Thoughts On The First Trump-Clinton Debate, Sept. 26th
The long-anticipated first debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton is over, and I have to say it's essentially a draw or close to. Neither candidate got in the kind of killer shot that flattened the other candidate. Overall, I think that Trump will benefit a bit from the debate; not Hillary. His poll numbers have been picking up, he has the momentum right now, so he had something to lose tonight. He didn't lose it.
The polite word to describe Hillary's performance is "articulate." A less polite word is "shallow." Back in 1980, Robert A. Heinlein made a wisecrack about Time magazine: the more he know about an event, the less accurate its reporting. That's close to how I took Hillary's words: the more I know about a particular subject, the more her words came across as glib patter - as questionable.
Trump was true to form: bombastic, plowing ahead like a piledriver, vague. Hillary tried to use the last against him, but didn't sting him. He stuck to his usual: negative, with a hint of if-this-goes-on doomsaying, anti-politician, common-sensical in a way. Again, he urged everyone to trust his business record.
He certainly interrupted an awful lot - he certainly like a good heckle! - but he seemed restrained even to the point of missing a few kill-shot opportunities. For example, Hillary Clinton bragged that she put together a coalition against Iraq that included Russia. The Donald did not jump in at that point and belt out, "So you admire Putin!" Along these lines, just after Hillary going on about what she's doing about ISIS, he could have barged in with "And Russia - Vladimir Putin - is clobbering ISIS, which President Obama and Secretary Clinton just can't do!"
He also failed to mention anything related to the Clinton Foundation, which was probably deliberate restraint on his part. She did not reciprocate on her end. But if you're something of a political junkie like me, you noticed that all her swipes at Donald's business record were old news. We'll find out if they're also stale.
The best point Trump made was that the Dems have thrown everything at him and he's still tied or winning. A good reminder of how many times he's been not only slagged but also counted out. It reinforced his image as the unstoppable force.
If you're a Trump supporter, you'll surely think he's won. If you're with her, you'll of course think Hillary won. But my Canadian eyes didn't see any clear victor, any clear knock-out punch. Perhaps both candidates have too much self-confidence for any knock-out punch to work.
Now, it's up to the polls...
...and if the proverbial gun were to be placed at my head, I'd say that the debate will help Donald's numbers a smidgen. We'll find out soon.
This is fascinating -- the transcript of the debate with fact checking and annotation. http://www.npr.org/2016/09/26/495115346/fact-check-first-presidential-debate
Interesting. I watched the debate with some of my colleagues after work and the conclusion we arrived at: Trump failed miserably, even worse than we expected, and Clinton was her usual self: articulate, intelligent and shrewd. His ranting and rambling discourse which ended with him claiming that he had the best temperament elicited loud laughter from everyone in the pub. The Canadian and UK papers ripped him apart but my favourite post-debate piece was one that appeared in the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/27/debate-clinton-trump-recap-presidential-election-hofstra.
And what the fuck was up with his sniffling? The bartender said it was a "tell" that indicated Trump's nervousness and bluffing/lying. As for Trump's lies, check out the fact checker: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/26/debate-fact-check-trump-clinton-live-quotes-hofstra
Thanks for your views. There are lots of folks who are unimpressed with Trump, and many of them are in foreign lands. Funny that you mention my fellow Canadians: I remember a poll conducted in 2012 which implied that a Canadian electorate would have given Obama a huge landslide.
I'm not a representative Canadian in that I've been watching the turns and twists of U.S. politics for years. You might say it's my hobby :) One of the hardest things to "get" about U.S. politics, structurally, is the gridlock that's part of the Separation of Powers. If you grew up in a parliamentary democracy, as I (and I presume you) have, it is baffling at first to see Congress routinely defy "Prime Minister" Obama.
"What's goin' on 'ere? 'E won the election, didn't 'e?"
Oh...and for a different take, two links for the New York Post:
On the one hand... "How Trump won over a bar full of undecideds and Democrats" by Selena Zito. Excerpts:
On the other hand... "Trump’s debate incompetence a slap in the face to his supporters" by John Podhoretz, a regular columnist. Excerpts:
From the same paper, on the same day...
Fascinating!
Thanks! From what I've seen, Trump did get a slight boost in his poll numbers...
I thought it interesting when Donald said hilly has been in politics for 30 years where has her great plans been all this time
Thanks for this bit of commentary. I really wanted to watch the debate but I've been stuck at work so missed the whole thing. I'll have to content myself with reading after-action reports like yours. I can't believe how crazy the whole presidential campaign has been so far. Whether you support Hillary or Donald, we're in for some very interesting times ahead. I just hope America makes the right choice!
We'll see!
You should check for & read other reports; my post wasn't a fuil summary - just my observations. Word to the wise :)
https://www.google.ca/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=debate&tbm=nws
The above link should help you catch up. If you need a replay, this like will help:
but it's a loop. If you watch it, you'll prolly start in the middle.
Nice, thanks for that! And yep, I'll definitely check other sources to get some well-rounded color on it, yours is just the first one I clicked on.
glib patter vs. swagger
Wotta choice, eh? (sigh)
Funny how American politics has reached the point where both nominees have majority-unfavorables. It reflects the drop in Americans' trust of practically any institution except the military.
I'm glad this first debate is behind us with 2 more to go.
We have a very important decision to make that will greatly affect the world for many years to come.
Do we want things to continue the way that have been recently with massive financial instability and a massive refugee crisis and chaos?
Or should we try a different route and stop trusting the political elite to actually be honest with us and do what they say?
Trump my well win on those grounds. I can't count the number of folks who say that they'd rather gamble with Trump than lose for sure with Hillary.
I don't believe the polls. The press is manipulating them because they thrive on conflict. They will have a bigger audience until election day if the race is dead even. They also want to see the worst one win so that they will have plenty to write about for the next four years.
There's reason to be skeptical, that's for sure. Leslie Moonves is on record as saying, "I don't know if Donald Trump is good for America, but he sure is good for CBS!" (i.e., good for CBS' ratings.)
Interesting take. The media-bias arguments I'm used to reading claim a bait-and-switch. Namely, the media puffs up a "good" Republican candidate in the primary only to turn on him in the general. The people who say the foregoing claim ideological bias, not ratings hunger, for the pattern. These folks are the ones Trump is appealing to when he repeatedly says that the media is "very dishonest." But, the execs are clearly aware of what you wrote. There's an old saw that says a debate always gets higher ratings than a talk. People do like conflict, and like watching it.