One trait of Trump’s that was well-attested in both the 60 Minutes interview footage he released yesterday and last night’s debate was his deep and abiding belief in the power of magic words.

In both cases it was clear that he believed repeating certain key words and phrases was a superior approach to answering questions than, well… answering questions.

Once you understand this about him, a lot of things fall into place. His tendency to describe things as “strong” and actions as “strongly” even when it’s contextually odd, for instance.

Or this bit of apparent flip-floppery that Barb McQuade commented on after the debate:

Barb McQuade @BarbMcQuade

Trump can’t decide whether he is the “law and order” president or the criminal justice reform president. In fact, he is neither. DOJ ended pattern and practice police investigations and the results have been disastrous.

October 23rd 2020

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How can Donald Trump run on both being the champion of criminal justice reform and the champion of harsh law and order? It’s very simple: criminal justice reform is good, and law and order is good. He, Donald Trump, is very good. Simply the best. How can you not believe that he, Donald Trump, is not very strongly in favor of both good things?

This, too, is how it is possible that he has a plan for healthcare, he has dozens of plans, he could very easily make a plan, and he will have a plan as soon as it’s necessary.

These phrases do not, to him, describe various points in time as they relate to the existence of a plan in his possession.

They’re just various good things. It’s good to have a plan. It’s good to have many plans. It’s good to be close to a plan. It’s good if a plan would be easy to make.

He, Donald Trump, is again a very good person, possibly the best.

So how could any of these good phrases not be accurate, in relation to him? If one of them didn’t apply to him but could be applied to someone else, he couldn’t be the best human being, and he clearly is.

It’s like he told us years ago: he has the best words. Law and order? Good. Some voters really want that. Criminal justice reform? Good. Some other voters really want that.

So he’s going to do both. Has done both. Is doing both. Will do both soon, very soon, possibly within two weeks and definitely before the end of the year. He’ll show you, you’ll see. He’ll come out very strongly with them.