(It’s October, 2020. Elizabeth Warren and Donald Trump are on the debate stage with a moderator. They begin.)
M: Our first question is for Senator Warren. What do you propose to do about increasing inequality in America?
W: Yes, increasing inequality is a great problem in America, and President Trump has done nothing but make it worse with his tax cut. He stuffed his cabinet with billionaires and tried to take health insurance and a variety of federal benefits away from poor people. I have lots and lots of great plans to save the country. I’ll fight for the struggling working people of America, 24/7.
M: President Trump.
T: You know what the real problem with inequality is in this country? It’s not about money. It’s with overeducated Harvard people talking down to real Americans and telling them what to do. America is sick of that. That’s why I’ll win in November.
M: The next question is for President Trump. What’s your plan to deal with climate change?
T: Climate change is a hoax created by the Chinese and American socialists who want to take away jobs from real American workers. They even want to take away your car and your hamburgers with their idiotic Green New Deal! I alone can stop this; that’s why you need to vote for me.
M: Senator Warren?
W: That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. Climate change is an existential problem for all mankind. We need to try to stop it immediately. I’ll fight for the Green New Deal, and it will happen.
M: What do you mean by “fighting for the Green New Deal?” How would you get it past Mitch McConnell and the Republicans in the Senate?
W: I’ll fight and fight. I fight all the time. I never stop fighting. I’ll go to Kentucky and fight. I’ll make videos on YouTube and speeches on network TV. Average people will respond and put pressure on Mitch to support me. Fighting is about persistence. Even President Obama didn’t really understand that.
M: Another question for Senator Warren. President Trump is sometimes accused of being a racist. Do you think he’s a racist?
W: Of course he is. From his legal problems with discrimination in housing, to the birther controversy, to the Mexican rapists, to the good people supporting the radical right in Charlottesville, he has always done everything he could to denigrate people of color. My administration will put an end to it. I have a plan for that.
M: President Trump.
T: Whatever you say, Pocahontas. (He pretends to shoot her with a bow and arrow)
M: Senator Warren, your response?
W: See what I mean? All he knows how to do is to divide America. That has to stop. It’s killing our country.
M: President Trump.
T: I’m the least racist person in the world. You’re the racist! You’re the racist! You hate real white Americans! You want to make them write checks to black people because of slavery! Vote for me to keep that from happening!
M: I guess that’s a response of sorts. President Trump, you are often accused of being a corrupt authoritarian. What do you say to that?
T: I drained the swamp of all of those elitist liberals who wanted to boss real Americans around. We’re not doing what’s politically correct any more. If that’s corruption, we need more of it. I need four more years to finish the job.
W: The record is obvious to everyone. He’s destroying this country bit by bit, and making sure he gets paid for it. There won’t be anything left of liberal democracy in America if he gets re-elected next month. Everyone needs to understand that.
T: Yeah, I’m getting rid of “liberal” democracy, all right. My base loves me for it. They’re what America is all about–not political correctness and cuts in line for lazy minorities and illegal immigrants.
M: Final statements, starting with Senator Warren.
W: Just because we’re not engaged in any large scale wars, and unemployment is less than four percent, doesn’t mean the country, and even the entire planet, will survive four more years of this. We’re in an emergency. Vote for me to resolve it.
T: America, do you really want to listen to this old biddy professor lecture you for the next four years? It will be worse than having your mother-in-law in your ear every day. I alone can save you from that fate. Believe me. Believe me.
When it was over, all of the pundits declared Warren the winner, but Trump won the election, because Warren couldn’t overcome her problems with identity politics and swing voters.