Okay, Jane.
Okay, awesome.
So if you just want to say your first and last name and spell that for me, and then let
me know where you're from.
And get this title as well.
And your title, yeah.
Rolf Lindgren, R-O-L-F-L-I-N-D-G-R-E-N, and I live in Middleton, Wisconsin, and I'm
the Pines and Politics Director of the Republican Party of Dane County.
Okay, great.
So how do you think the importance of this presidential debate compared to ones in the
past?
I think this is going to be one of the biggest presidential debates of all time.
It's heavily anticipated because it's like in a boxing match when you have the champion
and the former champion.
Well, this is the president and the former president.
It's never happened before.
And typically the first debate always has higher ratings anyway than the other debates.
Jane, do me a favor to ask that question one more time because I can't understand.
So how do you think the importance of this presidential debate compared to ones prior
before it?
I think this is one of the most important debates of all time.
It's a president versus a former president.
So it's sort of like the heavyweight champion against the former heavyweight champion, sort
of like Muhammad Ali versus Joe Fraser.
It's a huge, huge debate.
And the first debate usually has the highest ratings anyway.
And also the highly, the high stakes of the issues in our country.
There's huge issues with the border and with the economy and inflation.
And people want action and they want answers.
Sure.
And why do you think this debate was held earlier than two prior debates?
I would say one reason is because the candidates are known earlier.
Usually the candidates are not known this early for sure.
And that's one reason.
Also the two presidents agreed to the early debate.
And I think that maybe they just did it because maybe the networks also wanted an early debate.
Remember the second, there's only going to be two debates.
And the second debate is I believe in September or October.
So it's a long time until the next debate.
Sure.
And what was the benefit of having a watch party here?
There were some of the pros of that that wouldn't have been able to happen with other events.
Well, I think the watch party will draw some extra people.
We had a really good, diverse crowd.
We had some regulars from the party and we also had a lot of Trump supporters.
But we had new people that maybe I didn't even know who they were, but they were here.
So that was good.
And what was your reaction to the event?
Well, I was really happy with the event.
The location was great.
The bowling alley is a great location.
And the debate itself was very entertaining and informative.
And I think that Trump won the debate.
And yet, I'm going to, you can answer this to Jane, and what, when you gauge who wins,
how do you, what are you looking for, what tell you?
Well, I would say that on the issues, the biggest thing really with the debate is the
substance.
And I would say on the substance, Trump won the debate because more people agree with Trump
on the issues than Biden, by far.
So this gets that message out to the people.
Also on style, Biden did not look like he's ready to take a 3 a.m. phone call and make
a decision.
Not to me.
And then answer, Jane, for this whole idea of paints and politics, what is that all about?
How does that work?
It's a monthly event that the Republican Party, county parties have all over Wisconsin.
It's just a chance for people to get together and talk politics in a social setting.
And same kind of question here, but in terms of watching a debate in a watch party, what
does that do?
Why is this a good way to watch something like this?
Well, I thought it was good because a lot of people got to meet other people.
Also, people can ask questions to each other.
They can learn things.
Some people are veteran political watchers or others are new, so they may not even know
what's going on with some of these issues.
So there's people who, there's also older people and young people.
You know, there were young people here, but there were some older people.
So the older people can remember back in the old days what was going on and they can contrast
it to what's going on now.
What else, my friend, anything else you want to say?
I just want to say hello, Madison.
Madison says hello back to you, my friend.
Good stuff.
That's great, buddy.
Thank you.
Are you Wisconsin?