On Wednesday, Former Vice President Joe Biden proposed a “live fact-check” crawler for his scheduled Presidential Debates against President Donald Trump.  Biden suggested that the crawler could immediately verify the veracity of both candidates’ statements during the debate and level the playing field for the Democrat nominee.

When asked a question about how he has begun to prepare for the upcoming debates, Hidin’ Biden had the following to say:

“Well…  I’ve begun to prepare by uh… by uh… going over what the President has said and the multiple lies he’s (chuckles) he’s told… What I would love to have is a crawler at the bottom of the screen, a fact-checker, you know, when we speak.  If we really wanted to do something I think that would make a
great, great debate. If everything both of us said was instantly fact-checked by an agreed to group of people out there, that we move forward [emphasis added], but that probably wouldn’t get very far in the debate.”

Biden went on to say that he was looking forward to the debate, but the language he used in his statement was either blatantly revealing his strategy or accidental tipping of his hand.  Biden may have been less concerned about the fact-checker and more concerned about setting conditions by which Trump may reject the format of the debates.  Should Trump not agree to the fact-checker, the former VP may use that as a justification for not debating Trump at all.  Right now, if he were to say debates aren’t necessary, he would take a bath in the polls in the coming weeks and face harsh criticism from both supporters and opponents alike.  Adding additional conditions that likely wouldn’t be favorable to Trump would lead to Trump denying the conditions and then give that justification for which Team Biden is looking.  Trump would have an understandable angle for denying the live fact-checking as the media has been working as the propaganda arm of the DNC and would likely fact check Trump’s statement at a much higher

Furthermore, as evidenced by the pile of praise Biden received for his low-energy and short convention speech, the Dems don’t want Biden anywhere near a debate with Trump.  That speech received so much praise not because of the quality of the speech or that it was one of the better he had ever given, but rather that he didn’t end up rambling off into incoherent mumblings.  The praise was more of a collective sigh of relief than actual legitimate praise.  Democrats could only hope that fact-checkers could help to provide from a distraction to the likely follies that would come from an off-script Biden on a stage with Trump for two hours.

Democrats will look for any excuse to avoid putting Biden on a stage with anything other than canned talking points and Trump jabs.  Even then, it isn’t likely they would have much confidence in their nominee’s ability to hold his own.