Risk. Ian bremmer, Time Magazine columnist and founder of the Eurasia GroupConsulting Firm. Bremmer will tell us some of Donald TrumpsForeign Policy notions arent as outrageous as Hillary Clinton says, however. The thing that really worries me about trump is god forbid trump elected next 9 11. God forbid. Because where a president really matters is response to crisis. Thats where everyone is looking to the u. S. President and congress is like, okay, whatever it takes. Ian breming coming up shortly. And later, in our evidence based politics segment, a scholar who sees mondays debate as serious show business. First, as the candidates prepare to fight tooth and nail on monday, are they neck in neck . Yes, time for the horse race. It has been a rough month for Hillary Clinton. Donald trump has gained significant ground in the polls. According to nate silvers forecasting models at 538, trump is within striking distance of defeating clinton in november. Since midaugust trump has climbed steadily from about a 20 chance of winning the election to more than a 45 chance this week. At the same time, clintons chances have plummeted from roughly 80 to 55 . So what happened . Might be that trump has restrained himself, declared the president a citizen and avoided being the main story. Gallup polling shows in recent weeks americans have been hearing more varied information about Trumps Campaign while continuing to hear news about Hillary Clintons emails, emails, emails and now her health. For example, the weeks of august 29th and september 5th, the worlds most remembered about clinton were lie, scandal, fbi and release. For trump in both weeks it was immigration, president and speech. Clintons struggle with trust is undermining her support among young voters as she tries to defend the electoral firewall that barack obama built for democrats in 2012. Young voters appear less passionate voting for the first female president than the first black president. Recent polling shows clinton support among young voters has been weaker than expected and many of the hope and change voters are voicing dissatisfaction with the two party system by throwing support behind Third Party Candidates, gary johnson and jill stein. And this could tip the scales. According to quinnipiac polling released on september 15th in a headtohead matchup clinton bests trump 48 to 43 . When Third Party Candidates are factored in the race becomes too close to call, with clinton getting 41 , trump 39, with gary johnson at 13 and joe stein at 4. If you were hoping for many more republicans like george h. W. Bush to defect to hillary, think again. According to a recent Huffington Post analysis, republicans are just as unified behind their candidate as democrats are behind theirs. Each candidate is now pulling in 83 of their own partys vote, yet even after so much bad news for clinton it still may be her race to lose in the last weeks of the campaign. According to that Quinnipiac University poll, despite her low marks for honesty, 62 still believe that clinton is qualified to be president while roughly the same number, 61 , believe trump is not. All right. Lets think about those qualifications in the arena of Foreign Affairs. How might americas role on the world stage change with donald trump versus Hillary Clinton in the oval office . Recently i had a wide ranging conversation about this in a public forum with ian bremmer, founder of the Eurasia Group, a Consulting Firm that addresses Global Political risk. Bremmer is author of nine books, most recently three choices for americas role in the world. He is also Foreign Affairs columnist for time. The event was organized by the center for Global Affairs at New York University where bremmer teaches, and it took place september 8th, which happened to be the day after the commanderinchief forum with the two candidates on nbc. Here is about ten minutes of our conversation, edited in sequence. At the Forum Last Night trump said he is less trigger happy than clinton, but he said no more sorry, she said no more substantial numbers of Ground Forces in iraq other than special forces, and he said we should capture and defend iraqs oil fields. Am i missing something, or not trigger happy and capture and defend iraqs oil fields are contradictory . Well, i mean you cannot ask me as a political scientist to try to defend consistency on the part of trumps policy descriptions, right . I cant do that. But what what i think is a fundamental truth, that trump has been able to get at in a way that Establishment Republicans just cant, which is that the. 1 in the United States and the establishment media and a lot of the intellectual crowd actually have a lot more in common, both in their world views and their values, with the top. 1 in other countries around the world than they do with their countrymen and trump is calling b. S. On that. Once you unpack what the policy recommendations are underneath that, i could tell you some things on Foreign Policy i think that he says that people ridicule that arent ridiculous. So, for example, when he said and please dont make it sound like im defending him, but i think the antiestablishment point is real. When he said that, look, if the South Koreans and japanese dont want to pay more, well, maybe they should just go nuclear. Would that be such a big deal. And hillary ridicules him. Hillary says, i dont think he knows what he means in terms of them going nuclear. I think the average american couldnt care less if japan and south korea went nuclear, and if it meant the u. S. Was spending less that would be a good thing. By the way, pakistan is nuclear, india is nuclear, north korea is nuclear. We didnt want that, right . But japan would be one of the most responsible powers in the world with nukes. I dont think thats a huge problem. I know they are immensely antinuclear, hiroshima, nagasaki, fukushima, i mean that actually brings out lots of japanese to demonstrate and theyre not people that demonstrate easily. Theyre pretty happy with the establishment, they have basically a oneparty functional system thats okayish. But hillary just demonized him for this. You have an article on politico recently that adapts your top Ten Political risks of year format to the top trump risks. Number one is what you call the bolt from the blue. What does that mean . Thats the thing that worries me the most about trump becoming president. Im not someone who first of all, i think it is unlikely he will get elected but he could get elected, we know this. If he got elected he, im not someone that believes suddenly the day after inauguration the United States loses super power status. I dont believe that. I think the ability of an individual u. S. President to make significant moves in policy, domestically, incredibly constrained, and even in Foreign Policy. Think about how different obama is from bush and think about how limited obamas ability to truly move the needle on things hes been passionate about has actually been. And i think that trump, who is not exactly a hard worker, right . Hes not going to want to be in the trenches, right . Hes going to want to delegate a lot of stuff. Well, in terms of the conversations his son had with kasich, for example, well, youre do domestic policy, you will do Foreign Policy and ill make America Great again. Right. Thats, you know. Right, right. I know a lot of billionaires in this town, hedge fund types, that are voting for trump because they believe, correctly in my view, that they will have unprecedented access to people with financial and, you know, sort of the inside, you know, the Valerie Jarrett types. As a consequence theyre going to do really well. I think theyre right. I think that is a good venile reason for voting for the president. Not one i happen to ascribe to but i understand it, right . It is one that putin would get. Now, you asked me two questions. It is the first time ive heard good and venile used backtoback. You need to spend more time with hedge fund types. So, look, the i can answer the putin question or bolt from the blue question. Bolt from the blue. The thing that worries me about trump, yes, there would be incremental damage to u. S. Alliances, to the u. S. Dollar, to u. S. Trade relations that would be worse under trump than they would be under hillary, although i think the structural effects of geo political destruction, the drivelessness of sort of, you know, World Politics today actually outweighs either. The thing that really worries me about trump is god forbid trump elected, next 9 11. God forbid. Because where a president really matters is response to crisis. Thats where everyone is looking to the u. S. President , and suddenly congress is like, okay, whatever it takes. You want us to pass a trillion dollars in bailout on two pages of paper from hank paulson, we have no idea whats in there . Fine. That will never happen. Because were freaked out, right . I think if trump were president in a time where there was a true crisis, i think you could do really systemic damage to American Democratic institutions, to the legitimacy of those institutions. Because he would seize power or overreact to the crisis . Either. Thats what we dont know, the bolt from the blue. I think thats one where sort of media independence could really take a hit we couldnt come back to, where the judiciary could become politicized in the sorts of ways you presently see in turkey. That could never happen on a daytoday basis, that would not happen under President Trump in a normal environment. But take trump and put 9 11 on top of that or massive cyber attack that brings down the u. S. Markets, things that are now thinkable in a way that a year ago were not thinkable, and i actually worry about the future of american supremacy, super power status, democracy, you name it. I do worry about that. By the way, the putin question, putin is a strong leader. I am on record saying that putin is the most powerful individual in the world. Hes accomplished that despite the fact that his country is in decline. What does it say about a president ial candidate who believes its fine to lionize someone who actually actively wants to undermine americas position in the world . Thats the real question. What does that say . Because who are the people out there that support trump right now . I understand why a lot of americans would want to vote against hillary, i really get it. But as a Foreign Policy person, you look at the people that support trump, it is putin, its hungary, its farage, its lapin, its wilders in the netherlands, it is kim jongun. Are you fricking kidding me . Thats if you care about americas role in the world now, there are good reasons why Many Americans increasingly dont care about americas role in the world. They say, look, we cared before and it hasnt helped me, and theyre right. Theyre right. It is an enormous indictment on washington and the establishment. But if you care about americas role in the world, then it is very clear that putin that trump is a very bad option. You also have trump red herrings in that article, what not to worry about. Number one is u. S. china relations. Really . Number one, china is not going to take the easy bait. The chinese understand that working relationships with the United States, because theyre getting more powerful over time, they can do incremental. They can build up their military a little bit more, day by day, monthly month, they can do bilateral relations with the indonesia, the vietnamese. As long as they dont lose power in terms of the communist party, the world is moving towards them. So i dont think they do not want conflict, the way that the russians want the americans to fail, the chinese dont. The chinese want the system to be stable, just let it keep kind of going in their direction and they will play more ball. We see it on climate. The chinese are doing more in syria on the humanitarian side, from a low ball but more than it was. Peace keeper, theyre putting them into africa, they werent doing that before. They put a military base in djibouti. Why . Theyre concerned about the supply chain. Those are marginally constructive things. Did you also or could you bring an article on the top clinton risks if she is elected president . Sure. They would look very differently obviously. Where would you start . It would be really boring. No, the clinton risks, the biggest clinton risk would be for four more years, maybe longer, we have a government that is largely captured by a bunch of entrenched interests, big pharma, big finance, the aarp, you know, and as a consequence you would not be able to really address these growing structural problems around the middle class, the working class. I mean theyll say it, theyll throw some they will check the box. It is like when corporations do sustainability. There are a few companies out there that truly care, but most of them are like, okay, we know that were going to get hit by, you know, sort of all of the demonstrators and the ngos unless we check the boxes, so we will check the boxes. Financial institutions will check the boxes on diversity. Are we done with that . Well focus on making money again. The biggest risk with hillary is check the box approach, sort of buying off bernie sanders, elizabeth warren, all of the people that had to hold their nose to vote for her and four years later the structural problems are greater. It is a boring risk, precisely because we can get away with it, you know. Ian bremmer, author of three choices for americas role in the world and founder of the Eurasia Group, a Consulting Firm that assesses Global Political risk at New York University on september 8th. By the way, among the topics for the first clinton trump debate monday is securing america. Now lets place that debate in Historical Context with some additional evidence. Time for evidencebased politics, where we report cold, hard facts on the overheated campaign rhetoric. Mondays president ial debate continues a tradition slow getting started, headtohead broadcast debates between the major candidates only go back to 1960 when senator john f. Kennedy took on Vice President richard nixon. And it is a fact that through most of these last 25 years the Republican Leadership has opposed federal aid for education, medical care for the aged, development of the tennessee valley, development of our natural resources. When youre in a race, the only way to stay ahead is to move ahead, and i subscribe completely to the spirit that senator kennedy has expressed tonight, the spirit that the United States should move ahead. After nixon lost to kennedy, there would be no more debates for 16 years. But beginning with Gerald Ford Jimmy Carter contest in 1976 the tv debate became firmly entrenched. The stakes are high because anything can happen, that includes the good, bad and the gaffes such as a small gesture of impatience like looking at ones watch. We have a question right here. Yes. How has in nixon, would you like to comment . I have no comment. It took the president 14 days before he called the attack in benghazi an attack of terror. Get the transcript. He did in fact, sir. Let me call thats what this campaign is about, not what is your philosophy and position on issues, but can you get things done. I see people in my state, middle class people, their taxes have gone up in washington and their services have gone down. Here you go again. Debates often include impressive one liners and zingers. How much of what we see is spontaneous . Who sets the rules and how much do debates matter to the Election Results . With some answers, Alan Schroeder joins us via skype from boston. He is professor of journalism at North Eastern university and author of president ial debates Risky Business on the campaign trail. Hi professor schroeder, thanks so much for coming on, hello. Thank you. So, what is a debate supposed to prove . Governing well is not about matching wits with an opponent on national television. I think you have to remember debates are a single component of a complex and Lengthy Campaign process. I think sometimes people look at debates and think theyre kind of the magic bullet and theyre supposed to give us all of the information we need about the candidates and their positions. Theyre not really that at all. Theyre more of a sort of personality test. They give us a little insight into the candidates at a moment under which theyre performing under great pressure and they put them side by side on the same stage, which is a very awkward and unnatural thing for them to have to do. So i think theyre important because they get the campaign they get the candidates off the campaign trail, into a situation not of their own control entirely, and then give us some insights into how they perform under a highly pressurized, awkward set of circu