The presidential debate on September 29, 2020 was an embarrassment. I don’t remember what the candidates said because I just kept panicking thinking about the fact that other people could see what was happening. Didn’t some adult somewhere have a kill switch?
After an hour of listening, I expressed my sincere wish that this had never happened:
Tyler had a more nuanced take:
It’s not just true in America. Much of what passes for “debate” is just people firing off talking points at each other. Usually it’s not quite so obvious and awkward because there are not such clear rules being broken.
If there’s one thing that Americans agree on, it’s that you wait your turn in line. This is the most basic schoolyard etiquette. No matter how rich or famous you are, cutting in line is deeply resented. It felt like President Trump was not taking turns (so then it was strange for me to fact check this and see that Biden spoke only 2 minutes less total than President Trump).
If it were in my power to undo that night I would. However, a new podcast gave me some more to ponder about in terms of what Americans can be proud of. A lot of true news comes out about Americans making mistakes. That can be useful for others. Audrey Tang said of our misdeeds:
COWEN: … the United States, has made … many mistakes … What’s our deeper failing behind all those mistakes?
TANG: I don’t know. Isn’t America this grand experiment to keep making mistakes and correcting them in the open and share it with the world? That’s the American experiment.
Being open about our mistakes might be the next best thing to not making them in the first place.
Tang, a transgender Taiwanese computer policy expert, said something that I think Americans can be happy about.
Speaking of software, here’s a recent conversation with a 5 year old about what exactly is software and what does it mean to buy it. My son imagined that if I bought it in a store I must have picked something up off a shelf. (I could have explained that software is a nonrival good, but I think it’s too soon.)
Economist Writing Every Day 
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