Debate Team Is What The Nerds Do To Get Into Harvard

I was thinking about another puzzle when I got up this morning: why do "the polls" say most people thought Kamala "won" the "debate", when the more respectable polls say Trump is inching ahead in electoral preference? The title of this post came to me in the shower: debate team is what the nerds do to get into Harvard. Look at Nate Silver's Wikipedia entry, for instance:

As a student at East Lansing High School, Silver won first place in the state of Michigan in the 49th annual John S. Knight Scholarship Contest for senior high school debaters in 1996.

Silver actually went to Chicago; same differece. But this reminds me of a presentation on cognitive dissonance I heard from psychology profs as an Ivy sophomore myself: looking back, it was remarkably cynical. Their point was that experiments had shown that the more unplesant an experience was -- like, just for instance, hazing -- the more respondents were inclined to rate it as valuable. The experiments involved things like requiring subjects to memorize nonsense syllables under harsh conditions, being told that this would lead to intense personal development or something.

Indeed, the subjects reported they'd been broadened and enriched by the experience. Ever since, I've been scratching my head over what those profs actually knew -- here they were talking to a bunch of underclassmen who'd been dragooned into sacrificing much of a normal childhood and adolescence in the elite university admissions rat race under the pretext that it would lead to their personal development or something. By the time they'd gotten into an Ivy, they'd been flattered into thinking they'd achieved something enormously worthwhile from a thoroughly unpleasant experience.

Winning first place in the State of Pennsyltucky in the 63td annual Throckmorton P Davis Scholarship Contest for senior high school debaters is just one part of that process. And let's face it, it's boring and unpleasant, so it must be really important. So we have a presidential debate, which all the important people tell you is really important and really decisive, but just because it's a debate, who are people goimg to say "won" it? Obviously, the nerdy teacher's pet who's bound for Harvard. Definitely not Don, the class clown, with his wisecracks about eating the dogs and cats.

This is how Kamala fits into the scheme. She's the annoying Social Studies teacher with the nasal voice, the one whose class you've got to sit through and say all the right things, and you've got to stay on her good side to avoid visits to the assistant principal. Don the class clown has flirted with suspension all year for his wisecracks in her class. But she's the debate team's faculty adviser.

So who "won" the "debate"? 95 of 100 couldn't care less, but if pressed they'll say they guess the nerdy teacher's pet. Whom do they like? Don the class clown, of course. Not all of them will admit it to a stranger over the phone, or worse, to an online poll that has their name, address, and social security number, and probably too, the e-mail of their employer's HR department.

This goes to the brilliance of the people behind the Trump campaign. They put an unflitered Kamala out in front with every opportunity:

Kamala speaking in her fake accent says "hello to all my divine 9 brothas and sistas" followed by a loud cackle pic.twitter.com/DJ3NUqC10j

— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) September 15, 2024

Nasal voice, angry schoolmarm facial expressions, fake accent, cackles -- she's pnony, annoying, and unpleasant, which is why she "won" the "debate". But as Sundance pointed out on Thursday,

If candidate Kamala Harris becomes visible, talks or tries to discuss policy, her tenuously fabricated support levels will collapse. Or, as those around Brian Fallon openly admit, if Harris campaigns, she loses.

If Kamala Harris campaigns, holds press conferences, or talks publicly about her policy proposals, she will lose. This is the problem that Brian Fallon is trying to manage[.]

The Trump campaign is doing all it can to help her get her message out.