First Presidential debate: Mon 9/26

[Mori Chu]

I'm really looking forward to this one. I think it will get huge ratings.

Which Trump will show up? Will he be reserved, the more Kellyanne Conway version? Will he be blustering, loud, and aggressive, more of the Republican primary version of Trump?

How will Hillary handle herself? She's the more experienced, the more prepared, the better debater. But can she handle an opponent who will probably puff out his chest and question her character and toughness more than her knowledge and her record?

I can't wait. I have my biases and I really don't want Trump to win, but I think the debates will be what causes a lot of the people in the middle to make their decisions.

[Nodack]

I am too also looking forward to this. For me it comes down to the moderator. Will the moderator let him get away with not answering the questions and just attacking Clinton or will they hold him accountable and hold him to the fire? Lester Holt from NBC is moderating. He's a black man from the notoriously Liberal NBC. Trump will no doubt attack him as biased after the debate and have a few choice insults for him. That I will put money down and on today. Will they hold Hillary accountable or throw her softball questions?

IMO Hillary will go into great detail after each question naming specific people and places relevant to the questions.

Trump will speak in generic terms and say how horrible everything is, not knowing any specifics about anything.

I want to see them focus on specifics of their plans, not attack each other. That does nothing for me and makes them both less Presidential IMO.

What is your plan to deal with ISIS?
What is your plan to fix health care?
What is your plan to create good jobs for average Americans?

Mr: Trump, you said you would rebuild our dilapidated military, build a giant wall, rebuild our infrustructure and lower the debt. How will you pay for these things? You said you would lower taxes dramatically.

I'm not an expert but, I grew up thinking that the government paid for all those things with tax money. You want to spend a LOT of money AND lower taxes by a lot and somehow pay for all these things while lowering the debt? My little brain says you are making promises you can't possibly keep. My little brain from experience knows that politicians always make more promises than they can keep. As soon as they are elected they throw all those promises right in the trash and do what they want.

[O_Gardino]

...
Mr: Trump, you said you would rebuild our dilapidated military, build a giant wall, rebuild our infrustructure and lower the debt. How will you pay for these things? You said you would lower taxes dramatically.

I'm not an expert but, I grew up thinking that the government paid for all those things with tax money. You want to spend a LOT of money AND lower taxes by a lot and somehow pay for all these things while lowering the debt? My little brain says you are making promises you can't possibly keep. My little brain from experience knows that politicians always make more promises than they can keep. As soon as they are elected they throw all those promises right in the trash and do what they want.

There's a difference between making promises and talking shit. Trump hasn't made any promises. He doesn't mean a thing that comes out of his mouth.

[Mori Chu]

Things are already heating up. Trump is apparently going to bring Gennifer Flowers to the debate. That's a pretty low blow.

EDIT: Now the Trump campaign is saying she isn't invited? Maybe all they needed was to get her name back into the news cycle, which they certainly accomplished.

[Indy]

Things are already heating up. Trump is apparently going to bring Gennifer Flowers to the debate. That's a pretty low blow.

EDIT: Now the Trump campaign is saying she isn't invited? Maybe all they needed was to get her name back into the news cycle, which they certainly accomplished.

Exactly. Worked like a charm. Their method is to keep Clinton off balance. They know that if they go into the ring with her on domestic or foreign policy issues, speaking specifics, they can't win. They need to get her to throw mud too, so the Sanders voters really feel there isn't much of a difference between the two. Really, the way Trump wins this election is not by getting more people to vote for him than Romney got, but to get less people to vote for Hillary than voted for Obama. He is doing a good job of that. And Millenials seem to be more concerned with how life-long Independent Bernie isn't the Democratic Party's nominee than they are with stopping a truly scary person rising to power.

[Wally_West]

Trump was spectacularly bad.

[Superbone]

Yeah, I don't think that debate changed anybody's minds. Trump lost his composure.

[ShelC]

Yea nothing really shocking for anyone paying attention the past year. Clinton was detailed and nuanced, Trump spoke in generalities and attacked throughout. Thing is, Trump's generalities tend to play well with some, as Clinton loses people with her boring policy details. I couldn't tell you Clinton's plan for the economy. But Trumps? Re-negotiate trade deals and go after Mexico and China on trade and keep American businesses from leaving the country. Are those the issues with the economy? Can he re-negotiate the deals? Can he keep American businesses and jobs here? I have no idea, but it sure sounds good and those are simple answers people can understand.

Many of Trump's statements were false/flat out wrong and all the fact checking won't change much unfortunately. In terms of presence, no contest. Clinton was cool and collected, Trump seemed (for the first time IMO), nervous and jittery. The sniffling, reaching for water, his tie wasn't properly tucked into his suit jacket. Felt like he was off.

But hey, today he and his team will re-write the narrative, tell everyone they won and move on and that'll be it.

[Mori Chu]

I thought the debate showed that she was very clearly more fit for the Presidency than Trump was. I don't know if the general consensus will agree with me, but I thought Hillary scored a win. The Birther part and the "stamina" part were particularly bad for Trump.

[Nodack]

Trump started out ok. Hillary started baiting him and he couldn't help but to take the bait.

Clinton- "So you didn't pay any taxes?"

Trump- "Because I'm smart."

Clinton- "So no money to help schools, the military, roads, etc?""

Trump- "They would just squander it anyway."

Clinton- "You stiffed a lot of your contractors. There is even a architect here tonight who designed one of your buildings and was stiffed. The building is beautiful and you used it right away. Why didn't you pay him?"

Trump- "He probably did a poor job."

Clinton- "You were busted twice by the Justice Department for refusing to rent to blacks."

Trump- "We settled out of court and besides, several other landlords were busted for the same thing."

Holmes- "You said that Hillary didn't have the look to be President of the United States. What did you mean by that?"

Trump- "She doesn't have the stamina."

Clinton- "He tried to switch from looks to stamina, but this is a man who has called women pigs, slobs, and dogs."

It seemed half the questions Trump was asked to answer, he went into some unrelated rant about I have no idea and certainly never came close to answering what was asked. I wouldn't be surprised if he refused to do any more debates. He needs to redeem himself.

Obama barely showed up for his first debate with Romney and was crushed. He acted like he wasn't interested in being there and was a wimp. Even his own handlers told him he sucked including Michelle. Obama came out in the second debate much more aggressive and won so we will see. Who in Trumps corner is going to tell him he sucked? He has a reputation of not listening to anybody but himself.

[Nodack]

Some people aren't into fact checking but, I am.

Factcheck.org fact checked the debate and here are their findings.

http://www.factcheck.org/2016/09/factch ... st-debate/

[ShelC]

What's becoming annoying for me (and it's Trump's own doing) are the pointless arguments about Obama's birthplace, who opposed the Iraq War and when...those aren't "issues". Problem is, Trump makes certain claims, then backtracks, then tries to correct people who call him out, then keeps flipping and twisting and dredging it back up. He just can't help himself and gets baited and goes off the rails and off topic. That was clearly the biggest mistake he made during the debate. I get what he means when he says he's smart for not paying federal taxes, but you can't win that argument in a Presidential debate. People get turned off by that stuff but he wears it like a badge of honor.

I watched some of Trump last night on O'Reilly and it felt like it was a practice run for upcoming debates. O'Reilly was almost coaching him on how to answer certain questions and how to stay on topic whenever Trump started to digress and get off topic. Trump was a lot more measured, even cut himself off at one point when he started to go off the rails and circled back to the question at hand. It's those things he needs to work on and polish. He can get by with the general speaking points and get after Clinton on emails, Benghazi, trade, race relations, etc so long as he's succinct and to the point. Otherwise he just turns into a rambling mess who does more harm to himself than anything Hillary says or does.

[Indy]

What's becoming annoying for me (and it's Trump's own doing) are the pointless arguments about Obama's birthplace, who opposed the Iraq War and when...those aren't "issues". Problem is, Trump makes certain claims, then backtracks, then tries to correct people who call him out, then keeps flipping and twisting and dredging it back up. He just can't help himself and gets baited and goes off the rails and off topic. That was clearly the biggest mistake he made during the debate. I get what he means when he says he's smart for not paying federal taxes, but you can't win that argument in a Presidential debate. People get turned off by that stuff but he wears it like a badge of honor.

I watched some of Trump last night on O'Reilly and it felt like it was a practice run for upcoming debates. O'Reilly was almost coaching him on how to answer certain questions and how to stay on topic whenever Trump started to digress and get off topic. Trump was a lot more measured, even cut himself off at one point when he started to go off the rails and circled back to the question at hand. It's those things he needs to work on and polish. He can get by with the general speaking points and get after Clinton on emails, Benghazi, trade, race relations, etc so long as he's succinct and to the point. Otherwise he just turns into a rambling mess who does more harm to himself than anything Hillary says or does.

All those things, and he is clearly a bigoted, racist, misogynist. You can win the presidency in this country by being the first two time and time again. But if you literally only get <1% of the black vote, and <20% of hispanic/latin voters, you need a YUUUUGE amount of white women voting for you. And it can't just be the ones that vote the way their husbands tell them to vote. So every time it is clear that he thinks women are 2nd class citizens, he gets further from the white house.

[Superbone]

So every time it is clear that he thinks women are 2nd class citizens, he gets further from the white house.

You would think so but I'm still very nervous.

[Nodack]

The fact that it's this close makes me shake my head.

The Arizona Republic has endorsed every Republican President since 1890. This year they are endorsing Clinton because they say Trump is unfit to be President. They have received death threats.

[Mori Chu]

It makes me sad how many people have no problem supporting a candidate who repeatedly discriminates against so many groups. Muslims, Hispanics, women, blacks, etc. Why is that acceptable? How is an email server worse than being an indecent discriminatory person?

[Phoenix219]

Uhm, one is a federal crime and a national security leak that endangered millions of americans, and if not for political protection, to a normal person, would have already ended up in jail time.... things being deleted with high end software after the government asked for it..... playing condescendingly stupid "what, wipe it with a cloth?" which is all signifying much more dangerous character flaws then the *personal opinion/judgement* ... how is wanting to vet immigrants and uphold our terribly flawed immigration policy discrimination? how is any of that anything more then your personal opinion and media spin? are any of those things crimes? are HER offenses crimes? Its that simple. Personal opinion is not discrimination, by the way. Actual discrimination is way more then a slant put on words. It boggles my mind that so many intelligent people are willing to overlook decades of criminal behavior and yet feel so morally superior. It boggles my mind that so many intlligent people are willing to buy the media spin of "anti Hispansics" when every word ever said on the topic has blatantly been about illegal immigrants that *should not be here.* It boggles my mind that so many intelligent people are against background checks and vetting processes for letting unknown immigrants and refugees into this country.

I know what happens now, though, so I won't be back to reply. Fire away.

[Mori Chu]

Hi P219, thanks for sharing your views on the subject. I hear what you're saying. I want to be clear that I'm *very* upset with Hillary about the email server. It was wrong and stupid and irresponsible of her to do it. I don't care if she didn't really know or understand what the consequences were; if she didn't, she should have known. I was mad about the email server when it first came up, and I'm mad about it now. It reeks of an "I am above the law" attitude, that a politician can hide their records and information without consequences.

And Hillary's initial reaction when caught on the email thing was disappointing. She defended and denied it and didn't sound remorseful or like she understood the gravity of what she had done. You're right that she also played coy about some things she was asked, like that cringe-worthy quote about "wiping down" a server. That is very disappointing, and I don't defend it. I am upset with her for doing that, and she deserves to be criticized by Trump and the media for it.

The part where I disagree with you is the "federal crime" part. There was a full investigation of her actions with the email server, and though they strongly admonished her and said that she was wrong and irresponsible, that it did not constitute a crime. The investigator said that she didn't break any laws and should not be tried for what happened.

I think both sides should be more willing to call out their candidate when he/she does the wrong thing. Hillary was just plain wrong about the email. Trump is plain wrong to act like all Muslims are terrorists/dangerous. Trump is wrong to say that Mexicans are rapists and criminals. They both have some strengths and some weaknesses, and it's all of our duty to be honest with ourselves about what they are, as much as we can.

[ShelC]

The part where I disagree with you is the "federal crime" part. There was a full investigation of her actions with the email server, and though they strongly admonished her and said that she was wrong and irresponsible, that it did not constitute a crime. The investigator said that she didn't break any laws and should not be tried for what happened.

http://nypost.com/2015/09/23/hillary-to ... book-says/

http://nypost.com/2016/09/23/fresh-proo ... as-a-joke/

Just some background into the "investigation". The whole thing was a joke and just going through the motions for "optics". What about Bill meeting with Loretta Lynch on the tarmac of an airport? They were just discussing golf and grandkids tho...

Whether or not she broke any laws...well that's always it with the Clintons. They're lawyers through and through and live in the gray area where you're never sure if what they did was actually a crime. That's what drives people crazy. The fact remains, she destroyed evidence so it's still obstruction of justice. And if those emails were to surface, there may be incriminating evidence showing she lied about what was in the emails or actual criminal activity in the emails (re The Clinton Foundation).

[Mori Chu]

I think part of the reason I favor Hillary over Trump so much is that it reminds me a lot of the 2000 election, Gore vs W Bush. I looked it as a smart person I didn't trust vs. an affable, cheerful dope. I decided I preferred the dope, that he would surround himself with good advisors and people to help him run things, and that I didn't like or trust Gore. The next 8 years were in my opinion a total disaster, and I decided that I want somebody intelligent and competent and experienced in the White House, even if I dislike a few of the things they have done along the way. This is especially true when the alternative is a man like Trump, who is probably the most reprehensible person to become a major Presidential candidate that I have seen in my life.

I do wish we had a great candidate and not two who are so bad. I think a lot of the anger on both sides this year is because we both know deep down that our candidates are deeply flawed and that our party should have done better. I can live with Hillary because of her many years of experience and knowledge, but all these scandals and mini-scandals and rumors and potential scandals make it tough to unabashedly support her.