Politics
Column: Trump and Biden agreed to debates. That's a lot less important than it was made out to be
The Biden and Trump campaigns agreed to two presidential debates last week. Who among us can contain our excitement?
Well, it depends on what you mean by “us.” In my corner of the professional world — pundits, commentators, political junkies — there was much rejoicing. Watching the Sunday shows, you could be forgiven for thinking church bells must have rung out to celebrate the news across the nation, as if some medieval queen had given birth to a male heir. The debates are happening! The debates are happening! Huzzah!
Meanwhile, among normal people, that sound you didn’t hear was the great mass of humanity shrugging. A smaller segment of the population likely let out an involuntary groan of the sort you make when you find out you got a middle seat on an airplane.
I don’t have polling to back this up, but I suspect most Americans would regard the prospect of Donald Trump and Joe Biden yelling at each other like two old men squabbling over the check at a Denny’s with resigned exhaustion. Ugh, really? We’re doing this again?
Now, I understand why journalists and junkies are excited. For starters, presidential debates inflate the egos of journalists, giving them ample opportunity to talk grandly about the fourth estate’s important role in democracy. They’re also great for ratings: The first, thoroughly awful 2020 debate was watched by 73 million people.
The drama of politicians offering unscripted — though often rehearsed — answers to complicated questions has a Super Bowl-like quality for political nerds. That listening to either of the current presumptive nominees talk is like watching a race car driver behind the wheel of a vehicle without brakes just adds to the excitement. The prospect of a spectacular crash always has a certain dark appeal, and in a Trump-Biden matchup, crashes are assured.
Lost amid the hoopla over the latest debate agreement is the fact that pretty much all presidential debates are tiresome and counterproductive spectacles.
The arguments for debates are often somewhat tautological. We supposedly need to have presidential debates because we’ve always had presidential debates. But this isn’t true.
The first presidential debates, between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon, were in 1960 (when Biden and Trump were, respectively, 17 and 14 years old). All anyone remembers about the Kennedy-Nixon debates is the first one, which Nixon lost, according to lore, because he was without makeup, unshaven and sweaty. Again, according to lore, people who listened to the debate on radio thought Nixon won, while people who watched it on television were so impressed by Kennedy’s suave style and good looks that they thought he won. Nixon, who was underweight and exhausted during his first appearance, got some rest and good makeup and won the next two debates, which nobody remembers.
In other words, the lesson from the beginning was that style was more important than substance. It has ever been thus.
We think, partly because we are told as much over and over again, that televised debates convey important information to voters. But television makes certain information seem more important than it is, often subliminally. For instance, in most presidential elections, the taller candidate wins. Does height in some way correlate with superior policies?
There’s a reason FDR hid his wheelchair from public view. But while I have no end of substantive criticisms of Franklin D. Roosevelt, his having had polio is not among them.
Obviously, television presence is part of modern presidents’ job description. But televised presidential debates magnify that qualification beyond all reason. Yes, yes, presidents need to be good communicators. But at no point during their actual presidencies are they ever expected to bicker with a political foe for 90 minutes in front of millions of people.
The political skills we are testing for are not the political skills the job requires. The candidate who forcefully, confidently or amusingly lies is often rewarded by debates, while the candidate who tells the truth awkwardly, hesitantly or with appropriate complexity is often penalized.
The debate “highlight” reels the networks routinely run are full of one-liners, gaffes and falsehoods often treated as true by sympathetic journalists. But I’ve never seen a really thoughtful explanation of the national debt or another serious problem celebrated as a great moment in debate history.
The prospect of a Biden-Trump rematch is especially deserving of an “Ugh, really?” But the truth is that all presidential debates deserve the same.
Politics
Fetterman unleashes on ‘dirtbag’ wing of Dems after far-left victories: ‘Orgy of socialism’
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Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., unloaded on his own party on Sunday evening, blasting a series of victories for progressives he called “anti-America.”
“Big night for the dirtbag left,” Fetterman said, referring to New York’s recent primaries, where two members of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) won primaries.
“I’ve said the party is becoming an orgy of socialism. Clearly anti-America, anti-Western Civilization,” Fetterman said.
Fetterman’s striking calls give a rare look at how some moderates may view the developments on their far-left flank that have dominated the party’s momentum in recent months, sparking concern that their high visibility is dragging the party further and further left.
FETTERMAN WARNS DEMOCRATS ‘DRIFTING FIRMLY INTO COMMUNISM’ AFTER SOCIALIST PRIMARY WINS
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., speaks to reporters outside the Senate Chamber during votes on Nov. 10, 2025, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
His comments come on the heels of a handful of key progressive victories.
In Maine, Graham Platner, a controversial Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate, has attracted controversy for denying knowledge of the meaning behind a Nazi-linked tattoo, for off-color comments about race and calling himself a “communist” in a deleted Reddit post.
In New York, one DSA member, Claire Valdez, won a primary on a platform of abolishing ICE and a Green New Deal-style approach to climate change. Similarly, Darializa Avila-Chevalier, another DSA candidate, beat out incumbent Rep. Adriano Espillat, D-N.Y., a high-ranking Democrat and the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
WINNERS AND LOSERS EMERGE AFTER SOCIALIST EARTHQUAKE ROCKS NYC PRIMARIES
Graham Platner, Democratic Senate candidate for Maine, speaks at a primary election night event at the Blue Hill YMCA in Blue Hill, Maine, on June 9, 2026. Platner won the party’s Senate primary after a campaign marked by accusations of past misbehavior and voter concerns. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Both Chevalier and Valdez had the backing of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, himself a socialist.
The wins have captured national attention and drawn criticisms from Republicans who have pointed to their success as emblematic of the direction of the Democratic Party.
Fetterman, who has not shied away from confrontations, has been one of the few Democrats to express alarm about the kind of candidates carrying the party’s banner.
“I mean, you look at some of the things that people have said. Abolish prison, abolish the border, abolish ICE, I mean these crazy people — I have colleagues in my caucus that refuse to even call this out,” Fetterman said.
FETTERMAN REACTS TO MAMDANI’S REFUSAL TO ACCEPT SUPREME COURT’S IMMIGRATION RULING
U.S. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., walks through the Senate Subway during the Senate War Powers vote on April 22, 2026, in Washington, D.C. (Heather Diehl/Getty Images)
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“Between P-hustle in Maine and some of the other winners in New York, they should form their own party and run on all the things that they’ve had to delete on social media,” Fetterman said, referring to Platner.
“That’s where our party has moved,” he added.
Politics
Supreme Court limits police use of cellphone data to find crime suspects
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court cast doubt Monday on whether police may obtain cellphone data to find crime suspects.
In a 6-3 decision, the justices said this location information showing where a cellphone user has traveled is personal and private and subject to the protection of the 4th Amendment’s ban on unreasonable searches.
Justice Elena Kagan said these “records serve as a personal journal of a user’s movements.”
She said the information “resembles other private materials — think of emails, documents, photographs, or calendars—that even if stored on Google’s servers, a user reasonably views as his own…and reasonably expects to be shielded from the inquisitive eyes of the government.”
Because an “individual has a legitimate expectation of privacy in his cellphone location data,” she said police investigators need a valid search warrant from a magistrate.
The court stopped short of deciding the proper basis for a search warrant in such cases. Instead, the justices sent the case back to judges in Virginia.
But the outcome casts doubt on “geofence warrants.”
In recent years, police have gone to Google and cellphone companies seeking tracking data on cellphones that were at a crime scene. Sometimes, they have had a warrant from a magistrate.
Civil libertarians say the use of this tracking data raises the specter of mass surveillance on innocent people.
Police and government lawyers say no one has a reasonable right to privacy when they are walking on a sidewalk or driving down the street.
The case before the court arose from the armed robbery conviction of a Virginia man who stole $195,000 from a credit union in a small town near Richmond.
By the time police arrived, the robber had fled. But surveillance cameras showed he was carrying a gun and a cellphone.
Lacking other leads, detective Joshua Hilton asked a judge to issue a special type of warrant seeking information from Google.
Referred to as a “geofence warrant,” it seeks data from phones in a particular area at a particular time.
The detective sought data on phones that were within 150 yards of the credit union within one hour of the late afternoon robbery.
After examining and paring down the data, the detective asked for the phone records of Okello Chatrie. Then, with a search warrant of his home, investigators found two robbery-style demand notes, a semi-automatic pistol and about $100,000 in cash.
A judge refused to suppress the evidence from an allegedly unconstitutional search, and Chatrie entered a conditional guilty plea.
The full 4th Circuit Court of Appeals split evenly on the legality of the geofence warrant, and the Supreme Court agreed to decide the issue in Chatrie vs. U.S.
Usually investigators obtain warrants to search the home or vehicle of a known crime suspect.
The new and disputed geofence warrants seek to find a suspect by examining data on the cellphones that were at the scene of a crime.
The FBI used this cellphone data in 2021 to identify suspects who broke through police barricades on Jan. 6, 2021, and pushed their way into the Capitol to disrupt the official counting of electoral votes.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Neil M. Gorsuch, Brett M. Kavanaugh and Ketanji Brown Jackson agreed on the outcome in Chatrie vs. U.S.
In a 21-page dissent, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. said the court had “carefully set the stage for its planned performance: striking a pose as a great champion of privacy in the digital age. I cannot support this irresponsible escapade.”
Justice Clarence Thomas agreed.
Justice Amy Coney Barrett agreed in a one-paragraph dissent. “Chatrie had no reasonable expectation of privacy in data about his public movements that he voluntarily disclosed to Google,” she said.
Politics
Supreme Court Expands Presidential Powers to Fire Independent Regulators
The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that President Trump could fire independent regulators for any reason. But the justices carved out an exception for the Federal Reserve, preventing the immediate removal of Lisa D. Cook, a Federal Reserve governor.
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