Hi everybody, I made word clouds derived from Clinton’s and Trump’s statements during Monday night’s debates. I also used the Word Count tool to determine that Trump’s total word count was 8,026 and Clinton’s total word count was 6, 032.
Wordle graphic representing Trump’s statements in Monday night’s debate.
Wordle graphic representing Clinton’s statements during Monday night’s debate.
I am also very interested in the upcoming VP debate. I am most interested to see the candidates respective strategies. Will they model their running mates demeanors, or will they act to counterbalance what Clinton and Trump bring to the table. I think that this is very integral to the election because Trump and Clinton both are viewed unfavorably by much of the population.
The Vice Presidential nominees can act to change this around. Kaine can make Clinton seem much more likable and authentic if he presents himself well. He can provide us with a new perspective of Hillary and make her seem like a human rather than the political robot that everyone criticizes her for being. On the other hand, if Pence can present a well though out strategy for policy for our country, he can complement Trump’s broad claims and give the American people something of substance to work with.
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/compare-pence-kaine-226804
I think that an interesting aspect of this election is to look at which candidate will win over the undecided voters. There are staunch supporters of both candidates that are entrenched in their allegiance to Trump and Clinton. However, there is a large portion of the population that is undecided. I feel like this comes from the fact that a lot of people view both candidates unfavorably. Because of this, I think that the candidate who appeals more to the undecided voters will win this election.
For me, Trump was very predictable in this debate. He acted to retain the support that he already has. I am not sure he persuaded any of the undecided voters to join his camp because he was his same old self. He used broad statements and antagonized Clinton like he has done throughout his campaign. I think that he needed to more to gain more support.
Clinton, on the other hand, I think won over some of her doubters. Her preparedness and ability to remain calm in the face of battle was very admirable. I think that people still view her as untrustworthy, but I think that when they compare her flaws to Trump, she comes out on top. I believe that she is the safer bet. Even though she hasn’t been completely honest, neither has Trump. She will win the undecided vote if she continues on this track, and Trump must make some changes to his strategy if he wants to win that vote. Although if Trump changes too much, he may lose some of the supporters who love his demeanor. He has to walk a very thin line to keep his supporters and gain new ones.
Here is a link from the Wall Street Journal on the issue of undecided voters: http://www.wsj.com/articles/undecided-voters-react-coolly-to-donald-trump-during-debate-1474947738
Additional articles from PBS that I came across today discussing the debate brought up a few more points that might be relevant to our class discussion.
The first article reported on tracking how many times Trump interrupted Clinton and vice versa during the debate. The trackers found that Trump interrupted Clinton 51 times, during the 90 minute debate, and that Clinton interrupted Trump 17 times, according to PBS. Different comments and conclusions have been attached to these facts. First, is Trump patronising Clinton when he interrupts her (it appears continuously)? Does this matter, does it hurt or help either candidate? Furthermore, is the degree to which Trump interrupts Clinton reflective on the gender scenario, and what would be the implications if it were reversed, a woman interrupting a man to this degree?
Additionally, the following quote came from the PBS article:
“His press releases, and nearly all around him strictly refer to the Republican nominee as “Mr. Trump.” But 29 different times, Clinton called her opponent simply “Donald”. (He referred to her as “secretary”.)”
We have discussed how time and again Clinton is referred to as Hillary – which aims to demean her status as a female candidate. Here we see Hillary may have used her own disadvantage to disadvantage her opponent, in order to topple Donald’s hegemonic masculinity platform. Furthermore, does this strategy appear to hurt Clinton and present her as a sore loser (as it might from a gendered view point)? Or, does it demonstrate her strength and how Clinton is able to level the playing field regardless of gender inequality that plays in the election?
Lastly, PBS commented on how after the debate the Trump family left the stage, whereas Hillary and her family stayed on the stage and greeted debate attendees. This appears to be an effort by Clinton to appear warmer, more approachable, natural and personable. However, is it likely that given how society views Clinton and how much of the media depicts her, that these small efforts will change minds? Is it to late in the campaign trail for these acts to have a large impact?
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/for-many-women-watching-trump-interrupt-clinton-51-times-was-unnerving-but-familiar/
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/six-takeaways-first-presidential-debate/
A few questions I wanted to offer to the group:
Did Hillary’s performance attract people from the middle or from the Republican side to switch and vote for her?
Will Hillary become more moderate as the debates go on in order to attract a larger voting crowd?
Will Trump alter his demeanor and prepare more for the next debate in order to improve?
Do people believe that Hillary was too prepared to the extent that she seemed rehearsed?
How do you think the role of Lester Holt, or lack there of, shaped the debate?
While I was watching the debate, I couldn’t help but concentrate more on PolitiFact and Hillary Clinton’s fact checker than the debate itself. Of course I’m not saying it wasn’t interesting, but I found the ability to check whether each candidate was lying in each sentence that they said even more interesting than the childish skirmish that was going on before my eyes. It was interesting to see the lack of truth coming from both candidates, no matter how large or small the fallacies were. However, looking back on the debate as a whole, I realize there was much more to it than misleading statements and attempted cover ups.
In the majority of eyes, Hillary came out on top in this debate. CNN asked viewers to take a poll to see who won this debate. http://mediamatters.org/video/2016/09/26/cnns-post-debate-poll-shows-overwhelming-victory-hillary-clinton/213345
It is quite clear with a 62% to 27% difference that Hillary was the favored candidate. This was not a hard task to achieve, seeing as she was able to discuss real policy, including investing in the middle class and creating jobs relating to clean energy, making large tax cuts, bridging the gap between community and police, and proving our power to threatening countries. On the other hand, Trump was able to discuss China and Mexico in minimal details, while additionally being unable to give examples even when he claimed he “knew thousands” and “could just keep naming them all day long.” Similarly, he did not have much to say much about the economy apart from keeping our companies from “leaving,” and began to support unconstitutional stop and frisk policies when discussing race. Further, it was almost impossible not to notice how Trump was unable to answer almost every question. When the moderator asked him specifically whether he supports the current nuclear weapons policy, Trump failed to pose an opinion and barely covered the components of the actual policy itself.
Despite Trump’s obvious mistakes in the debate last night, Hillary herself did not rise completely to some of the viewers’ standards. It was disappointing to not hear her go more in depth into solving college debt and bridging the gender wage gap when answering and debating the question related to creating jobs. Additionally, while she had good intentions of discussing the divide between community and police, the debate almost seemed to stray from the larger issue of racism in our entire country and amongst all citizens, rather than the more obvious issue of police shootings.
In regards to what we have discussed in class about Hillary’s authenticity, I believe that she is improving in this arena. I did not find her harsh or cold, but instead merely more knowledgeable and well-informed in comparison to Trump, who seemed to be grasping for words to fill the time. While Hillary was awkward at times in response to Trump’s jabs, I didn’t find that she was struggling to prove herself and her genuineness to the public. She was clearly the more prepared candidate, which in itself, is truly and authentically Hillary.
Pre debate:
Scrolling through Twitter, it was easy to see from various polls that the race for president between Clinton and Trump is a dead heat. Sometimes races cause numbers to bounce a lot, but not always. Many sources were asking which of Trump’s personas would show up. In answer to this, I really think Trump played into his stereotype of strong machismo, while Clinton also played into hers: compassionate for vulnerable Americans. Also I think both campaigns took this social media frenzy to ask their supporters for financial donations. It’s also worth mentioning that the official ticket to the event spelled Hillary’s name wrong. Also interesting to note that this was the most widely watched debate ever, yet both candidates are seen quite unfavorably.
During debate:
While Lester Holt guided the candidates through various topics, themes arose regarding their respective presentations. In an act of asserting his dominance, Trump interrupted Hillary 70 over the course of the debate. Also, he spent a lot of time retroactively defending himself against claims of Clinton’s. Consequently he wouldn’t get to answering the question and Holt would have to redirect him. In general, Trump’s comments seemed more negative and pessimistic. He spent a lot of time criticizing and blaming Clinton for broken policy and stagnation, but very little time offering solutions. For approximately the first twenty minutes, Trump was strong and his attacks on Clinton biting, but after a while, he just couldn’t hold himself when talking about policy. Even watching the debate muted (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/28/us/politics/trump-clinton-debate-body-language.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur) showed how Trump obviously lost his cool over the course of the debate.
Lester Holt as moderator also played an interesting role. Most memorably, he could barely get a word in! (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/09/26/lester-holt-is-basically-invisible-at-the-presidential-debate/?tid=sm_tw_pp&wprss=rss_the-fix) I thought it was very rude how much Trump interrupted him. Untraditionally, Holt did some real time fact checking himself. For example, he called out Trump by saying stop and frisk was declared unconstitutional in New York.
Clinton struck me a different way. Though she didn’t have as many aggressive attacks against Trump as he did against her, the caution she exhibited worked to her advantage. She spoke more truths than Trump and could actually discuss policy in a sustaining and coherent way. Clinton as an experienced debater used pathos and the word “we” to further build the relationship between herself and the country. Clinton seemed more positive. (We can build this, rather than we can destroy this.) She gave a genuine apology for her mishandling of emails, while Trump got extremely defensive when Holt brought up his taxes.
Post debate:
As the trend has been, there was noticeably more media focus on Trump than on Clinton. Also, a lot of people noticed Trump was audibly sniffling throughout the debate. Both made pointed attacks, but I think it’s right to say that Clinton was trying to portray Trump as incompetent, which I believe she did by out debating him. Trump had the challenge of proving his competence and capitalize when Clinton began speaking in political generalities. Social media mostly wanted to talk about Trump’s temperament and the beauty queen he insulted. A lot of news sources contended that Clinton simply had more stamina than Trump. Though he began strong and attacked he aggressively, he just could not contribute substantive comments the whole way through.
(http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/cp/opinion/clinton-trump-first-debate-election-2016/trump-fails-the-stamina-test)
(http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/us/politics/presidential-debate.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur)
Another aspect of the debate that stuck out to me was the references to personality, appearance, and gender. In particular, I was interested in the moment Trump claimed that Clinton didn’t have the stamina to be the president. When asked why Trump thought Hillary didn’t have the presidential look, his response was that the job of the president requires more stamina then Hillary Clinton could handle. As a viewer, this statement brings with it many thoughts in regards to gender. As we have talked about in class, gender within presidential and media positions plays a large role in how people are viewed and treated. Often times, appearance and personality is the focus of women in the media rather than actual content. Trump brings up that Clinton wouldn’t have the stamina to speak about conflict with Saudi Arabia but doesn’t necessarily explain why he makes this statement. I felt that this comment called into question stereotypes regarding women and Clinton’s ability to be the first women president.
However, Trump’s earlier comments seem to support his claim in some ways. Towards the beginning of the debate, Trump consistently brought up how Clinton has been around this position for years and accomplished nothing. While Trump tends to make bold statements that may or may not entirely be the truth, he backs up his claims with examples of what he believes are bad decisions supported by Hillary. One of these examples was NAFTA, a deal signed by Bill Clinton that impacted the economy is some way or another. Trump claims it was the worst trade deal ever signed in this country while fact checks claims that NAFTA only had a modest impact on the U.S.
(http://www.npr.org/2016/09/26/495115346/fact-check-first-presidential-debate).
Many of Trump’s arguments were presented aggressively with or without truth to them. He was adamant about his responses and often interrupted Clinton or Lestor Holt when they spoke. This seemed strategic to him at times, as it got his points across, but rude or overly assertive at other times. Hillary on the other hand seemed to take a passive aggressive route, with lots of false smiles and sarcastic responses. Often times, Hillary’s sarcastic or passive comments would come after Trump presented a false statement. Truth vs. lie became an important aspect of this debate, as fact checkers were often checking the validity of what each candidate said. NPR presented a full script of the debate with fact checks:
http://www.npr.org/2016/09/26/495115346/fact-check-first-presidential-debate
Overall, I don’t believe that this debate necessarily persuaded many voters either way. I believe that Hillary supporters are still Hillary supporters while Trump supporters are still voting for Trump. I’m sure that some undecided voters were able to connect more with one candidate or another, however, the content and focus on past issues made it slightly difficult to look ahead. Several issues were discussed and as the Washington Post describes, Hillary came so prepared that “at times she came across overly rehearsed and robotic”
(https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/09/26/winners-and-losers-from-the-1st-presidential-debate/).
On the other hand, many believe that Trump was too unprepared, as he avoided answering direct questions towards him. It will definitely be interesting to see the next debate and how each candidate prepares.
This was a very unique presidential debate for many reasons. Post-debate polls explain that Hillary came away as the winner of this one. 62% of voters who watched were in favor of Hillary while only 27% favored Trump.
(http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/27/politics/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-debate-poll/)
This wasn’t necessarily surprising, however, due to the words and actions displayed by both candidates it was difficult to truly decide a winner. The reason I say this is due to the main focus of the debate. Rather than focusing on the future and upcoming presidency, much of the debate seemed focused on each of their past and personality. While both of the candidates are celebrities in one way or another, it is important that voters hear what each candidate holds for the future, while only being knowledgeable about what each has done in the past. It became quite evident during the debate that each candidate truly has flaws and both Clinton and Trump tried to hold each other accountable.
One particular example of the past being brought to the table was in regards to Hillary’s email scandal. While Trump attempted to argue reasons not to publish his tax returns, he claimed he would release his tax returns only when Hillary releases her 30,000 private emails sent across a private server. This moment stuck out to me as one of the most important moments of the debate. In McArdle’s article that we read prior to the debate, I thought that one of the most persuasive reasons decent people choose to vote for Trump is due to Hillary’s email controversy.
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-06-09/five-reasons-decent-people-may-want-to-back-trump)
Many Americans have a lack of trust towards Clinton for this exact reason, and it was a topic that was bound to come up during the debate. It was interesting to me that her response to the email scandal was an apology, claiming that it was a “mistake”. While it is true that people make mistakes, I thought that Trump won this particular argument, stating that it was “more than a mistake.”
Immediately after the debate, CNN conducted a poll calling and asking many different questions to people about the debate. 62% of respondents said they believed that Clinton won the debate, while 27% believed Trump did (http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2016/images/09/27/poll.pdf). While 26% of survey respondents were Republicans, and 41% were Democrats, with the other part being Independents, Clinton’s margin of victory according to CNN’s poll means she won over many independent voters and maybe some Republicans. FiveThirtyEight has analyzed the immediate-after-the-debate poll since 1984 and found that winning by 35% should correlate to a roughly 2.5% increase in national polls (http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/clinton-won-the-debate-which-means-shes-likely-to-gain-in-the-polls/). However, they are quick to point out that opinions from immediately after the debate can be swayed based on how the media presents the debate over the next few days.
Looking at various news websites, they do not agree on who won the debate. Politico has many stories on how Clinton won the debate or Trump lost it, including stories from today about how Trump “points finger after shaky debate” and how “Clinton zings Trump on microphone conspiracy theory.” Unfortunately, neither of these stories contain much policy information, an all-too-common theme in politics, but mostly define the winner based on actions. Clinton was calm, but attacked when Trump lied while Trump was interrupting Clinton and having a hard time answering the questions. On CNN’s cite, a large banner at the top reads “TRUMP LOSES HIS COOL” with a link to their recap of the debate. Most of the stories on CNN’s page are similar to that of Politico’s, containing stories highlighting Clinton’s night. However, on Fox News’ site, the headlines talk of a debate that Trump won. Stories are titled “Online voted declare Trump debate winner, despite media consensus for Clinton” and “Trump vows to hit her harder in the next debate.” Even knowing Fox News is conservative, it is interesting to see so many stories about Trump’s “success” last night when most other news organizations are saying the opposite. Since the majority of these stories are spinning the debate as pro-Clinton, then according to FiveThirtyEight’s logic, we can expect to see a Clinton bounce in the next couple of days. However, as FiveThirtyEight founder Nate Silver warns, do not read too much into the coming polls for the next seven days or so, so that pollsters can see if it was just a bounce or a bump that will last for a longer time.
Politico stories:
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/09/trump-blame-first-debate-performance-228775
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/09/clinton-microphone-trump-228783?lo=ap_a1
CNN story:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/27/politics/presidential-debate-hillary-clinton-donald-trump-highlights/index.html
Fox News Stories:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/09/27/online-polls-declare-trump-debate-winner-despite-media-consensus-for-clinton.html
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/09/27/trump-threatens-to-hit-her-harder-at-next-clinton-debate-as-surrogates-rip-moderator.html
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/2016/09/27/5-takeaways-from-donald-trump-and-hillary-clintons-first-debate?s_campaign=Email:BComToday&bc_em
This is an interesting article outlining five takeaways from the debate. They seem to be pretty consistent to many of the twitter account I follow and student’s reactions the day after the debate.
A few instances stood out to me throughout the debate, as I am sure they did for many people. These instances also connect well with what we have been reading and discussing in class.
1. Donald Trump’s remark, “Hillary doesn’t have the stamina” …to be president.
This comment is another one of Trump’s vague statements that he often makes with very little support. It is hard not to assume that Trump is not so discreetly aiming to tell the public that Hillary, as a woman, does not have the stamina to be president because the job is clearly a man’s job. This is a prime example of how Trump connects with his voters through displaying his masculinity and using gender stereotypes to remind the public that only a man can be president.
2. Trump’s statement “I know how to win”
Trump made this comment and further stated, that his temperament was one of his best qualities. Trump is able to make these statements because he is a man, because he knows his aggressive demeanor and drive (at all costs) to win the presidency reflects well on him as a strong, masculine man and connect well with much of the male population.
Additionally, in general the debate reflected how unique this election is, given the two candidates are celebrities. Of course, every campaign and election looks at who the people are and what they have done in the past in order to figure how they would act and what they would decide as presidents, however it seemed as though the entire debate was focused around “he did” “she did.” The nature of the debate was focused on ratting out one another’s past comments and actions, and as a result the content focused very little on the future and plans. This unfortunately may be the nature of the election, and particularly of Trump. Nevertheless, given that the candidates are celebrities, much of what they have done in the adult lives is public and is therefore fair game throughout the election and debate.
Before the debate, there was mixed commentary, some even predicted Trump would quit after (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/26/us/politics/trump-debate-schedule.html?_r=1), but the clear consensus was a large amount of voters remained undecided and would sway after debate.
During the debate, the two candidates successfully managed to differentiate themselves—Clinton even blatantly stated “we come at it from different perspectives” at the beginning of the debate. Clinton answered questions directly, and explained why she decided on her policies. Meanwhile, Trump ignored questions — when asked questions regarding America’s cyber-security, he responded with who is endorsing him, — or gave vague responses like, “don’t let our jobs leave” when asked “How will you bring back companies into our country?”. Shortly after this comment, Bernie Saunders tweeted “If Trump is concerned about companies going abroad maybe he should move his plants out of Bangladesh where workers are paid 30 cents an hour”. As the debate continued both candidates made unrealistic arguments—Trump’s arguments lacked any factual grounding and Clinton was idealistic to say she hopes to end Isis within the year.
Trump’s performance deteriorated throughout the debate when Trump began to wrongly argue with Lester Holt over his support for the Iraq war (http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/jun/22/donald-trump/trump-still-wrong-his-claim-opposed-iraq-war-ahead/). (Although, I do think it is important to note that the moderator in the debate was bias.) Trump then gave increasingly fact-less and pointless arguments, such as “I have a much better temperament than Secretary Clinton”, and saying Clinton does not have the stamina to be president of the United States. Throughout the debate, Trump continued to sniff—this raised questions about his own health, after he attacked Clinton for her own health and refused to release his health records (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/09/the-internet-has-some-theories-on-trumps-debate-sniffing.html).
Clinton gained steam at the end of the debate, drawing attention to Trump’s refusal to pay his workers, racial discrimination to renters, and sexist comments (which were all true and fact checked—see end of post for links). Trump’s response to the last question of the debate, (how he would feel if Clinton was elected POTUS) was shocking. I expected Trump to gloat about how he is the best candidate, but instead he stated that he would support Secretary Clinton. I was also surprised there was not more discussion on gender wage gap or healthcare during the debate.
As Stacey noted, Clinton “navigated the ‘gender minefield’’ well, while Trump was aggressive, telling the moderator he was wrong and interrupting Hillary consistently throughout the debate. The post debate commentary noted that Trump is held to a different standard than Clinton, but I was surprised that Trump was not more offensive during the debate. The commentary also stated that Clinton’s opening statement felt “over-prepared”, which goes back to the question of her authenticity. This statement made me wonder, has Clinton’s lack of authenticity made Trump’s honesty and rash persona more appealing to voters? Does the common feeling of choosing the lesser of two evils for POTUS reflect the style of the debate (highlighting the other candidate’s weaknesses almost more than talking about one’s own policies)?
This morning, the Wall Street Journal summarized the debate by saying “After 90 minutes, they did an incredibly effective job of moving no voters,” (http://www.wsj.com/articles/undecided-voters-react-coolly-to-donald-trump-during-debate-1474947738). This prolongs the great uncertainty of America’s future as the two candidates continue to battle it out in the upcoming debates.
Links:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/alicia-machado-donald-trump_us_57431d11e4b00e09e89f8aa4
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/inside-the-governments-racial-bias-case-against-donald-trumps-company-and-how-he-fought-it/2016/01/23/fb90163e-bfbe-11e5-bcda-62a36b394160_story.html
http://www.wsj.com/articles/donald-trumps-business-plan-left-a-trail-of-unpaid-bills-1465504454
My reaction to the debate is that I think Hillary Clinton came very prepared for the debate. She not only was able to answer each of the questions with well though answers, but she was also very prepared for what Trump would bring to the debate. In predictable fashion, Trump was his usual self making broad claims and blatantly making false claims, but Hillary dealt with this very well. She did not back down from the fight, nor was she overly harsh. In many cases, she just ignored him, especially when he was interrupting her responses. When she got into arguing matches, she was very calm and used her wit to argue against him. For me, Trump brought his usual strategy to the debate, and Hillary countered it extremely well.
This morning there has been much talk about the differences in the candidates’ preparedness for the debate. While Clinton was clearly well-prepared (and let us know she had done her homework while her competitor was traveling), Trump lacked the same calm, cool, and collected manner while responding to Holt.
Clinton’s campaign manager, Robby Mook, appeared on CNN this morning to claim that Trump was unprepared for the debate (https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/780743833692823552). After watching the election, this feels like a very accurate claim. Meanwhile, on this morning’s “Morning Joe” segment on MSNBC, Mika Brzezinski compares the debate to a job interview between a man and woman (https://twitter.com/Morning_Joe/status/780728410486165508). While she admits his claims are not always true, she calls Trump’s delivery “blustering,” and “confident,” which she says appeals to many viewers. On the topic of Clinton, Brzezinski proposes, “She was perfect. But sometimes that doesn’t matter. Especially when it comes to men and women going to job interviews.”
It is clear that Hillary was more prepared for this debate than Trump. Is if fair to punish her for this? What are your thoughts on Brzezinski’s comment’s?
This morning both Clinton and Trump’s campaign managers made appearances on CNN and MSNBC, respectively. As proven by their immediate appearances on big networks this morning, campaign managers are clearly another public face for the candidates. I am interested in what each of their campaign managers says about the public images Clinton and Trump are trying to achieve. While Robert Mook (Hillary’s CM) is a young-looking, clean-cut, articulate man, Kellyanne Conway (Trump’s CM) is a middle-aged, blonde, red-dress-clad woman. To assert authority and power in this election, does Hillary feel the need to be seen co closely affiliated with a successful man, and Trump by a beautiful woman?
I also thought it would be useful to include some quotes from both sides throughout the debate:
Trump:
o “Jobs are fleeing the country”
o “I will release my taxes when Hillary releases her deleted emails”
o “We need law and order”
o “My strongest asset, maybe by far, is my temperament” (to which Clinton replied, “Whoo! Ok!”)
o “Single greatest problem this world has is nuclear weapons, not global warming.”
o “Hillary has experiences, but they are bad experiences”
o “If she wins, I will absolutely support her.”
Clinton:
o “I want to help people balance family and work”
o “Donald, I know you live in your own reality”
o “Implicit bias is a problem for everyone, not just police”
o “A man who can be provoked by a tweet shouldn’t have his hands near the nuclear codes”
o “It is essential for America’s word to be good.”
o “The only secret is that (Trump) has no plan.”
o “This election is about you and your families and what kind of country you want.”
About midway through the debate, Clinton noted that in preparing for the debate and throughout her presidential campaign, she has been advised to take the high road against Trump’s aggressive and disrespectful comments. Tonight, that was what she did. Clinton started off weak compared to Trump because his witty comments overruled her serious, business-like responses. The Trump that showed up was glib, purposeful, and casual. His demeanor worked for a while, and got him to his position as representative of the Republican Party, however, after the first fifteen minutes of the debate, Clinton began to dominate in two ways. She answered the questions she was being asked and managed to respond to Trump’s comments in a official, yet cunning way. As always, she answered the questions asked by the moderator in a “political” way – truthfully, but only addressing what she herself wanted to address. More importantly, what she did better than usual was respond to Trump in a way that made him look like he wasn’t taking the debate seriously but didn’t make her seem “harsh” and “unladylike” as is her reputation. Regarding Liasson’s essay on the debate, therefore, I would argue Clinton navigated the “gender minefield” as best she could.
I agree with Stacey’s assessment of last night’s debate. I think it is worth reiterating the difference between the candidates’ delivery and articulation of their messages. While Clinton was able to clearly, methodically, and calmly answer all questions with thoughtful answers, Trump’s answers were loud and aggressive, often becoming so passionate that the viewer had no idea what was about to come out of his mouth. He seemed to have very little control over what he was about to say. And while he offered many comments, he failed to directly respond to many of the questions asked. I understand that many of Trump’s supporters appreciate this lack of censorship and measured articulation; however, what are we supposed to do when questions about the issues vital to our nation’s future are simply sidestepped?
Hi everybody. What do you think so far?
The current discussion between Lester Holt and Trump about the War in Iraq is very interesting. Trump refuses to acknowledge that he originally supported the war while Holt points out that he did support it. Politifact ranks this statement as false (https://twitter.com/politifactlive/status/780593256711200769). That Holt must argue with Trump over a fact that cannot be disputed is crazy, especially when there are so many organizations, like Politifact, that can prove him wrong immediately.
This morning there has been much talk about the differences in the candidates’ preparedness for the debate. While Clinton was clearly well-prepared (and let us know she had done her homework while her competitor was traveling), Trump lacked the same calm, cool, and collected manner while responding to Holt.
This morning Clinton’s campaign manager, Robby Mook, appeared on CNN to claim that Trump was unprepared for the debate. After watching the election, this feels like a very accurate claim. Meanwhile, on this morning’s “Morning Joe” segment on MSNBC, Mika Brzezinski compares the debate to a job interview between a man and woman. While she admits his claims are not always true, she calls Trump’s delivery “blustering,” and “confident,” which she says appeals to many viewers. On the topic of Clinton, Brzezinski proposes, “She was perfect. But sometimes that doesn’t matter. Especially when it comes to men and women going to job interviews.”
It is clear that Hillary was more prepared for this debate than Trump. Is if fair to punish her for this? What are your thoughts on Brzezinski’s comment’s?