Name: Column: Trump and Biden town halls showed us two worlds, and only one of them is terrifying
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Column: Trump and Biden town halls showed us two worlds, and only one of them is terrifying

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AdvertisementBy Chicago TribuneOct 16, 2020 at 11:33 amToggling between former Vice President Joe Biden and President Donald Trump taking questions in separate televised town halls nearly killed me.I’ve been dizzy for hours and still can’t spell my name. Each time I close my eyes I see a flashing image of a calm expanse of ocean followed by a flashing image of Pennywise, the murderous clown from Stephen King’s novel “It.”AdvertisementClicking from one town hall to the other Thursday night felt like being atomized and transported to one reality only to be scrambled up and rocketed through a portal to a reality altogether different.Biden, on ABC, was speaking calmly and intelligently about specific policy issues, from climate change to the coronavirus pandemic. Trump, on NBC, was speaking angrily and refusing to denounce bizarre conspiracy theories while showing off his ability to know shockingly little about anything.AdvertisementDuring the town hall, Mercedes Schlapp, a senior Trump campaign adviser tweeted: “Well @JoeBiden @ABCPolitics townhall feels like I am watching an episode of Mister Rodgers Neighborhood.” Aside from misspelling “Rogers,” she was absolutely — and I’m quite sure unintentionally — correct.Listening to Biden speak with empathy, kindness and understanding was like hearing the calming voice of Mister Rogers, a man beloved by Americans of every political stripe. We’ve had four years of the antithesis of Mr. Rogers and his Neighborhood of Make-Believe in the White House. We’ve had Mr. GRAHHHHHHHHHHHHGERS, the angry overseer of the Land of I-Can’t-Believe-This-Is-Happening.On ABC, Biden spoke of decency and bringing Americans, both Democrats and Republicans, together. He even complimented Trump on brokering bilateral agreements between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.On NBC, Trump defended a tweet he shared on his Twitter account that alleged Osama bin Laden’s killing was staged and that members of Navy SEAL Team 6 had been killed to cover it up.“That was an opinion of somebody and that was a retweet,” Trump said. “I’ll put it out there. People can decide for themselves.”On ABC, Biden was asked about protecting the rights of LGBT people and answered by sharing a story from his childhood. He saw two men kissing for the first time, turned to his dad and his dad said: “Joey, it’s simple. They love each other.”On NBC, Trump was asked by moderator Savannah Guthrie if he would denounce the QAnon conspiracy theory, an outlandish pile of dangerous nonsense that revolves around a staggeringly baseless belief that Democrats are involved in a satanic pedophile ring.Trump claimed to not know much about QAnon, though he has repeatedly shared tweets from Twitter users who support the conspiracy: “What I do hear about it is they are very strongly against pedophilia and I agree with that. I mean I do agree with that.”AdvertisementGuthrie asked: “But there’s not a satanic pedophile cult …”Trump responded: “I don’t know that.”It was then that my soul briefly left my body. I think it needed to scream into the void.I clicked to Biden and he was talking about the importance of wearing masks to slow the spread of the coronavirus.I clicked back to Trump and he was wildly misrepresenting a study he clearly hadn’t read and saying — insanely and absolutely incorrectly— that 85% of people who wear masks get coronavirus.At one point I returned to Biden’s town hall and wondered why my stomach had stopped shooting acid into my throat and my brain didn’t feel like it was about to explode and send my eyeballs flying across the room.AdvertisementBack to Trump and he was trashing Obamacare while promising a health care plan he couldn’t articulate — because it doesn’t exist — and claiming state coronavirus restrictions are a conspiracy against him.It was like jumping from a rerun of PBS’ soothing Bob Ross show “The Joy of Painting” to a scene of a hyena devouring a wildebeest on Animal Planet.These were not two candidates with different views on governing. These were two candidates who exist in entirely different realms, one tethered tightly to a world most Americans can see and relate to and the other spinning violently away to a dark and noise-filled world of self pity and paranoia.That might explain why the first Trump-Biden debate was such an explosive debacle. These two worlds can’t intersect.Those who prefer the delirium of Trump’s world surely viewed Biden as boring, but holy Moses, let me tell you, there are those of us who think boring sounds beautiful. Hearing a serious person say serious things without yelling or disparaging others is a welcome respite from four years of unending dingbattery. (It has been so bad I had to make up a word to describe it.)I doubt the two town halls changed the minds of many voters.AdvertisementBouncing back and forth between the events changed my mind only in the sense that it may now be permanently altered. The cognitive dissonance of all-caps TRUMP vs. regular Biden bruised my thinking meat, breaking down synapses then building them back again, simultaneously embedding nightmares and infusing an unfamiliar sense of serenity.It nearly killed me. But it was worth it to get a fleeting reminder of what normal looks like.rhuppke@chicagotribune.com Advertisement

AdvertisementBy Chicago TribuneOct 16, 2020 at 11:33 amToggling between former Vice President Joe Biden and President Donald Trump taking questions in separate televised town halls nearly killed me.I’ve been dizzy for hours and still can’t spell my name. Each time I close my eyes I see a flashing image of a calm expanse of ocean followed by a flashing image of Pennywise, the murderous clown from Stephen King’s novel “It.”AdvertisementClicking from one town hall to the other Thursday night felt like being atomized and transported to one reality only to be scrambled up and rocketed through a...

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Rex Huppke writes a humor(ish) column. He is considered (by himself) to be America’s most-beloved columnist, though there is no empirical evidence of that. Before becoming a columnist he spent a decade reporting on social justice issues, from poverty and gang violence to the gay civil rights movement. He previously worked for The Associated Press.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/chinews-ask-rex-huppke-i-just-work-20130507-staff.html#nt=byline

Rex Huppke

The Chicago Tribune is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television are named), it remains the most-read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region. It had the 6th highest circulation for American newspapers in 2017.

Column: Trump and Biden town halls showed us two worlds, and only one of them is terrifying

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