Transcript
SPEAKER_02
0:04
is The Strategist, episode 594. My name is Zain Velji. With me, as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter. Guys, what's up? Happy emergency podcast, Zain. We're
Carter
0:13
We're not with you. We're not with you at all.
SPEAKER_02
0:15
are spiritually with me. That's what matters, because
SPEAKER_02
0:17
because we are doing post-debate analysis. Yeah,
Corey
0:20
Yeah, I think it's really important we do this now, because I'm honestly skeptical there will be another debate at this particular moment.
Corey
0:27
Really? Oh, yeah. I think Donald Trump just got whipped. And I think he's going to go out and say, I did everything I needed to do. Debate format's crooked. I'm the best, but they're the worst. And debate's odd.
Carter
0:43
jumped right in. You just jumped right in. No, that's
SPEAKER_02
0:45
good. That's what I did. Listen, this is
SPEAKER_02
0:47
is the emergency podcast format. Some of you might be familiar with it. Stephen Carter is at an undisclosed
SPEAKER_02
0:53
undisclosed location. Actually, this time he's in exile for outing his own political campaign. So Stephen Carter is at an undisclosed location.
SPEAKER_02
1:01
We've got Corey Hogan circling outside in the Northeast on the streets looking for Donald Trump's cocaine dealer.
SPEAKER_02
1:07
And you've got me. You've got me packing some
Carter
1:12
some cocaine and heading
SPEAKER_02
1:12
heading out to go meet Corey. so
Carter
1:15
the three of us fielding telephone calls to host the next debate there zane uh oh man horrible we thought you're a horrible and then we met lester lester was fine lester lester was
SPEAKER_02
1:30
let me tell you this lester uh first cousins with our former host chester uh they they are related that's not true and you're just making things up
SPEAKER_02
1:40
at least someone's fact checking something cory uh let's get right into this let's get right into this our first and only segment you all watching this shit guys holy
SPEAKER_02
1:52
holy crap i that was 95 minutes of something but before we get into all the meat of it start
SPEAKER_02
1:59
start here cory i'll go with you first who had the most to lose tonight going into this was it donald trump or hillary clinton oh
Corey
2:05
oh i think it it was Hillary Clinton. And I came in totally expecting Hillary Clinton to lose because all that Donald Trump needed to do to sort of win the expectations game was act like a normal human being. That proved impossible. That proved utterly impossible for him. By my count, there were four comments that I would deem totally career ending for a normal politician. His comment about his temperament as he's totally unspooling talking about what a great temperament he has like that's that's a bad look to actually be losing your temper as you say how great your temperament is his comments about Iraq where he was trying to talk over uh the moderator just ignoring what he was saying about you said this in 2002 this crazy rambling response that included call Sean Hannity call Sean Hannity over and over again weird as f and then his birther comment where he didn't really have a good reason why from 2011 where he got the birth certificate air quotes around got to 2016 why he continued to push that narrative instead patting himself on the back for for getting the birth certificate and then for five years it didn't make any sense and then finally his tax return comment i say finally but it was actually the first of those ones i think which was as brutal a response as i have ever seen to that given by him he had nothing he had absolutely nothing to say about it and in fact he seemed to insinuate that he paid no federal taxes like he didn't he didn't refute that part and in fact he sort of built on top of it when hillary Clinton suggested that might be the case.
Carter
3:33
Yeah, he made it sound like everybody should try not to pay any taxes. I mean, what do you mean, you losers? You guys have to pay taxes? I don't pay taxes. I'm too good for that. And he got murdered. So murdered
SPEAKER_02
3:44
when he said that. So,
SPEAKER_02
3:45
So, Carter, in your opinion, who had the most to lose going into tonight?
Carter
3:48
Oh, absolutely. Clinton did. I mean, Clinton has been preparing to be president from the time she She was a very little girl just around the same time she started fighting ISIS. So that
SPEAKER_02
4:04
know, this list could go forever. Wait, you mean you mean unsuccessfully fighting ISIS? But go on
Carter
4:08
on saying they got started because of Hillary. OK, when she was a very little girl, she's but she's been fighting and failing her whole life. Yeah. Yeah. Donald Trump's not prepared to be president. He doesn't he wasn't prepared for this debate. he doesn't seem to put any thought into how he would govern he is not presidential material so he didn't have anything to lose he was literally there to promote his own developments that happened tonight has that ever happened before that was that was amazing grandma coming up and saying you gotta take one of my classes you gotta take one of my classes i have the
Corey
4:46
i have the you know the other thing every reference you know i thought hillary clinton could have done more connecting with stories as her husband would have done, you know, as Bill Clinton would have done in the nineties running for president. But Trump, Trump was trying to connect based on his investments. Charlotte, I have a lot of investments in Charlotte, Chicago. I've got a beautiful building in Chicago. You know, I mean, it was, it was about as unapproachable an approach as you could possibly imagine. And it's really hard to, you know, in some ways we we just jumped right in but can we talk about how in god's name did that man get on that stage ever i mean i don't think he could have looked less like he belonged there i
SPEAKER_02
5:27
i mean that will be part of our 48 part series as to how donald trump became the republican nominee but but but spare me this cory you guys both touched on this clinton
SPEAKER_02
5:35
clinton had the most to lose but tell me about the game plan going in? If you are Donald Trump, you know you are preparing against someone. Preparing is a loose term for him. You're preparing against someone who's been getting ready for this all her life. What is your game plan? What was his game plan heading into this? We touched on this a little bit last episode, but
SPEAKER_02
5:54
but tease it out before we get into the specifics of tonight. What was he trying to do getting into the debate tonight?
Corey
6:00
Well, you know, I actually,
Corey
6:02
actually, how it started unfolding at the beginning, I think you could sort of see the wheels spinning in both candidates' heads and maybe I'm just projecting into them what I was feeling watching it, but Donald Trump was really shaky at the start. And I don't mean shaky like later where he was unhinged. I mean, he seemed quite unsure of his footing and it was almost looking like it was going to be a relatively normal debate with him trying to look as normal as possible, which is what I think he should have done. But it wasn't working. And I think it was not working because he himself didn't have the capacity to pull off that thing so then he swung swung hard to uh you know really aggressive donald trump and i'll say uh that happened right around the exchanges on trade and hillary clinton for a moment i was thinking oh god oh my god she's not going to be able to handle this and
Corey
6:50
because it's just so you know her task is impossible let me just say right now she's debating a sociopath who doesn't care if he's lying or called out for lying but i was right i I was quite worried, but she actually managed to make the pivot. She made that. I think she was thrown off because she had one Donald for the first five minutes and then a different Donald. But she made the pivot. And then as it went on and it went into subject matter where, frankly, she had stronger footing anyways, she
Corey
7:15
she did well. What Donald Trump needed to do was be reasonable. What Hillary Clinton needed was to make Donald Trump look unreasonable. Donald Trump decided he would make himself look unreasonable. reasonable
SPEAKER_02
7:25
reasonable well carter would would that be your analysis as well in terms of if you were designing the game plan for donald trump was it just be
SPEAKER_02
7:33
be reasonable was was that kind of the heading on on the white sheet that you'd give him before he stepped up to that podium i
Carter
7:39
i really really resent you calling uh saying white sheet and donald's trump in the same sentence uncalled
SPEAKER_02
7:46
uh would you also make the two holes for him before you gave him said white sheet is
Carter
7:51
is that something you pointy hats because that's not right okay listen um donald trump did not listen to the strategist podcast last episode um because he's
SPEAKER_02
8:03
he's a frequent listener but not every episode yeah listen
Carter
8:05
listen he he called he said you guys were too mean to me uh he wouldn't listen to the whole thing he said call sean hannity he'll
Corey
8:13
he will tell you but
Carter
8:16
he he missed the most important part of our our advice, my advice, because Corey offered nothing. My advice was don't engage with Hillary, right? Just say your shtick to the audience. They love it. His best moments were when he ignored Hillary and just went after her and just attacked and just didn't worry about a human being beside him. He just dug in and started talking about things and those were his best moments. And when he did those, especially at the beginning, I was like, uh
Carter
8:46
uh-oh, we is done now. but then he does things like say you know what the cyber attacks could be done by a 400 pound hacker laying in bed well
Carter
8:58
this is gonna be okay we'll be fine we'll be fine well on your on your
Corey
9:05
your point there his
Corey
9:07
really painting the picture yeah his worst moments by far were when he was trying to engage on her and he was so thin-skinned about so many things and you would have thought that these things would have at least come up in debate prep and it's like don't don't take that date a bait donald like the other comment he said which i think in any normal debate like if this had been mitt romney if this had been 2012 would have been the gaffe of the debate was when he described getting 14 million dollars from his father as a very small loan it wasn't even enough to say it was like a small loan and you know his i don't know i mean it just he he managed to rise to every one of her challenges. And by that, I mean, you know, he took it. I don't mean he did well with it.
Corey
9:53
And I don't I don't know for the life of me what he was thinking.
Corey
9:57
I just don't know.
SPEAKER_02
9:59
Let's let's get back to Trump in a second here. First, let's let's focus on Clinton. How did she perform tonight? You guys have already touched
SPEAKER_02
10:05
touched upon this a little bit. Carter, I'll go to you first.
SPEAKER_02
10:07
How did you make up how did you make Hillary Clinton's performance at
SPEAKER_02
10:11
at the debate tonight what did you think i
Carter
10:13
i think she suffered from something that we do all the time where that's over prepare our candidates when
Carter
10:18
when she was scripted and trying to get all of the points in that she was scripted she was horrible but
Carter
10:24
but when she had the opportunity and i should say horrible from like a real candidate standpoint not horrible like donald trump but
Carter
10:33
when she was unscripted when she went off script and just did what she does which is is talk to the people and address the issue in the room she did great and i was really impressed with those moments and my thinking would be for the future debates that may or may not happen uh
Carter
10:49
uh in cory's world uh
Carter
10:51
uh get her off script stop training her she has been trained for 30 freaking years let her go if she doesn't know this stuff by now she's never going to know it so get her out of her head and let her be Let Hillary be Hillary, which
Carter
11:10
which we've heard with
Carter
11:12
with a bunch of candidates, including, I think it started with Reagan, but I'm not sure.
SPEAKER_02
11:17
Corey, your assessment of Hillary Clinton's performance tonight, what did you make?
Corey
11:21
Well, I do think that her canned lines were some of the weakest material. Trumped up, trickled down, that's
Corey
11:27
that's not a thing. Stop trying to make that a thing, Hillary. It's not going to happen.
Corey
11:31
And I do wonder, I will say, if some of her moments that were great in real time will translate. Like there was Donald Trump. I can't even remember which of those things he was going off of. But he just was sputtering and sputtering and sputtering and sputtering and sputtering. And then, guys, you know what he did? He sputtered some more. And when he finally finished, she said something like, whoa, well, that was a lot. And the audience laughs, right? Oh, yeah. But nobody's going to watch a five-minute clip. The clip is going to be the last two sentences of Donald Trump and then her saying that. And I don't think it's going to translate as well to the viewer afterwards. So I do wonder if Donald won't be saved a bit in soundbite simply by the fact that so much of how brutally he did was the rambling and the context that you're never going to get after the fact.
SPEAKER_02
12:24
Carter, I've heard Corey's take so far a little bit on Donald Trump. I want to get yours on the record. Is there anything that Donald Trump and his camp can be satisfied with tonight in terms of his performance? I
Carter
12:35
I think the Donald Trump camp can say if we can keep the debate to 11 minutes and 32 seconds, we have a chance of winning this.
Carter
12:45
Because the first 11 minutes and 32 seconds were bang on. And you know what? I think he also scored points in his last probably four minutes. So if we took those together, they may have. 16 minutes, 15 minutes.
Carter
12:57
Don't round up. saying don't overreach okay he has 15
Carter
13:02
15 minutes and 32 seconds to get himself because he was good for parts of it um normally and you know in fact if you'd said to me listen he
Carter
13:12
has a chance to be good for one-sixth of the debate what do you think you think he can pull it off i just said yes because donald
Carter
13:18
donald trump being good for one-sixth of the debate has not been the experience that we've had to this point okay but moving forward there is no way that he can you know like he his shit was so bad in the other five six he
Carter
13:34
can't it doesn't balance anymore so i i'm i am i i just can't i if i was advising him i'd say what happened man we had a game plan just you blew it up you
Carter
13:46
you You blew it up right halfway, like 15 minutes in. What happened?
SPEAKER_02
13:50
Corey, same question to you. What, if anything, could the Trump camp after tonight be satisfied with in Donald Trump's performance?
Corey
13:59
Well, it's clear that Hillary Clinton doesn't have very good answers on trade. And in fact, I think the whole envelope of what have you been doing for the past 30 years was some of her weakest material. And that means they've found a vulnerability. And when they start looking at that game tape, I'm sure they're going to note that. and they're going to try to find better answers. Now, of course, it's an arms race, and the same will be said for Hillary. But, you know, her answers were very, very weak. Even when she was talking about the things she did as senator and secretary of state, as Canadians, we're really familiar with the 1984 debate, like, I had no option. This was, some of her language got close. It's like, look, it wasn't my job. I don't know what to tell you. That's tough when you're in the room and you're making a big thing about the fact you are in these rooms and having these discussions, to then turn around and be like, yeah, that wasn't my job. It just doesn't work when you're asking for the big job. And so if they can sort of build on those lines of attack and go forward on that, they may find more fruit. But I don't know. I mean, I kind of think that it's more likely, based on what I saw tonight, that Hillary Clinton will adjust to that line of attack than Donald Trump will adjust to to deliver that line of attack.
SPEAKER_02
15:09
Carter, let's talk about missed opportunities for a second. You know, you've done debate coaching in the past for candidates at the provincial level and otherwise. Missed opportunities are effectively either a narrative series or a particular moment that you felt like should have been hit harder or your candidate went left when they should have gone right. Did you see one, let's start with Hillary Clinton, did you see one for Clinton that you wish you would have done this at that moment of time rather than doing that or had gone down a particular way where you were just sitting to yourself being like no why are you doing this did you find yourself in that in that position oh
Carter
15:42
oh man i mean it's like picking
Carter
15:45
hillary clinton um was
Carter
15:48
was not great okay
Carter
15:49
okay so let's let's just start there she was not great tonight she she had a
Carter
15:54
tendency to want to resort and
Carter
15:56
and i've already said this to the scripted and that that creates havoc for her so
Carter
16:00
so the missed opportunities were jumping
Carter
16:02
jumping out and actually attacking something Like, she
Carter
16:05
she can do that. And she
Carter
16:08
didn't. And that was her biggest missed opportunity. I think, I mean, it's hard to figure out, you know, kind of an opportunity
Carter
16:15
opportunity for her to push back.
Carter
16:18
But sometimes like that, like
Carter
16:20
like when she did that, you
Carter
16:22
you know, woo now or whatever the heck her quote was at the end of one of Trump's indecipherable tirades, it
Carter
16:29
it really played. and
Carter
16:31
i think that she could have done more and more of that as the evening went through where
Carter
16:35
where it was like wow
Carter
16:37
wow i can't believe i'm up here debating this gorilla and
Carter
16:41
and i think that that's probably the best that she could have done is start almost every answer with i'm debating a gorilla and then and
Carter
16:49
uh that'd be fine cory
SPEAKER_02
16:52
cory same question to you you know i i tweeted earlier where it seemed like every time she had a chance to make a right poke she went with a history lesson instead.
SPEAKER_02
16:59
from your vantage point, did
SPEAKER_02
17:02
did you find yourself, whether it was a larger narrative arc or a particular moment or two, where you saw missed opportunities for Hillary Clinton?
Corey
17:10
You know, I think a lot of people are going to be taking that line, maybe suggesting there was some sort of knockout punch to be thrown. The knockout punch was not to throw a punch. She did what she needed to do on that. I don't think she executed perfectly. I don't even think she she executed very well. I think she was pretty mediocre in her execution, but when you compare it to Donald Trump, looked okay. But I do not think, I do not think she should have been delivering those left hooks. That's not what her strength is. And frankly, if you want to get into a mud fight with Donald Trump, good
Corey
17:39
good luck, right? I mean, you don't fight a grease fire with grease and she needed to do what she needed to do, which is look presidential up there. And you're not going to look presidential by getting in a sniping match with Donald Trump. Leave that for the surrogates i don't know if you guys were watching the talking heads after not even the partisan ones everybody was like wow what the fuck was that about oh yeah um uh
Corey
18:02
uh you know debate performance and i'm sure we'll talk about it but trump himself was in the spin room and the comments oh my god were like really you're you're satisfied with that was basically the vibe of the questions that were being presented to donald trump i
Corey
18:17
mean that's fine and so i let the other people throw throw the the hooks as you put it there let you know you can be the person who looks like you're an adult in the room carter
SPEAKER_02
18:27
carter let's let's go missed opportunities for for donald trump oh i'm sure several to pound upon but if there was one or two that you would choose carter which ones would they be as as the largest missed opportunities for donald trump tonight i
Carter
18:41
i mean not staying in character i mean we talked about his first 15 minutes he he had the opportunity to prove that that he's not just a buffoon. He needed to show us today that he was presidential in some fashion. It doesn't need to be that which is presidential that has been defined by Barack Obama or Judge George W. Bush or President Clinton or any of the others. Everybody else is defining themselves as presidential on their own terms. Trump gets the same opportunity, but he must be able to articulate himself in some fashion uh
Carter
19:15
uh and i think he did at the beginning um
Carter
19:19
and then he lost control uh
Carter
19:21
uh he was clearly coached
Carter
19:24
coached he was listening to his coaches until
Carter
19:26
until the point when he wasn't listening to his coaches and
Carter
19:30
and that to me is is the the i
Carter
19:32
i think that that's that's
Carter
19:33
that's that's his missed opportunity cory
SPEAKER_02
19:36
cory what do you make missed opportunity for donald trump any one or two two large narrative themes that stick out to you yeah
Corey
19:41
yeah i i love what carter said there about not standing character i mean i think he was in a character and it's a character we all know and it's the shithead who always has an excuse and is just too weaselly to be pinned down for anything and that was sort of the core of all of those things i listed at the top right like he always has a reason not to do the right thing or it's always somebody else's fault or always somebody Somebody said it first. And it's just, you know, he almost seems like he's lying to himself and nobody like forget him being your president. Would you want to work with Donald Trump? Imagine going into the office and going to do a staff meeting and having that guy in the staff.
Corey
20:21
It just doesn't. Yeah. Nobody wants that guy. And if Hillary Clinton can make it about. I don't even know if it's like, you know, the old adage, like, which candidate would you like to have a beer with? I'd like to say, which candidate would you like to go to work with? If she can make that the ballot question, I think that would go a long way. Now, we sort of jumped off earlier. I do want to sort of throw out there like a dead cat on the table here. The one major critique I have with Hillary Clinton during this debate, and it
Corey
20:50
it was that it was entirely fought on Donald Trump's terms. It was entirely fought on Donald Trump's terms. She slayed him on his terms, but it was fought on his terms. Mm
Carter
20:59
Mm hmm. Well, that is an interesting point. I mean, we
Carter
21:03
we often talk about how, you know, if you're really going to win a debate,
Carter
21:08
it must be you
Carter
21:09
you must control and build and construct the model that you will win in. um
Carter
21:15
um interestingly when you really win a debate when you knock a ball out of the park sometimes
Carter
21:20
sometimes it's because the
Carter
21:22
the other guy screws up so badly right and you know uh
Carter
21:26
uh jim prentice loses
Carter
21:27
loses to rachel notley not because necessarily rachel notley nails the bait and owns the debate it's
Carter
21:34
jim prentice screws up the debate when he and he has his moments his mistakes his he's
Carter
21:39
he's the one who chose rachel notley he's the one who looked across the table and
Carter
21:44
and and said this is the one that i think can beat me or that i'm afraid of beating me or the whatever
Carter
21:49
whatever i mean however their team made those decisions it was a mistake and that
Carter
21:56
gives the the debate to his adversary in
Carter
22:00
in this particular case clinton said i
Carter
22:03
i know what your best pitch is you
Carter
22:05
you can throw it in there but
Carter
22:07
but i'm going to knock it out of the park and
Carter
22:09
and uh and she just did yeah
SPEAKER_02
22:12
yeah yeah and i want to actually extend on Carter's point there, Corey. Do you think that was costed
SPEAKER_02
22:16
costed in by Clinton where conventional debate prep, she would have a message box and which side of an issue to dominate that was really to her favor?
SPEAKER_02
22:26
At this point, do you think her campaign strategically just said, you know what, that's fine. We're going to play this game on your terms because I can beat you on your terms if that's what you want to do. Do you feel like that may have been the MO of the campaign? Well,
Corey
22:39
Well, if that was, that was a pretty high risk strategy that I certainly wouldn't recommend and in fact i would drop it right now for the next debates uh there was a the basic thread of donald trump is that america is falling apart and i did not hear enough from hillary clinton that that was simply not supported by the facts there were moments i thought some of her stronger fact providing were along the lines of like since 91 you know violent crime is actually down 40 murders down 50 that was good right but it
Corey
23:09
wasn't wrapped in like it was a fact it was a a rebuttal and it was just a fact. It wasn't part of a story. And I really think there's a strong case to be made that, look, America's not perfect, but America's a pretty good place and there's nothing wrong with America that can't be fixed by what's right with America. And if that message had been a bit stronger, I think she probably wouldn't have found herself in some of the corners she did find herself. Let's just observe one thing right off the bat. She has totally conceded that free trade is an ill uh you know yes yes she has just totally abandoned that and uh you know she can say no i supported some but i don't do it in other cases and i'm off tpp and all that but the fact of the matter is that is not just because of trump but it's because of trump and it's because of bernie sanders and she's gone away from her position she's weak on that because that is a brand new position for her and it's hard for her to explain how she got there she's
Corey
24:02
she's playing on their turf you
SPEAKER_02
24:04
know guys when we when we did a uh a live show this past week which which is a story we need to discuss oh we do it's your episode thanks steven
SPEAKER_02
24:21
so we will discuss the story around the story in a second but when i asked you guys there for the the audience that we had, what was the one thing you would be looking forward to tonight? Both of you said
SPEAKER_02
24:32
said body language. So I want to talk about that for a second. What did you make of
SPEAKER_02
24:36
of the body language that was that was at play during this debate? Now, I was watching on CNN, so I'm not sure about the other networks, but there was a split camera. And I don't remember that ever before in a debate, a constant 95 minute split camera on both candidates. You can watch their reactions constantly throughout uh
SPEAKER_02
24:54
uh but with that being said in painting that context what did you make of the general sort of body language of both of the candidates cory well
Corey
25:00
well um i didn't watch it on cnn i watched it on cbc and their feed was cutting between different people um the split camera i had i can remember as far back as 2000 because i can remember there being footage of gore acting really huffy as george w was saying some things like the
Corey
25:18
that's right yeah it's not like a new thing although I'm not sure if if that
Corey
25:22
that was maybe constructed after the fact it's it's tough to know what I'm remembering and what was a construct but I was she was awesome on body language Hillary Clinton was very good on body language she had exactly the right facial expression pretty much all of the time nobody's talking about her body language because it wasn't an issue a lot of people are talking about Donald Trump's body language you know his sniffing his agita the the way he's kind of fidgeting around, and just his general sort of discomfort with that scene. Interestingly, though, it did not seem to be a concern for Hillary Clinton. I mean, she had it down, in my opinion. I was worried about how she would react, if she would smirk, if
Corey
26:04
if she would do anything like that. She didn't. She carried a pretty stoic but not mean face through the entire debate.
Carter
26:10
Yeah, I think that Hillary Clinton's body language might have been her most impressive part of the debate, because
Carter
26:16
because there was a certain
Carter
26:20
certain amount of, you
Carter
26:24
you know, kind of, I'm waiting for you to finish. I'm going to give you as much time as you want. And if you look, actually, at
Carter
26:33
they've been they track the number of interruptions by each candidate. Yes,
SPEAKER_02
26:38
that's right. Yeah. You
Carter
26:39
You know, he had like 24 or something interruptions and Hillary had three or four.
Carter
26:44
And the reason was that she just sat there looking confident,
Carter
26:49
knowing that what he was saying wasn't
Carter
26:52
wasn't hurting her the
Carter
26:53
the whole time, even
Carter
26:54
even when, frankly, sometimes what he was saying was hurting her. So
Carter
26:59
So I think that she's, you
Carter
27:00
you know, her body language was really strong.
Carter
27:04
Trump's body language, you can actually see when he thought he was losing, when he thought he was having a bad moment. He came a little bit unhinged. He pushed
Carter
27:14
pushed too hard. And
Carter
27:17
body language came over the top and kind of showed that, which I
Carter
27:21
I thought was amazing. It was very interesting to watch.
SPEAKER_02
27:25
Guys, let's get into strategy mode for a second. So suppose this debate ends. You are both tasked. We'll go for each candidate in sequence.
SPEAKER_02
27:33
You're tasked to be strategists out on the spin floor to give the spin for each of your candidates.
SPEAKER_02
27:38
Corey, what are you saying if you have the giant sign behind you that has your name, the
SPEAKER_02
27:44
cameras are in front of you? What are you saying as a spin for Donald Trump after
SPEAKER_02
27:49
after you finish this debate and you're in the spin room? You
Corey
27:52
You know, we all expected to see a polished politician up there in Hillary Clinton, and that's fine. But polished people have lied to you for a long time. Polished people have told you this country is going to get better if you just do what we do. And it hasn't happened. What you had from Donald Trump is a man who was palpably angry at a fact that career politicians have run this country off the road. And it's time to make America great again. get. You saw how little she had to answer for when we started talking about trade. You saw how little she had to answer for when we started talking about stop and frisk and all of those other issues. The fact of the matter is we need law and order. We need fair trade. We need to get back our standing in the world. And we can't be pushed around by the Chinese, the Iranians and anybody else anymore. And just like that, Donald Trump stood up and he will stand up for America, too. so
SPEAKER_02
28:40
so so cory how did that compare to what you saw on the floor compared to when you were watching it just before we started recording here what did that what yeah yeah i want to get you in on the car in a second but i've just no
Carter
28:51
i haven't forgotten about you i'm still on the phone here that's what i'm saying i haven't
SPEAKER_02
28:56
haven't forgotten about you i haven't forgotten about you i am just curious to hear because cory seems to have a very vocal and cohesive message for donald trump in the can in the back of his subconscious um
SPEAKER_02
29:08
um the cory well how did that compare and how would you rank what was actually put on place um in the in in as compared to what you said well
Corey
29:15
well full disclosure i was i was watching cnn only sporadically i was not watching the feeds of the spin room um they cut to the spin room a fair bit but the guy who was giving the republican spin was donald fucking trump who spins for themselves that's
Corey
29:30
that's the craziest thing ever that's
Carter
29:32
that's not if zane
Carter
29:33
zane would have let me do my spin for donald trump as a surrogate i would have started off by saying donald trump did great he did oh look here he is in the spin room this is exactly what i wanted to prevent go ahead carter god i mean who does that i mean his mere presence in the spin room immediately
Carter
29:53
immediately sends a signal to the rest of the media and everybody covering it this
Carter
29:57
was a disastrous debate that donald himself had to step in and do the lowly art of spinning and as someone who's had to spin it is a lowly art and
Carter
30:07
and they your candidate in it ever
SPEAKER_02
30:12
let's take a quick step quick step back to conceptualize for people that may not know so the spin room uh
SPEAKER_02
30:17
uh it comes in many different formats but ultimately is where the campaign surrogates, staffers, anyone
SPEAKER_02
30:24
anyone really with a pulse sometimes who can speak on behalf of the campaign, talks to media outlets, bloggers, reporters, whatever it may be, to
SPEAKER_02
30:32
to give them the take and the real
SPEAKER_02
30:35
real sort of spill for what the campaign believes happened that
SPEAKER_02
30:39
that night at the debate. Carter, you've done it before. Corey, I'm sure you've done it as well.
SPEAKER_02
30:45
And it's almost, can i use the word unprecedented
Corey
30:47
unprecedented hold on that's
Corey
30:49
zane i'm just getting this from the decision desk some breaking news for you okay the cnn or orc poll uh first debate hillary clinton wins 62 to 27 so
Corey
31:01
that's a beating that's a beating folks yeah
Carter
31:04
yeah you know what it reminds me of it reminds me of when uh mitt romney got about 67 on the first debate so
Carter
31:11
so i think we have to be really careful because you know these these immediate reactions uh
Carter
31:17
uh cory's really good at them cory's
Carter
31:19
cory's really good at the immediate reaction but
Carter
31:21
but they they they fade and
Carter
31:24
then so the reason they put spinners out to build off of yes question is that the
Carter
31:29
the debate itself we expect it the debate will speak for itself it doesn't it never does someone needs to get out and tell people how it actually unfolded and then we need to tell it again the next day and again the next day and again the next day and here's what scares me about donald trump whenever
Carter
31:45
whenever there is a news cycle that is not favoring him he changes the channel now he may change the channel by literally lighting his hair on fire right
Carter
31:54
right by literally taking the hairspray lighting a lighter and letting her go
Carter
32:00
but that's uh that's how he changes the the channel all the time so who
Carter
32:06
who won this debate I'll tell you what, talk to me on Wednesday and if we're still talking about the debate on Wednesday, Hillary won if we're talking about something other than the debate on Wednesday Donald Trump won.
Carter
32:19
Polls be damned No,
Carter
32:20
No, I disagree for
Corey
32:21
for two reasons both
Corey
32:23
have to do with this election cycle one is that the viewership for this debate is expected to be far, far higher and less people are going to be hearing about it in spin and more voters will have actually seen it with their own two eyes. The second is is 62% by Hillary Clinton with her unfavorables where they are, and the fact that so many more people were kind of owned by third parties at the time is a very different number than the 67 that Romney had. This is just also, by the way, it entirely reverses the momentum that Donald Trump had, whereas Romney winning reversed the momentum of Obama, and it gave him a month of grief.
Corey
33:01
This is a good night for Hillary Clinton.
SPEAKER_02
33:04
Carter, I robbed you on the last question, so I'm going to give you first shake at this one.
SPEAKER_02
33:09
Yeah, okay. I finally put you in the driver's seat. I mean, you are still a little bit in exile.
SPEAKER_02
33:13
You are spinning for Hillary Clinton from the spin room. What are you saying? For
Carter
33:21
Yeah. I'm saying, you know what? We saw one president up there, and we saw a buffoon. The president stood up and talked. you know she she did what she needed to do to prove to the country that she's presidential that
Carter
33:36
is fundamentally why we hold these debates this is this is the reason is it so you can stand up there and you can see person
Carter
33:45
who is the most likely person to
Carter
33:47
to carry america forward over the next four years and there was only one person that actually was showing that everybody Everybody else, everybody
Carter
33:57
everybody else looked like a, well,
Carter
34:00
well, everybody else. He looked like a caricature. He
Carter
34:04
He looked like a caricature, period.
SPEAKER_02
34:07
Corey, same question to you. Is there any danger going after Donald Trump in your spin? Do you just talk about your positives? What do you do to kind of get the most leverage from the spin room if you are Hillary Clinton's campaign? no
Corey
34:19
no just like i think hillary clinton shouldn't have said anything about donald trump and taken the bait as we discussed i think her spin room's got to go for the jugular i think this is the opportunity to lay bare all of those facts i
SPEAKER_02
34:31
i think it's when you
Corey
34:32
you think they're the ones that deliver the right hook of course i mean absolutely you send a hitman the the godfather doesn't kill the person themselves and because there's always a bit of blowback on on being negative let the blowback fall on somebody else let hillary clinton just stand above it and talk about the america she she wants to make, which, again, is something she should have done more of and said more positive things about the United States. But now is the time like now is when you get everybody out on every network and you make it clear that you won. Right. I mean, the victory. The thing about politics is until you get to voting day and there's actually counting of ballots, victory is entirely determined by whether or not people thought you won. So go out and explain to everybody how you want carter
SPEAKER_02
35:16
carter for you you know let's talk about some of the um some
SPEAKER_02
35:20
some of the lines from this debate because we know that just like you mentioned the debate doesn't live by itself there will be moments from here that will be extracted they'll be put online as memes they might be used in brochures and television ads was
SPEAKER_02
35:34
was there a particular line or a moment from either candidate and either side that really struck out to you at with your strategist head on saying If I was on the other side, I would be taking that and using that as an attack. Or if I was on my side, this is what I'd want to really capture and crystallize as part of my campaign. Did anything stick out to you from this debate that was really a line that you'd want to repurpose and leverage for further use?
Carter
35:59
I thought that the Trump not paying taxes line was the attack
Carter
36:04
attack out of the future. Right.
Carter
36:06
Right. Here's that one.
Carter
36:09
God. I mean, sure.
Carter
36:11
sure. Birther, sure. Four hundred pound hacker. Sure. Iraq.
Carter
36:17
All of that's been done before. um
Carter
36:19
mean that and the fact that trump was literally called a racist no
Carter
36:24
no one in a presidential debate has ever been called a racist gary
Carter
36:28
gary or barry goldwater i almost felt gary goldwater weird barry goldwater was never called a racist even though he was a racist he was a racist there's no evidence blah blah blah well
Carter
36:41
well look to me it's the 14 million dollars Yeah, Corey, what was the
Corey
36:45
the $14 million very small loan just because of its sound biteableness, right? I mean, some of those other things, as I mentioned, in the whole, they are just so brutal. But you're never, I mean, what, are you going to run a three-minute commercial? No, I mean, you're going to take a tiny clip and Donald Trump saying, you know, I think it was like Hillary Clinton saying, you got a $14 million loan from your father and him being like, I got a very small loan from my father, you know? I mean, come
Corey
37:11
come on, $14 million, that's an out of touch. That's a very out of touch line. And I think that
Corey
37:18
that coupled together with a few other things he said about his great temperament, like you could put together a commercial pretty quickly, pretty easily. I think that is just him saying things that Americans will
Corey
37:28
will just say, like, what is this guy on? And we all know what he's on. Howard Dean tweeted it. It's cocaine. Okay, but I'm
Corey
37:36
I'm bringing some very
SPEAKER_02
37:38
Corey. Listen, on the other side, if you are a Republican strategist and you were tasked with looking at this debate for
SPEAKER_02
37:46
for material for future use, did
SPEAKER_02
37:49
did you have anything that you could have used yourself if you were sitting here in the Republican slice and dice room looking for material? Did you see anything that was leverageable in your domain? domain yeah
Corey
37:59
yeah there's there's no question to me in the first section there hillary clinton sputtered a lot and there was a lot of stammering and whatnot and there were a lot of moments where donald trump was on the offensive that again if you just took a few seconds of that clip it would look pretty bad for hillary clinton and i do expect to see that kind of stuff in an attack ad pretty soon well
SPEAKER_02
38:20
anything on your end yeah yeah
Carter
38:21
yeah uh free trade um
Carter
38:24
um cory already already mentioned that her free trade was really weak but there's there's there's ads there there's serious ads there about free trade and donald trump saying uh
Carter
38:33
uh i mean first of all donald trump the great capitalist being against free trade i thought there were times there when the vast majority of the republican party would have come up on stage and choke the life out of him for some of the things he was saying right because
Carter
38:47
because they are his they are the republican position things
Carter
38:51
right you've got to allow us to trade we got that's how else we're going to make our money but
Carter
38:57
did that and that was uh that was kind of weird but i think that ironically it could work for him if he takes that um
Carter
39:08
if he takes that anti-free trade positioning
SPEAKER_02
39:11
carter tell me this you are working to engineer the next week going forward for for both of these these campaigns what
SPEAKER_02
39:17
what is the maybe you didn't start top line what is the strategy going forward in terms of surrogates
SPEAKER_02
39:23
surrogates and and headlines that you're looking for how do you uh
SPEAKER_02
39:27
uh and cory let's just assume there is another debate how do you use the momentum or the the in this case what you've called changing the channel going forward into the next debate what are you looking to do top line yeah
Corey
39:39
yeah well i think if you're donald trump to steven's earlier point you just you turn the the channel as quickly as you can this is where i will be very suspicious if there's yet another russian hack uh or a release of hacked information oh man but you
Corey
39:54
you you try to find something anything that will change the channel on this one right now you've got to do something big and splashy you've got to figure it out if you're hillary clinton you just want to have people talking about this debate for as long as you can as long as it continues to roll out the way it looks like like it's rolling out, this is nothing but good for you. And I think you really start applying pressure to Donald Trump. You have to be very careful, though. You don't want the next debate to be one of expectations that have swung the other way. Right. I think I think you do have to say like that was a very tough debate. I mean, ultimately, I'm I'm arguing with a guy who it's unarguable. Like I'm used to arguing and debating with people who actually care about the truth and facts and and trying to actually get a cogent point forward. And this man cares is about none of those things. And I think you have to really stress that he's a disaster. But the fact that he's a disaster makes it challenging to argue with him. I think you have to manage expectations going forward because right now it looks like such a beating. I'm worried about expectations. Carter,
SPEAKER_02
40:55
Carter, you want to do some riffing?
Carter
40:57
Well, I think, I mean, one of the things that bugs me about the U.S. cycle is
Carter
41:02
is that I'm so used to the Canadian cycle that
Carter
41:06
that it is impossible to put things into the timeline so
Carter
41:09
so the timeline that is is unfolding in front of us the timeline of moving into a uh an election in november like the latest possible date in november according to the u.s constitution november the 8th this is it this is as late as we can possibly go that
Carter
41:29
is so far away in
Carter
41:31
in in the context of a canadian cycle right this would be the equivalent of having an election an election debate in the first week of the campaign in the Canadian cycle. So what impact does this have when we get to the end?
Carter
41:46
And I think it's really going to be like Romney facing Obama in 2012.
Carter
41:51
It doesn't matter how well you do in this particular debate. It matters how well you can construct the storyline and maintain it over what seems to be an impossibly long time. The
Carter
42:02
The three of us have been watching 538 real clear politics and other predictors say um and freaking the fuck out over the last three weeks because
Carter
42:13
because we've watched it to go from 80 probability of hillary clinton to 50 uh 54 i think today 52 of it was held today so
Carter
42:22
so i mean it's a coin toss it's a dead red heat, as Nate Silver would say.
Carter
42:28
And that's because Hillary Clinton couldn't sustain
Carter
42:32
the narrative through all of this. She's gotten a new lease on life today.
Carter
42:38
Can she sustain the narrative for
Carter
42:40
for the remaining, what is it, six weeks? Six weeks?
Carter
42:44
Holy crap, that's just brutal.
SPEAKER_02
42:47
Okay, let's move it on to our final segment, our over under our lightning round. Guys, I just want to get through this.
SPEAKER_02
42:52
It's past 10. Are you losing steam? Are you like, like are you donald trump at the 89th minute minute are you guys good to do this what's where's the energy level at i
Carter
42:59
i i'm i'm exhausted because i'm old here
SPEAKER_02
43:02
here we go great
SPEAKER_02
43:04
one to ten hillary clinton's debate performance one to ten what did you make of it uh
Corey
43:07
uh six and a half it was not great but you know what i'm sure the next question will make that uh we'll swear that circle carter
SPEAKER_02
43:14
carter one to ten on hillary clinton what did you make of her performance um
Carter
43:18
um six she she She was better than Trump, but she would not have won against Obama.
SPEAKER_02
43:25
Corey, one to ten,
Corey
43:26
the good old Donald Trump.
Corey
43:28
Oh, yeah, one. I think this was about as bad as it was. That bad? Seriously. I honestly think this may have, you know what, let's not get nuts and it's easy to overreact to this. But I honestly think this may be the moment we look back on and be like, well, all right, this isn't really competitive anymore. You've got to keep in mind, Stephen was just talking about the length of the U.S. election campaign. him but the last time there was a big news event that propelled hillary clinton up eight points it took her about six weeks to come back down to where she was only up by two points right we only have six weeks left if this has the same effect as the conventions he doesn't have enough time to recover carter
SPEAKER_02
44:03
carter one to ten on donald trump what did you think well
Carter
44:06
well he started off at least at a three and then he went down to about a two one one maybe a one yeah so he had moments of three Three to four, and he went down to one very, very frequently.
SPEAKER_02
44:19
In only a couple of words, one regret or redo for each of the candidates. If Clinton could do one thing over again that you'd advise her, what do you think it'd be, Corey?
Corey
44:28
Her answer on trade, no question. That was easily her weakest part of the night.
Corey
44:31
Carter, what's your Clinton redo?
Carter
44:33
Well, I was going to say trade, too, but Corey said it, so now I feel a little bit guilty just taking the same thing. But you will.
SPEAKER_02
44:40
Yeah. I'll give you Trump. Trump, if you are to redo Trump and no, you cannot say the entire 95 minutes, what would you redo for Donald Trump?
Carter
44:47
I probably would remove the not paying taxes thing because
SPEAKER_02
44:50
that's the real killer, you think?
Carter
44:54
the most important thing in an election campaign is being able to be seen by the voters as someone you can relate to. That is tried and true time and time again. and donald trump just basically said to the average voter fuck
Carter
45:09
fuck playing paying taxes don't
Corey
45:13
cory your trump redo what is it well yeah i think for him i i would have stuck to the script his big problem was he got off script as much as he was feeling uncomfortable in it and it was shaky i guarantee you if he had just stayed that shaky guy throughout the entire thing maybe he wouldn't have had the highs and by highs i mean the three or the four on the 10 point scale on on trade but he would not have had the lows we'd probably have been saying he got like a four or five and when hillary's only getting a six and a half it's a wash like it's more
Carter
45:43
more than a wash zane or cory if he gets fours and and uh hillary gets sixes he wins he
Corey
45:51
in a landslide so this is the thing he went for a blow and and he just had no capacity to deliver it we're
SPEAKER_02
45:57
we're under on six where 1 is Chester and 10 is me, how would you rank Lester Holt as the moderator?
Corey
46:04
Well, so 1 is the high and
Corey
46:06
and 10 is the low. A confusion from our usuals. No, you know what? On a scale of 1 to 10, assuming 1 is low and 10 is high, I thought that Lester Holt did a pretty good job. I'd give him an 8. It's an impossible job. Everybody complains about it. You're pretty limited. But he pressed. He pressed in a couple of different instances. And even though he didn't get the answers, him just pressing highlighted that Donald Trump had not answered. Carter,
SPEAKER_02
46:29
Carter, what do you make of Lester Holst? Over, under, on six.
Carter
46:32
Over, under, on six. I say that Lester as a host made you look like a great host.
SPEAKER_02
46:39
were not as kind to him. What was your take? Because he's facing a lot of fire today on Twitter right now as well.
Carter
46:47
Listen, when you say we're moving on to the next question, we're moving on to the next question, period. You've determined as the moderator that people have had enough time on this question you've got other things that need to be done and you shut them the fuck down and you have to do it on the first question the second question the third question because they okay
SPEAKER_02
47:05
okay we're moving on to the next question carter we're moving on to the next question even
Carter
47:10
can do that zane even you steven
SPEAKER_02
47:13
steven carter to you one week from today with the most generous liberal arts curve applied who
SPEAKER_02
47:20
who do we say won this debate one week from today oh
Carter
47:23
oh man i think I think one week from today, it's still going to be Clinton who won.
SPEAKER_02
47:29
Corey Hogan, one week from today, liberal arts curve, who is the winner of this debate? Clinton
Corey
47:33
Clinton wins the debate.
SPEAKER_02
47:35
We'll leave it there. That's a wrap on episode 594 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Velgey, with me
SPEAKER_02
47:40
me as always, Stephen
SPEAKER_02
47:41
Stephen Carter, Corey Hogan, and we'll see you next time.