Just once, when Donald Trump brags about one of his supposed successes, I wish someone would follow up with, “So Donald… exactly how did you make that happen?”

We all know where he’d head next. “Well, there are a lot of things,” he’d say. “It’s very complicated and only someone with a perfect brain like mine can understand it.” And whoever posed the question would let him get away with it.

That’s why he does all these ridiculous rallies, where he and his nine other personalities go unchallenged for an hour and a half, frantically waving their hands around like a baby trying to hold onto a bar of soap in the tub.

Meanwhile, there’s Pete Buttigieg, knocking one policy question after another out of the park in eloquent, thoughtful responses that actually make sense and can run 30 seconds or more without even a hint of flop sweat dribbling off his upper lip.

There’s no debate I want to see more than Pete Buttigieg versus Donald Trump. I guess you could compare it to David and Goliath, where David is a Harvard-educated war veteran, and Goliath crosses “cancer” out of the dictionary with a Sharpie and claims he cured it.

You might argue, “But what about what Trump did to Hillary in the debates?” Yeah… he LOST to her… three times. He lost like a pathetic whimpering dog with nine bankrupt doghouses and a bunch of poodles filing sexual harassment claims.

But Trump had one trick that Hillary didn’t: he could label himself an outsider. He could claim government was a mess, blame her for it, and say only he could fix it. What’s he going to argue this time? That selling us out to Russia, kissing North Korea’s ass and extorting Ukraine is actually just Phase One of his master plan to save the Republic?

Now that he’s no longer the outsider, that trick won’t work. Not even with a lot of his base. So what does that leave? I guess there’s name-calling. But how is Trump gonna do that? He could try a gay joke. I’m sure Lindsey Graham has heard one or two he could pass along.

But Pete’s already neutralized the gay issue, and anyone who sees his being gay as a reason to vote against him won’t need to be reminded of it. So what else can Trump attack? The fact that Pete has a one-eyed dog? That he can actually find sweater vests in his size? The embarrassing amount of time he doesn’t spend lying naked in a Bahama Mama tanning booth wearing plastic goggles?

Look, even though I haven’t actually seen Pete Buttigieg and Donald Trump in a debate, I know one thing for a fact…. Pete already kicked Trump’s ass in the debate.



Pete has an actual plan for strengthening health care. Trump’s plan for health care is shot-gunning Big Macs in the Situation Room.

Pete can talk about the importance of stewardship. Trump thinks stewardship is something you grope on a plane after Melania takes a sleeping pill.



Pete wants to establish racial equity programs and award a quarter of all government contracts to minority business owners. Trump let Kanye bang on his desk.

I can’t imagine anyone reaching the end of a Pete Buttigieg-Donald Trump debate and still feeling undecided. “Gee… I don’t know. It’s a real Sophie’s Choice for me. Do I pick the educated, forward-thinking politician who’s carefully building a national name for himself? Or the guy who cheats at golf, toilet-tweets, and steals from his own charity?”

There’s only one thing Donald Trump can do to score points with America in a debate with Pete Buttigieg: not show up.