Self-defeating strategies

From Ann Althouse, "[Mike Pence is] a good debater. So, I’m so concerned, like I can only disappoint."  I keep observing how puzzling some of the campaign actions seem to be.  Trump's campaign actually almost appears traditional with a carnival atmosphere peppered by his sometimes unexpected tweets, a feature to which we should have become accustomed by now.  

But Biden's campaign keeps doing things which make me stop and think, why on earth would they do that?  I am no campaign manager expert.  This is simply rank puzzlement.

Althouse is pointing out another example.  In business, negotiations, war, and politics, it is not uncommon that you want to lower expectations.  Either because you believe you cannot meet those expectations or because you want to encourage your opponent to enter a fray you believe you can win decisively.

You may want to lower expectations but you go about it subtly, quietly.  To announce that you wish to lower expectations tells the audience either that you expect to fail or your opponent that you have something up your sleeve.  In either case, the public discussion of the strategy to lower expectations is self-defeating.

A key quote cited:

So, we’ve got to lower expectations for Kamala and keep the expectations for Biden low.

Well, mission accomplished.

If you expect your candidate to do so poorly that you have to publicly discuss the need to lower expectations, then it seems like you have potentially started a downward cycle of recalibrating lower expectations.  

But what I enjoyed most were some of the comments to Althouse's post.

America needs a President and Vice President who must be protected by low expectations.  After all, that's how we became a great country.

What was it about the soft bigotry of low expectations?

 Biden’s record is 47 yrs of grift, graft and groping while smiling like the Cheshire Cat. 

So expectations for Harris were high, but for Biden, expectations have always been low. That's not good, considering the two debated each other and Biden won out. 

A bit mean but sharp humor.