Best president for Black America since Lincoln? C’mon, man!
Let us now celebrate the calming, sedative qualities of a mute button.
Yes, the mere addition of a mute button in the second and final presidential debate between President Donald Trump and challenger Joe Biden appears to have been all it took to squelch the constant interruptions, mostly from the president, that plagued the first debate.
Instead, the second debate offered something approaching a serious exchange of ideas and a good contrast between how these two men see the world, as well as the big gap between the worlds in which they live.
That gap was particularly obvious when they tackled one of the hottest of this nation’s hot buttons, “Race in America.”
Both gentlemen agreed on one thing: They had entered the race because they didn’t like how the other handled issues like hate groups, unemployment, criminal justice and systemic racism.
“You guys did nothing,” Trump said as Biden disagreed. “Joe, I ran because of you. I ran because of Barack Obama. Because you did a poor job. If I thought you did a good job, I would have never run.”
Same here, says Biden on the stump — or, famously, by videoconferencing from his basement.
Trump lambasted Biden and Obama for failing to do enough to address these critical Black community issues during their eight years in office.
Biden similarly cites racial divisions as his reason for running, particularly Trump’s startling suggestion after the 2017 violence between white supremacists and anti-racist protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, that “both sides” were equally at fault.
Trump has denied strongly that he had that message in mind and, as he has declared in numerous speeches this year, “Nobody has done more for the Black community than I have, with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln.”
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