If I Moderated the Presidential Debate

"The late, great Carl Schmitt, you know— What can you say? He’s being recognized more and more, you’re beginning to notice."

With credit to Bentham’s Bulldog and Scott Alexander.

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Glenn: Good evening, and welcome to the first debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump. Thanks to the candidates for agreeing to participate, and thanks to our subscribers (ahem)—

for helping us make history tonight with the first presidential debate to be hosted via blog. The name of this publication is United States of Exception, and Mr. Trump, our first question is for you. The state of exception, some argue, is key to the function of sovereignty. What is your theory of sovereignty?

Donald Trump: Well, first of all, thanks to this wonderful blog, and I think everyone should go read your articles about public intellectualism, so important. The late, great Carl Schmitt, you know— What can you say? He’s being recognized more and more, you’re beginning to notice. “Dictator,” I said, you remember that one? “Dictator on day one.” I meant it in the Schmittian sense, a vanguard. And you have these people, very sick people, that twist my words and say it means forever, that I’m a usurper. Agamben, such a nasty guy, he got it wrong about the China virus and so much more.

But I’m actually glad that you asked me that, really, because nobody is more sovereign than me. Biden-Harris, I actually call it Harris-Biden, you know, because Biden, quite frankly, he has no idea what’s going on, not a sovereign— And he could never be as sovereign as I am. For four years, it was more sovereign than ever, on the border, not just a state of exception, a space of exception, a liminal space even, so incredible— Fighting the China virus, bing bing, state of exception. And when I’m back in, you’re going to see some very sovereign stuff going on, very exceptional, I don’t know if you’re going to believe it, actually.

Glenn: Ms. Harris, your response?

Kamala Harris: My mother used to tell me that you don’t see what you have to see when you just see what you’re seeing, and you have to see what you’re not seeing if you want to see, what— what you want to see.

And Donald Trump isn’t seeing the full picture, of things, he’s not seeing, when it comes to what you need to see, to see the nature of sovereignty in a liberal democracy. So, you can see sovereignty in terms of the exception. But the exception is just one way of seeing sovereignty, in a democracy. The exception— And I listen to Agamben. We listen to the experts, because we believe the experts. The exception is the inclusive exclusion, but the example is the exclusive inclusion. And so, the extralegal is instantiated within the legal. Everyone is homo sacer. Everyone is excluded from the law. Everyone is excluded through their inclusion in the exclusive inclusion, and everyone is included through their exclusion from the inclusive exclusion.

Now, if you take a look at the two of us. Donald Trump is a criminal. I’m a prosecutor. He’s bare life. I’m— Well, I think it’s clear which of us has a more robust theory of sovereignty.

Glenn: Thank you, Ms. Harris. Since you alluded to biopolitics, I want to ask you both which is the more appropriate paradigm for modernity: right of death or power over life? Madam Vice President, we’ll begin with you.

Harris: Power over life is the political paradigm of the modern. I think Foucault was very clear about this.

[pauses for audience applause]

And I have a feeling that we’re going to be hearing differently from Donald Trump, because that’s what he’s been saying ever since he came down that escalator. He wants to bring us back, he— He wants to bring us back to when the highest exercise of power was to kill and destroy. And the technologies of power that we’ve been building up for hundreds of years, surveillance and discipline, he wants to tear up our institutions. Well, we’re not going to let that happen. We’re not going back.

Glenn: Mr. Trump, would you like to respond?

Trump: Well, I think her reading of Foucault is— And, I’m going to say this: I think it’s not good, believe me, not good— And if she was smart, you would know that. Because you have all these people that read Foucault and think he’s saying one thing or the other, when really— You get this, right? He’s saying it’s not one thing or the other, it’s, they’re the same thing. Power over life, power to kill, they’re the same thing, really. And you can tell that she’s not reading Mbembe and, quite frankly, Judith Butler, because if she was then you’d understand that. And it’s a good thing that she’s not reading Butler, maybe, because she’s going to have a very grievable loss in November.

Glenn: Ms. Harris, I think that warrants a rebuttal.

Harris: Well, first of all, Donald Trump is lying if he says he knows Judith Butler better than me, that’s number one. I’ve been reading Butler since I was in grade school. And on the question of power over life, number two, it’s like my mother always said: Kamala— And I was raised by Indian women, so, and we should know this. Kamala, our dreams are just tomorrow’s yesterdays. And I, that— Donald Trump wants to bring us back. But we’re not going back, we’re dreaming. Of yesterday. Tomorrow’s yesterday. Today.

Glenn: Thank you. Let’s move on to the economy. As you know, this issue is very important to our readers. Mr. Trump, what will you do to get the JSTOR gear store back online?

Trump: The J-Store, you know, I did a lot for those people, and Israel. Probably more than anyone. We gave them Jerusalem, which— Did you hear about this? People were after that one for years, and we got it done. And we’re looking very closely at Michael Walzer for the Supreme Court, I can tell you. Edward Said, a real schmuck—

Glenn: No, Mr. Trump, JSTOR.

Trump: The J-Store?

Glenn: The database.

Trump: Oh, JSTOR. My son, Barron, he’s a whiz with computers, you wouldn’t believe, and all the information they have— Data scraping, that’s what they did with the last election, data scraping, but we’re still beating Kamala, like a dog— And we were just talking about Foucault— Great guy! Not a sick puppy like they said, and that was a real hatchet job. But all that information: one, zero, one. It’s amazing. Knowledge. Some people say knowledge is power. But it’s co-constitutive, really. It’s co-constitutive. And so, when you talk about the gear store, you know that’s complicated because you’re talking about knowledge, and knowledge, the function of knowledge is to regiment people to the norm, and then you’re talking about commodifying that and you get into some really creepy stuff which, quite frankly, brings us to places where we shouldn’t be going.

Glenn: Ms. Harris, your response?

Harris: This isn’t the sort of place where you look to Foucault for a critique, Glenn, this is where you look to Horkheimer and Adorno. You look to Marx. And Gramsci. And you and I understand that, and people at home understand that, but Donald Trump doesn’t have a Marxist bone in his body. He’s never known anything about the Frankfurt School—

Trump: That is not true.

Harris: It is true.

All: [crosstalk]

Glenn: Please, candidates, let’s be civil. Mr. Trump, your name was invoked, so I’m going to give you time for a rebuttal.

Trump: She’s such a nasty liar, really, there’s no one on Earth that’s as big a liar as she is. She doesn’t even know what “parrhesia” means, probably, that’s how big a liar she is. And the Frankfurt School, I know the Frankfurt School better than anyone. No one does more for the Frankfurt School than me. And if you look, that’s why they endorsed me, okay? Slavoj Žižek, maybe you’ve heard of that. Habermas— I have a feeling that you’re going to be hearing from Habermas very soon, and you’re going to like it, the Frankfurt people out there, what he has to say. And I know what it is, but I think you’re going to be very surprised.

Glenn: Ms. Harris, our next question is for you. Since the topic was broached earlier, there’s been dissension in the Democratic ranks about the administration’s—

Harris: Well, first of all, I want to correct the record. Angela Davis, who is the closest living link to Herbert Marcuse, is voting for me, not Trump—

Glenn: Right, Ms. Harris, but about the war in Gaza—

Harris: Pass.

Glenn: I’m sorry, I can’t skip the question. Now, the war in Pales—

Harris: I’ve gone deaf, Glenn. I can’t hear a thing.

Glenn: You’ve gone deaf?

Harris: Well, I can hear you now, but it goes in and out.

Glenn: I’ll speak up, then. About the war in Pal—

Harris: I’m sorry, I can’t hear you.

Glenn: ABOUT THE WAR—

Harris: [shrugs]

Glenn: We’ll move on. Mr. Trump, can you speak about the war in Ukraine?

Trump: Well, I can speak about it, but I don’t think it’s happening.

Glenn: You don’t think it’s happening?

Trump: No, it’s not happening, and that’s a very nasty way you asked the question, actually. But the war, you see it on TV and— People are getting hurt, and so much destruction. But if the war’s not happening that doesn’t mean the war isn’t happening. It’s all on a screen, everything that used to be— In real life, you know? The shooting and the pow pow, on a screen. And we have lots of screens, more than anyone in the world, actually, my people just handed me the numbers before we got on stage. But the screens, people see what they want to see. The politicians all talk on screens. And the bombs, the fighter jets all have screens. And Putin, he keeps using the N-word. The N-word. That’s the nuclear word. Which supposedly is the most powerful word, and you’re not supposed to say it, but he keeps saying it and nothing happens. So how can it be a war? No one’s fighting. The screens are fighting. It’s not a war.

Glenn: Ms. Harris, I’m sorry, but because you skipped your question we don’t have time for a response. In lieu of closing statements, for your next question, you’ll be limited to one sentence each. What do you like best about me? Ms. Harris, you’re first.

Harris: Well, Glenn, I like that you endorsed me, and I’m glad you’re ready to help us defeat someone whose understanding of concealed power structures is so shallow, who practically doesn’t know what a dialectic is—

Glenn: Ms. Harris, your time has expired. Mr. Trump?

Trump: Well, I know the dialectic probably better than anyone, and I appreciate the dialectic we’ve had here tonight, even though, frankly, it’s been rigged from the start. And that’s a very strange question, really, what do you say? I like that they don’t let you on the real news.

Glenn: Thank you, candidates. And for those following along at home, that concludes the debate. Thanks for tuning in, and stay tuned for our regularly scheduled programming of analyzing every single article in the latest issue of International Security.