I didn't watch the debate last night. I'm more and more convinced that just about nothing in current events is going to have much significance in the presidential election next year. It may just come down to a simple referendum: Trump or no Trump? Most voters may cast their votes not on who has the best health plan or who had the best vision for the economy…but if they think Donald Trump is a very good man or a very bad man, end of thought process. It might also be about one divisive issue like whether you think the U.S. should welcome refugees or keep them out.
Who "won" last night? I dunno. Amanda Marcotte thought Cory Booker did great and Joe Biden did poorly. Eric Levitz says Biden won the night. Take your pick. The many diverse opinions out there suggest to me that no one scored a meaningful gain…and I'm not sure at this point, any of this matters.
There was talk about different health care plans. I kinda agree with Kevin Drum that debating this is silly and needlessly divisive. The Democrats may have several different plans but they all have roughly the same goals and much in common. The Republicans meanwhile have no health plans and no real desire for there to be one. They'd like to get rid of the government-backed ones that already exist. That's the divide here, not whether Kamala's plan takes longer to phase in than Bernie's.
Maybe the thing that interested me most was how rapidly Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers were able to generate material about the debate between the time it ended and the time they went on the air. They had to really scramble to pull that one off.
And to segue to another frequent topic on this blog: That's one of the problems MAD magazine has faced. The last few years, one of the things the MAD crew realized would boost their circulation was a cover ridiculing Donald Trump and promising more of the same within. Just as calling Trump a moron raised Stephen Colbert's ratings, Trump caricatures on MAD clearly goosed their sales. He may have been a better mascot for them than Alfred E. Neuman.
And why not? They're equally qualified for the presidency.
But it's nearly-impossible to do topical humor in a magazine. It was never easy and now in the era of the Internet and immediacy, why even try? If later today, Trump says something that cries out for parody and scorn — and of course, the odds are pretty good he will — there'll be a thousand jokes on Twitter and Facebook within the hour. Colbert, Meyers, Kimmel and maybe Trevor Noah will all be on it tonight. Depending on which day of the week it is, they'll be closely followed by Samantha Bee, John Oliver, Bill Maher, Saturday Night Live and ten or twelve others.
Who knows? Maybe Jimmy Fallon will even mention it.
By the time MAD could get an issue to its readers, the topic will have been strip-mined and then forgotten. Trump could molest a nun and when the MAD article mentioning it finally came out, even Trump enemies would say, "Aw, that's old news." The pre-2018 crew of MAD did a good job finding timeless Trump humor…like making fun of his hair. That's always good and it never changes, just like his rotten business track record or his mistreatment of women. They did some good pieces but these days, we not only want today's news today, we want the jokes about today's news today. Or sooner, if possible.