JUDY WOODRUFF: The Democrats spent this week
making their case for a Joe Biden presidency.
Next week, it's the Republicans' turn to argue
for four more years for President Trump.
But, tonight, it's the analysis of Shields
and Brooks. That is syndicated columnist Mark
Shields and New York Times columnist David
Brooks.
It is so good to see both of you. We have
seen you -- you have seen us too much for
the last four nights, but we're so glad to
have you back.
David, the Biden campaign is putting out positive
vibes tonight. They're saying: We think we
did really well. We raised $70 million over
four days. A lot of people were watching.
How do you think they did? What stays with
you?
DAVID BROOKS: What is that Beach Boys song,
"Good Vibrations?"
Yes, they have earned them. They had a convention
that vastly exceeded expectations, certainly
my expectations. They had a candidate who
delivered an address with a fierce urgency
that you can't fake, actually.
And they had Barack Obama, Michelle Obama.
They had a series of remarkable performances
that I think, for the first time in this campaign,
not only generated opposition to Donald Trump,
but generated some general and genuine enthusiasm
for Joe Biden.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Mark, what do you -- what's
your takeaway?
MARK SHIELDS: I couldn't disagree more.
No, Judy, it was a...
(LAUGHTER)
MARK SHIELDS: It was a very, very positive
convention, make no mistake about it.
Barack Obama being the big surprise. After
four years of Democrats waiting for him, his
being circumspect and restrained, he arrived
with a full-throated indictment of Donald
Trump, and Donald Trump's failure to lead,
and Donald Trump's failure to protect the
country in its great crisis, and basically
made the case that Donald Trump did not devote
the time, energy, effort, and probably did
not have the capacity to be president.
But I think -- and I agree with David about
Joe Biden. It was -- in many respects, it
was a great advantage to have the remote convention,
because Joe's tendency often is to win everybody
in the room, and which he tries to do and
does when he's speaking.
But, here, he had 24 minutes. It was -- he
stayed within himself. He made the case, I
thought, compellingly.
But, more than anything else about the convention,
to me, I was reminded of the words of the
poet Maya Angelou, who said, people will forget
what you did, people will forget what you
said, but people will not forget how you made
them feel.
And the vignettes about Joe Biden from Greg
Weaver of Amtrak, who suffered a heart attack,
a conductor. Joe Biden knew his children,
his grandchildren. Joe Biden, as vice president,
reached out and contacted him in a barbershop
in New York City to be sure how he was doing,
that Joe Biden, the way he treated the elevator
operator at The New York Times.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Right.
MARK SHIELDS: He didn't get the endorsement
of The New York Times. He got her endorsement.
She nominated him and said that there's more
than room in his heart for himself. There's
room for me and so many others.
And, finally, as you commented, Brayden Harrington,
the 13-year-old, brave, courageous young man
from New Hampshire, who revealed that Joe
Biden had told him: We're in the same club,
we're stutterers, and helped him and gave
him the courage.
And I think that came through probably more
strongly than anything else, and I think to
Joe Biden's advantage.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, David Brooks, did they
do what they needed to do? And did they miss
the mark on anything?
DAVID BROOKS: Yes, they did three-quarters
of what they needed to do.
What's impressive about the Biden campaign
is that they had a theory about two years
ago, and they have stuck with the theory.
The theory is that the country is exhausted
and wants a uniter. And they ignore Twitter.
They ignored a lot of the left-right thing.
They just pursued that theory.
What they did not do is go to the heart of
this electorate, which is working-class voters
in the Upper Midwest. It's sort of mind-boggling
to me. In 2016, Hillary Clinton made a colossal
error by ignoring those voters in Wisconsin,
Pennsylvania, and Michigan and such places.
And if the Democrats lose those states again,
the indictment -- and a correct indictment
-- will be that they made the exact same mistake
in 2020 as they made in 2016.
And I think it's just because they don't have
the vocabulary or the cultural knowledge to
know how to talk to those voters. I just think
there are not enough people in the Democratic
Party who emerge from those communities and
know what concerns them and know how to talk
to them.
And it could just be an inherent error and
shortage in the party.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Mark, do you agree? They failed
to reach these voters in the heartland, many
of them white working-class voters?
MARK SHIELDS: Well, I think Joe Biden has
an enormous advantage over Hillary Clinton
in that respect, just in his natural rapport
and his record in dealing with working people
and working issues.
But the Democrats have to be wary of becoming
a party that -- where people shower before
work, instead of after work, who don't work
by the hour, who don't pack a lunch. And I
think that remains a problem.
But Donald Trump's doing everything he can,
as he did with Goodyear, in trying to boycott
Goodyear tires in Akron, Ohio, and a great
American company, to lose -- to win back for
Joe Biden and the Democrats this group.
I thought the biggest mistake of the night,
Judy, of the entire four week -- week was
your coming to us when John Legend and Common
were singing...
(LAUGHTER)
MARK SHIELDS: ... and asking us...
(LAUGHTER)
MARK SHIELDS: I mean, I have heard nothing
but unmitigated criticism of what the hell
we were saying, when people wanted to hear
them.
And what was David -- what was David Brooks'
bestselling album, they wanted to know.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, we have heard some of
that as well. And we apologize to anybody
who thought we made bad decisions. But we
try our best to get it right.
MARK SHIELDS: OK.
JUDY WOODRUFF: But, David, OK, now it's the
Republicans' turn. It's President Trump's
turn.
What does he need to do next week?
DAVID BROOKS: Well, first, scare people.
(LAUGHTER)
DAVID BROOKS: Show that this is a country
in disorder, crime is rising, violence in
Portland.
Talk about China, which the Democrats did
not do enough. Talk about the threat and say,
hey, I might not be as nice as Joe Biden,
but you need me.
And I think that's the key thing. And the
second way Trump will say you need me is,
they didn't talk about their policies at their
convention. But what they really stand for
is the Green New Deal and opening the border
and all that.
I expect the Republican Convention, weirdly,
to be weirdly more policy-oriented.
The final odd thing about the Republican Convention
this year, which is unprecedented in my lifetime,
in all our lifetimes, is that the 2012 nominee
would be not welcome there. Mitt Romney would
be not welcome there. John McCain, if he were
alive, would be not welcome there. George
W. Bush, the last Republican president, would
be not welcome there. George H.W. Bush, the
previous Republican president, would be not
welcome there.
This is a party that's utterly transformed,
and the previous nominees will just be not
welcome at the party as it currently exists.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Mark, as you look ahead to
what the Republicans need to do next week,
what are you thinking?
MARK SHIELDS: I think it's fair to say, Judy,
not only would they not be welcome, but not
one of the four would want to be there at
that convention, which also speaks volumes
about the change in the Republican Party.
I think that they have got a tough, uphill
fight. I mean, Donald Trump has spent 40 -- four
years concentrating on his base. And, Judy,
this is going to be a different election from
2016.
Forty-six percent, regardless of how acutely
it's distributed electorally, is not going
to be enough to win the White House back.
And he's got to expand. And I don't know where
he goes to expand. All he does is drill down
on his own side.
And I really feel, if anybody has any extra
empathy, they ought to extend some to the
people who are trying to put together this
Republican Convention, because I think his
whims are changing it from hour to hour, and
the direction it's going to take, and the
message it's going to deliver.
And I just -- I really think it's an uphill
-- it's an uphill struggle from here, politically,
to make a theme, to develop a theme.
What are you going to run, on sleepy Joe,
after Joe Biden just ran -- gave a 24-minute
speech that was the equal of any given?
FOX News, before the convention, asked, do
you think Joe Biden has the mental acuity
to be president, in a poll, and 47 percent
said yes, and 39 percent no. They also made
the mistake of asking it about Donald Trump,
and 51 percent said, no, they didn't think
he had the mental acuity.
So, there's two themes that have kind of gone
by the board, sleepy and mental acuity.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, one of the things the
president has been talking about -- and we
heard about it earlier in the program and
just now from viewers, David -- is what's
going on with the Postal Service.
The postmaster general went before the Congress,
a bunch of senators today, got grilled over
that. He assured them that everything's going
to be fine. But a lot of Democrats are saying,
this is something they need to -- we need
to watch.
How serious an issue is this? How much do
you think it's going to play a role in this
election?
DAVID BROOKS: Well, Donald Trump's comments
are a serious issue, because they will serve
to proactively delegitimize the election if
it comes out in the way his followers don't
like.
And so they will have an excuse. And they
will say, see, Donald Trump said this all
along. It was those mail-in ballots, a system
that we know is honest.
As for what's actually happening in the post
office, I think much -- vastly too much is
being made out of this. The Postal Service
is a service in financial trouble. The amount
of mail is down sharply. The nature of the
mail has shifted from letters to packages.
So, shifting over from some of the sorting
machines for letters to other things, and
making room for packages processing machinery
seems to be just the normal thing you do.
There's no evidence that I have seen that
any of this is done with bad motives, other
than try to save the Postal Service.
We get 160 million voters maybe or so, probably
less. The Postal Service delivers 430 (sic)
pieces of mail every day. There should be
some expectation, as there has been all these
centuries, that they can do this job and that
they're going to do this job.
And if we -- it's worth watching. But, so
far, I don't see any evidence that the Postal
Service has become some sort of corrupt and
untrustworthy institution.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Mark Shields, only about 30
seconds on the Postal Service.
MARK SHIELDS: I don't think -- Judy, I don't
think that anybody is suggesting the Postal
Service is.
We're talking about the leadership. And the
old line, you don't talk to the monkey, when
you can talk to the monkey grinder -- Donald
Trump has made quite clear what his intentions
are. He does not want millions of Americans
voting by mail in the middle of a pandemic,
in which the United States has paid a greater
price in personal lives and suffering than
any industrialized nation and many non-industrialized
nations in the world.
And this is obviously a priority of his that
far exceeds the pandemic itself. He keeps
talking about it, and says on the record that,
if people vote by mail, the Republicans -- if
everybody votes by mail, the Republicans will
never win another election.
I think we need all the light, all the sunshine,
all the antiseptic and dyspeptic we can keep
on this story. And I look forward to the hearings
on Monday.
JUDY WOODRUFF: We will keep covering it.
And we thank you both after really an extraordinary
week.
David Brooks, Mark Shields, thank you.
