Madden Mischief

It was billed as a debate, but quickly became a contest more of facial expressions than words.

Listening to Kamala, Trump’s face would flash expressions from utter disdain to downright grizzly contempt.

His glares and sardonic smiles showed what he thought about what she was saying about him and the audacity to call him names, he the conqueror, her the last-minute substitute who didn’t lift a finger to keep hordes of killers and cutthroats from storming across the border to rape and pillage and devour people’s pets.

Then when he would rightfully growl and scold Kamala, she would fire back disarming expressions of bemusement, amazement, utter incredulousness at him as if saying she thought he was ridiculous, a complete joke and “give me a break.” 

Her facial expressions were like robust flashing billboards.

Her face advertised how dare he have the nerve, the audacity, the gall and the chutzpah to say the things he was saying about her being inept, incompetent.

Her expressions shout that he is the one so off the rails, so into himself and such an admirer of fellow autocrats while he looks at her like she’s much more than off the rails, she’s off a cliff. 

If the contest was judged only on facial expressions, many would say Kamala was the smile winner.

Yet seeing Trump’s mentally simmering inside while she excoriates him and then mixing his simmering with a sprinkling of wise smirks, Trump was signaling to his base he was obviously the smarter, the wiser, the more experienced and therefore much more deserving to be the next President then this far-out liberal upstart who is one day Indian and the next day black and in three and half years as vice president accomplished zilch on the border, in Ukraine and wherever else she went or didn’t go, but should have gone.

Yes, facial expressions talk louder, often more eloquently and insightfully than mere words and watching those two Tuesday night go head-to-head we viewers learned more about their character than we did just listening to their standard talking points, sermons, self-defenses and accusations they gave us in the weakest, most abstruse form, orally.   Words, words, words.  We’re so sick of words!

What we remember viscerally, indelibly, more memorably are the facial expressions at which they’re both masterful and brilliantly bewitching. 

Which expression are you voting for?

Tom Madden is masterful more with words than facial expressions as he doesn’t shave every day, so he prefers facing his laptop screen more than crowds at a cocktail party.  When he’s not writing his blog, he’s cranking out books like his latest Planetary Lifeguard, Blowing the Whistle on Climate Change or churning out press releases at his PR firm, TransMedia Group.