US Presidential Debate highly entertaining

THE EDITOR, Madam:

The September 29 United States Presidential Debate was bizarrely entertaining for many. The incumbent’s tactics to steamroll his opponent was very apparent from the outset, leaving no doubt that he had learned hand-to-hand combat from mentor Vince McMahon of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). After all, Linda McMahon has been a member of his cabinet as head of the Small Business Administration since 2017, until leaving recently to oversee his Super-PAC for re-election.

The WWE franchise is a huge financial success worldwide, whose colourful alumni include luminaries such as former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura, and Dwayne Johnson (The Rock), whose films are among the highest-grossing in Hollywood. Ironically, many of those same media voices who claimed after the debate to be so shocked by both participants’ brutish, crude and uncouth antics, even sounded like the commentators heard ringside at WWE events.

Many news networks in USA and globally seem to forget that American presidential politics have never been as totally bland as their commentators pretend. Some of the most revered names in their history said some very outrageous things about political opponents, dating back to the Founding Fathers, with John Adams calling Alexander Hamilton “The bastard brat of a Scotch peddler”, while Adams was called an hermaphrodite by agents of the revered Thomas Jefferson. Things haven’t got much better since then, and there are myriad examples of similar boorish behaviour throughout the history of political campaigning, but not only in the US, of course.

Still, nobody should forget that America is a violent society with around 400 million firearms, and well over 16,000 murders last year. With about 4.4 per cent of the global population, they incarcerate 22 per cent of the world’s prisoners, and have a sordid history of four presidential assassinations, with countless plots and failed attempts over the last 150 years. On the bright side, there are two more Presidential Debates scheduled between Messrs Biden and Trump; just like the saying that’s applied to many other of life’s endeavours, “ the first time is often the worst time”.

BERNIE SMITH

Parksville, BC

Canada