I'd love to be in a room with two other people for a debate. One of them is a DC-brained lanyard who ideally works in DC because it's funniest. The other is smart non-American middleschooler who is perfectly fluent in English who has - their choice - their phone or a PC in front of them. The kid doesn't know a thing about American politics but she's learned a great deal about fascism. And she - whoever she is - must love to ask questions.

She would be the audience. Me and the lanyard would be the debaters. Each of us would have a maximum of 30 minutes to make our case. The topic would be Biden's messaging. My take - of course - would be that it's moronic and stupid. His take - of course - is that it's seemingly modest but highly effective. It would be a kid of that age because I'm very lazy and I don't want to deal with the lanyard making things a mess by injecting endless amounts of nuance and details. She's old enough to know that's bullshit and still young enough to express that to a lanyard.

I'd demand to go first. My arguments require nearly zero effort on my part. I'd say to the kid - "The term the 'controlled opposition' is key here. The controlled opposition is a protest movement, opposing or dissenting voice that is actually being led and controlled by the government. In my opinion - the democratic party is the controlled opposition." We talk a bit. She could google if she wanted to.

After that - I'd talk to her about the "Google Project 2025" tweet. I'd ask that she google it because it's funnier and more powerful to see the stupid thing. I'd tell the kid to ask the lanyard why voting is so important if the democrats never do anything. The lanyard would take exception to this because the topic is messaging but I don't play fair. Then I'd surprise the lanyard by resting my case. I figure all of that would take 10 minutes tops.

I'd tell the lanyard that "to be fair" they could have my unused time if they wanted to. Then I'd be in great spirits and smiling as the lanyard flailed around trying to explain to the kid 'how politics works' in the US. I'd win the debate easily because the lanyard would have no good arguments to make. Ideally - they'd use my time too. With each minute they'd dig themselves into a deeper hole. Lanyards have lost contact with logic and common sense. They always seem to think any topic requires 10,000+ words to explain when it doesn't at all.

They have no idea how insane American politics is and how clearly insane it is to any outside observer. Explaining it isn't insane is a pretty good definition of somebody acting crazy.