The contest for the soul of America, between Trump and Biden, is going to begin seriously with the two men facing off in Cleveland.
Donald Trump eschews debate preparation, relying upon his instincts, which are both sharp and formidable, and his comfort zone in television studios. He can be expected to employ bluff and bluster in the debates, and to endeavour to ride roughshod verbally over his opponent.
Trump's focus will be on law and order, a strengthening American economy and a vaccine for COVID-19, which the president will argue will arrive just in time, like the cavalry in John Ford's classic western Stagecoach.
Foreign policy and economic policy will be interlocked and the
focus of both will be China. Joe Biden will be painted as generally weak, but particularly weak on China, which has assumed villain status in Washington DC among both major parties.
For his part, Vice-President Biden will seek to be more presidential than partisan, judging by his campaign to date, although he will seek to hold the Trumpian feet to the fire on mismanagement of the pandemic and the dramatic collapse in the US economy. The pandemic is returning to centre stage, given Trump's own revelatory interviews in Bob Woodward's new book, Rage.
On the military, Biden will unquestionably be emotional, given the claims in The Atlantic of Trump's disparagement of American war dead and the service of Biden's son Beau. This election may be different, with military issues playing better for the Democrats. Climate change will be injected into the debate, but overall, the vice-president will seek to ensure that this election is a referendum on the Trump administration, especially attempts to dismantle Obamacare.
Trump will not be able to elbow Joe Biden aside as he did his opponents during the Republican primaries of 2016. Nor will he be able to seek to intimidate the former vice-president by hovering around on the stage, as he did with Secretary Clinton.
Biden is far too experienced, as he demonstrated in
vice-presidential debates against Governor Sarah Palin in 2008 and Speaker Paul Ryan in 2012. On both occasions he won comfortably, whether it be by virtue of dismissing Paul Ryan's claims or refusing to follow Sarah Palin down every ideological crevice on offer. The Biden campaign tends to be disciplined; Trump far less so.
Famous presidential debates have produced great moments of theatre and clear campaign momentum.
President Ronald Reagan demolished former vice-president Walter Mondale in 1984 after his advanced age had been raised as an issue, declaring: "I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth and inexperience."
Senator Lloyd Bentsen of Texas, running with Governor Michael Dukakis on the Democratic
ticket in 1988, annihilated Republican senator Dan Quayle of Indiana, who had claimed as much governmental experience as Jack Kennedy with the rejoinder: "Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy."
The cameras miss nothing. Governor Ronald Reagan walked across the stage to shake hands with President Jimmy Carter and was applauded for his courtesy. President George H. W. Bush was caught glancing at his watch during his debate with Governor Bill Clinton and earned much criticism.
For diverse reasons, these debates matter.