this morning and throughout the day. I also think it worthwhile to check out Bongino's Top Six Lies From Joe Biden, along with The Top Five Moments From Last Night’s Debate. Highly insightful.

1. Here's the bottom line:
Joe Biden is a hustler. He's been hanging around politics for half a century. He has accomplished nothing significant. He lies incessantly about his past and his future plans should he become president.

— Mark R. Levin (@marklevinshow) September 30, 2020

In the end, I really like the way Monica Showalter summarized not only what we watched of last night's contentious political slugfest, but also what this election inevitably boils down to for the American voter:

...voters can now decide if they want a crude guy with a good governing record, or a crude guy without a good governing record, who spews insults at both them and the office, just because.

And it's for those drastic differences in governing records and philosophies as they apply to the ultimate trajectory of our nation, as well as the unprecedented volume of voter fraud that we are guaranteed to encounter, that makes it crucial for us to get out in droves to reelect President Trump and to vote Republican down ballot this year.

Related links: Trump accomplished what he needed in the first debate
Leo Terrell: It's Donald Trump vs. the Left-Wing Media!
Video: ‘Proud Boys’ of EVERY Race Speak Out Against the Media-Driven Propaganda Calling Them “White Supremacists”