Campaign drama: The final few weeks
The failure to ask about climate change is a failure of journalism. I thought that the debate moderators had some very fine moments over the last few weeks, calmly drawing out the candidates. But the lack of a single question on the world’s biggest problem was a grievous error.
The moderators asked about a lot of other serious issues: Syria, Russia, terrorism, tax policy, health care and the Supreme Court. They also asked about Trump’s early morning tweets and about Clinton’s and Trump’s favorability ratings. Somehow, amid all of that, climate change didn’t make the cut.
David Leonhardt
The New York Times
Although Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump discussed the Supreme Court at the debate Wednesday, they didn’t convey how crucial filling its vacancies will be for our constitutional rights. Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat will almost certainly be left for the next president to fill. But there are three more justices who are 78 or older — since 1960, 78 is the average age at which a justice has left the bench. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is 83; Anthony M. Kennedy, 80; and Stephen G. Breyer, 78.
Since 1971, when Richard Nixon’s third and fourth justices for the Supreme Court were confirmed, there have been five and sometimes as many as eight justices on the court who were appointed by Republican presidents. Now there are four appointed by Democratic presidents and four appointed by Republican presidents. The outcome of issues that intimately affect our lives will turn on who gets the chance to replace these justices.
Erwin Chemerinsky
Los Angeles Times
Reality TV is about winning. It doesn’t matter how you manage to be a “survivor,” so long as you stay on the island. That’s the sensibility that Donald Trump, the ultimate reality-television star, brings to foreign policy.
In Trump’s world, winners don’t have to worry about alliances, nuclear proliferation or human rights — if they come out on top.
David Ignatius
The Washington Post
Like just about everyone in my home town, I was first shocked and then saddened to hear that the county GOP headquarters was firebombed, with a swastika and the words “Nazi Republicans leave town or else” spray-painted on a nearby building.
… But make no mistake, the impact of the firebombing is frightening in a completely different way. As Stevens, a registered Democrat who, like everyone who runs in our town’s nonpartisan elections, serves without a party affiliation, said: “Its hateful message undermines decency, respect and integrity in civic participation.”
Steven Petrow
The Washington Post
We don’t know the political beliefs of those who committed this act of terrorism, but the words painted on the wall of a nearby building — “Nazi Republicans get out of town or else” — show that this was an attack on democracy itself. America ceases to be a democracy when its processes are disrupted by violence, threats or intimidation. This crowdfunding effort was an opportunity for many of us to state in public, with some of our hard-earned money, that democracy trumps threats, intimidation and violence. …
The North Carolina GOP’s need was a chance to remember the norms democracy needs to survive: decency, respect, empathy and a sense of commonality. Together, these virtues constitute the premise of American democracy. …
Remembering our shared love of democracy is just the barest beginning if we want to make democracy great again.
David Weinberger
The Washington Post
Donald Trump probably is not helping his cause much with his conspiracy-mongering about a “rigged” election but Democrats should be thankful for small favors.
If today’s Democratic campaign were being fought against a generic Republican without Mr. Trump’s distinct qualities and history, here’s what would dominate the news:
Mrs. Clinton was verbally convicted by the FBI chief for mishandling classified information yet somehow not formally charged.
Her aides were allowed to cut curious deals with FBI investigators that effectively swept under the rug any possible charges against them for obstruction or evidence tampering.
The debate we aren’t having in the campaign, we will continue not to have: how to foster a modern state that doesn’t metastasize corruption, cronyism, elites helping themselves. There will be no bipartisan action on things that ail the American economy and hold back its growth. All of Washington will be enmeshed in a replay of the Watergate era, inward-looking, destructive, consumed with investigations and score-settling.
Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.
The Wall Street Journal
The dangers of a Hillary Clinton presidency are more familiar than Trump’s authoritarian unknowns, because we live with them in our politics already. They’re the dangers of elite groupthink, of Beltway power worship, of a cult of presidential action in the service of dubious ideals. They’re the dangers of a recklessness and radicalism that doesn’t recognize itself as either, because it’s convinced that if an idea is mainstream and commonplace among the great and good then it cannot possibly be folly.
Ross Douthat
The New York Times
… If Mr. Trump nonetheless loses this election, it’s because he has failed to do the harder job: He hasn’t given millions of voters the comfort — or reason — that they need to vote for him.
Despite some high-profile Never Trumpers, the GOP is remarkably consolidated around its nominee. This isn’t so much Mr. Trump’s doing as it is the hard work of conservative leaders, who have convinced many Republicans that it is their duty to stop Hillary.
Kimberley A. Strassel
The Wall Street Journal