All right! The Big Day is almost here! No, not the start of the college football season. That was last week. And the pros have already kicked things off in Kansas City. Major League Baseball playoffs are still a few weeks away too. But that other game in town is all set to give us an opportunity to root, root, root for our favorite player.

I’m speaking, of course, of the great debate between Kamala Harris in the blue corner and Donald Trump in the red one. The war of words is scheduled to take place on Tuesday night, September 10th. The question-and-answer tete-a-tete will really be the first opportunity We the People have had to see our presidential candidates together on one stage.

Reports are that Vice President Harris is spending a whole lot of time practicing her responses to anticipated questions, as well as coming up with zingers to try to stifle any pointed barbs The Donald may throw her way. Former President Trump, on the other hand, apparently feels he’s been in the trenches long enough to know what to expect and will practice the shoot-from-the-hip style of answering all queries.

Despite their different approaches to the upcoming discussion, I’m sure both candidates are getting suggestions from their close confidants. I think, for example, that at least one, if not all, of Kamala’s people is telling her over and over again, “Don’t laugh!” The Veep has a reputation of nervously smiling and, well, cackling when she either doesn’t want to answer a question or can’t really think of anything to say. Case in point: During an interview with Lester Holt a couple of years back, in talking about the immigration issue, he said to her, “You haven’t been to the border.” She laughed uneasily and, apropos of nothing, replied, “And I haven’t been to Europe either.” Holt didn’t know what to say. So, I’m guessing the Harris camp will come up with a better rejoinder should the issue arise Tuesday night.

On the other side, Trump’s people might well be telling him, “Don’t interrupt her.” That may be difficult for the Republican nominee. Perhaps aides are playing him tapes of the Mike Pence and Harris debate in 2020, when Kamala repeatedly said to a continually disrupting Pence, “Excuse me, I’m speaking.” (Kind of like, “Talk to the hand ’cause the face ain’t listening.”)

No doubt the Harris contingent will strongly suggest that she make casual mention of Trump’s criminal conviction. Perhaps she’ll refer to him as “Prisoner Number 1” or ask him how he thinks he’ll look in an orange jumpsuit.

Trump might hit hard on massive border crossings, the high prices of food, gas, clothes, and how “Comrade Harris” seems to think massive government money expenditures and bloated federal bureaucracies are always the answer to any problem.

Of course, the debate will be moderated by hosts who will choose from broad topics and will hopefully ask the same questions of each candidate. That’s not really how a true debate should run, but it’s what the news networks have devised. As debate participants in high school, my friend and I took either the Affirmative or Negative side to a single resolution. Something such as: Resolved. That the federal government should grant annually a specific percentage of its income tax revenue to the state governments. One of us would speak, then the opposition, and then we all got chances to ask the other side questions. Whichever duo presented their case the most convincingly, in the minds of the judges, won the trophy.

There’s a slightly bigger prize at stake on September 10th. But perhaps the ground rules should be the same. I read somewhere that someone has suggested Harris and Trump take a page out of history and mirror the infamous Lincoln/Douglas debates of 1858. At the time, both were running for the Senate in Illinois. After speaking at different events in Chicago, the two thought it might draw more attention if they stumped together throughout the rest of the state. They were right. How about a cross-country debate-a-thon?

Honest Abe and the Little Giant probably didn’t rely quite as much on prep time as today’s candidates. And while aides may have suggested a witticism to inject into the proceedings at just the right time, I think most of the rhetoric was delivered off the cuff, on the spur of the moment.

There are historians who claim that Lincoln and Douglas were actually friends. One said that, “In political fights they hit each other with all they had, but they actually held a genuine regard and respect for one another.”

Alas, I don’t see history repeating itself before or after Tuesday.

©MMXXIV. William J. Lewis, III – Freelance Writer