"He prowled around
Hillary Clinton, looming behind her when she approached the undecided
voters in the audience. He hugged himself and hooked his hands in his
belt. He inhaled so sharply through his nose that he sounded like he
was snorting his own insults." (...)
Richard Wolffe
A
Red Bull display of madness': reactions to the Trump-Clinton
presidential debate
Hillary
Clinton and Donald Trump clashed on Sunday night in St Louis at their
second debate, an event full of crosstalk and character attacks
Richard Wolffe,
Jessica Valenti, Kenneth Pennington and Christopher R Barron
Monday 10 October
2016 04.33 BST
Richard Wolffe: ‘The
nicest thing you could say about Trump’s performance was that it
was bonkers’
richard wolffe
That banging sound
you heard were the last nails being hammered into the coffin of the
Trump campaign. Or it might have been the thumping of Donald Trump as
he stalked the debate stage.
Either way, the
Republican nominee treated the notion of a contrite, humble
performance with all the subtlety of a subway train. Not for him was
the usual shame we associate with someone caught in a moment of
sleaze.
He prowled around
Hillary Clinton, looming behind her when she approached the undecided
voters in the audience. He hugged himself and hooked his hands in his
belt. He inhaled so sharply through his nose that he sounded like he
was snorting his own insults.
Wounded animals
behave in strange ways, and Donald Trump was nothing if not strange
at the second presidential debate. He went far beyond barking his
usual interruptions and conspiracies from the darkest corners of the
internet: he answered a question from a Muslim voter by saying it was
“a shame” there was Islamophobia. Then, two feet away from his
questioner, he stoked Islamophobia as much as he possibly could: “We
could be very politically correct, but whether we like it or not,
there is a problem.”
He blamed Hillary
Clinton for allowing him to pay no taxes. “Of course I do,” he
admitted, when asked if he took advantage of tax loopholes. “So do
all of her donors or most of her donors.”
He blamed both
Clintons for raising the issue of sexual assault, as if he was just a
hapless victim. “I think it’s disgraceful and I think she should
be ashamed of herself, if you want to know the truth,” he said.
In any normal
presidential debate, a nominee would be embarrassed to say something
that evoked Gerald Ford’s calamitous assertion that there was no
Soviet domination of eastern Europe. But Trump bettered Ford by
several thermonuclear warheads: “I know about Russia but I know
nothing about the inner workings of Russia,” he said.
The nicest thing you
could say about Trump’s performance was that it was bonkers. A Red
Bull display of sheer madness all the way to the end, when Clinton
complimented his children.
“I don’t know if
it was meant to be a compliment,” he said. Donald Trump knows about
elections but he knows nothing about their inner workings.
Jessica Valenti:
‘People will say that Trump won simply because he didn’t
spontaneously combust on stage’
If there was a theme
for Trump this evening, it would be aggressive desperation. Whether
is was the skulking around in Hillary Clinton’s frame, his shots at
her marriage or his inability to stop interrupting both Clinton and
the moderators – it all came across as a last gasp.
Trump set out to
defeat Clinton in the debate in the only way he knows how to deal
with women – as as Rebecca Traister put it – by “sexualizing,
degrading and humiliating her”. That’s why he trotted out a
pre-debate panel of women who have accused Bill Clinton of various
offenses, and it’s why he took aim at Hillary Clinton on the same
topic at the start of the debate. But it didn’t land, because
everyone is still talking about the video of his horrific comments on
women.
Donald Trump’s sex
boasts: ‘When you are a star they let you do anything’
I was glad that
Anderson Cooper laid it plain; he asked Trump, “You bragged that
you have sexually assaulted women. Do you understand that?” Trump,
who later dismissed the tape as “just words”, doubled down on
calling his comments “locker room talk”.
What made that
non-apology even worse was the physical way Trump held himself in the
debate. Perhaps if you’ve been embroiled in a controversy about
groping women and bragging about groping women, you don’t skulk
around stage behind a woman. (And maybe don’t threaten to throw her
in a jail – a new low!)
I predict that on
Monday there will be people saying that Trump won simply because he
didn’t spontaneously combust on stage. Clinton was clearly more
composed and knowledgable, while Trump did his usual word salad,
ignoring questions and making the odd racist move of talking about
inner cities to an undecided voter seemingly only because he was
black.
But at the end of
this strange event, I think the biggest loser was all of us watching.
Kenneth Pennington:
‘Trump is depriving Americans of robust national discourse’
Donald Trump lost
tonight’s debate. His asinine attempts to dismiss his piggish
behavior by distracting viewers with talk of Bill Clinton and Isis
were a failure.
But the real losers
in tonight’s debate, and in this election, are the American people.
When Donald Trump answers a serious question about his (lack of)
healthcare proposals, he says simply, “The plans are going to be so
good.” When asked about his (lack of) morals, he says randomly,
“I’m gonna knock the hell out of Isis.” He won’t answer
questions.
Part of that is a
deliberate diversion strategy. To avoid talking about the video clip
where he appears to condone sexual assault, he slams Bill Clinton or
resorts to fear-mongering. But most of Trump’s answers lack depth
because he simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about. When
Anderson Cooper pressed him on how he could possibly reconcile his
policy on preconditions with a repeal of Obamacare, he had absolutely
nothing to say. He just doesn’t know.
When it comes to the
Syrian civil war and the millions of victims it’s claimed, his
policy also remains to be seen. This is a man who decides
consequential policy positions on the stage because he hasn’t
thought of them ahead of time. When he threw Mike Pence under the bus
on Syria, it appeared to be the first time he’d even considered the
question at hand.
Sadly, his lack of
depth means our country has lost a valuable opportunity to engage in
a desperately needed public discussion about the differing viewpoints
in America on consequential issues. America needs Hillary Clinton to
face off with an opponent who will challenge her viewpoints, not a
hollow-headed clown with zero depth.
How can we fight
climate change, raise incomes for the middle class, reform our ailing
democracy, educate our children or champion world peace without
serious and deep debate? We’ll never make headway on our serious
challenges without robust national discourse. Trump’s campaign is
depriving us it.
Christopher R
Barron: ‘Trump succeeded in recapturing the momentum’
After a poor first
debate performance – and the Friday release of the Access Hollywood
tape – Republican nominee Donald Trump needed to hit a home run
Sunday night to change the narrative and recapture the momentum.
Trump succeeded, and
he succeeded before the first question was even asked.
Trump’s pre-debate
press event with four women who have accused both Clintons of
wrongdoing changed the conversation from what Donald Trump said in
2005 to what Bill and Hillary Clinton actually did.
It is clear that
Trump’s pre-game press conference not only got talking heads to
change the conversation, but it got Hillary Clinton – once believed
to be unflappable – off her game, in a big way.
If Clinton was
prepared for whatever Trump threw at her, it certainly didn’t come
across in this debate.
Gone was the happy
warrior from the last debate; in its place was a new defensive
Hillary Clinton.
Trump kept Clinton
on her heels for the entire debate. Whether sparring over Obamacare
or foreign policy or tax reform or job creation, he effectively kept
hammering her on her 30-year record.
Instead of a debate
that was focused on Trump’s vulgar comments, the debate was focused
on policy issues, and despite all of Clinton’s “preparation”
when it came to the nuts and bolts of policy, Trump managed to not
only go toe-to-toe with Clinton, he often got the best of her.
Trump needed to win
tonight to stay alive. Clinton did not. Trump won, and he lives to
fight another day. This race is far from over.
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