We had planned to watch at home, but at 6:30 there was a major power outage knocking out 7,000 customers, including us. So instead we headed to the National Democratic Club. It was more than half empty — with Congress out of session a lot of people were not there.
First reaction which is not mine — there was a lot of hooting and hollering, specific moments leading to laughter or cheers and applause.
You already have scientific polls saying Clinton won.
If you watched Twitter, if your feed was at all like mine, the key issues were “nasty woman” and Trump not committing to accepting the outcome.
Perhaps you have heard commentary, such as Brian Williams saying the refusal to accept the results it was disqualifying.
Nicole Wallace said “he might as well lain in his own coffin and hammered nails into it.”
All of that is true.
It is also insufficient.
There is no doubt this was, at least for the first 30 minutes, Trump’s best performance. He reasonably kept his composure, he was not sniffing, he was not interrupting. But calling it his best performance is a very low bar, given how atrociously he did in the first two.
And then … Clinton was able to bait him, and hooked him completely.
He almost never smiled.
He interrupted.
He was nasty.
He was petulant.
He returned again and again to his pet talking points, regardless of the question at hand, or even to what Clinton has said that in theory to which he was responding.
Trump may have spoken on abortion and the Supreme Court in a way that appealed to his fervent but narrow base, but which inevitably alienated most other people.
Clinton gave a forceful defense of a woman’s right to make her own choose.
It was a tour de force for Clinton, because she seized every opening. She was the effective counterpuncher on issue after issue.
For some Americans, it was the first time they learned that Trump built using Chinese steel.
Clinton was able to give something of a vision of why she wants to be President in the closing. Trump spent his minute complaining and attacking, and offering no meaningful vision.
There was a moment that passed by most people because they were Anglo. It was heard clearly by ever Latino: “bad Hombres” — that will resound in Latino circles, and will intensify turnout in opposition to Mr. Trump.
And of course, “such a nasty woman” will continue to hurt him, along with his constant interruption, his reaction to being asked about the charges of sexual abuse, the fact he did not apologize to his wife.
What will be the impact of this? I suspect it will NOT stop Trump’s downward spiral in polls, but it also will not accelerate it.
The legitimacy of the results — that is going to be an issue for every down ballot Republican to have to address, they will be forced to go on the record about that. If they do not step away from Trump on that issue they are likely to undercut any appeal to independents and moderates, and if they do some Trump supporters might be angered.
In my opinion, this debate performance was more harmful for down ballot Republicans than for Trump himself, but that is largely because he was already toast.
My favorite moment in the aftermath can be seen in this tweet from his co-author on The Art of the Deal. It occurred as Trump was trying to work the crowd afterward.
Having Schwartz as her guest created this moment on behalf of Clinton. In it, she got inside his brain in a way that all his attempts to throw her off by his guests did not.
Schwartz later wrote about that exchange
Three other tweets from Schwartz:
A few additional comments.
Chris Wallace did a good job. He actually did fact check Trump. And his willingness to push Trump created the most memorable moment.
Clinton did ramble at times, but she also successfully pivoted and avoided answering several problematic questions. Her pivots demonstrated skill, while Trump just simply by blunt force changed the topic, sometime with no effort to ever address the original question.
Clinton did nothing to hurt herself. Of greater importance, she demonstrated that she could go directly at Trump, hard. She demonstrated strength and made him at times look weak.
But then, he did most of the damage he suffered he did to himself.
Although she did him a great deal of damage. Especially when Trump said to Clinton that Putin had no respect for her and she responded “That’s because he’d rather have a puppet.”
As a Democratic partisan and Clinton supporter, I saw much to enjoy tonight.
As an American and a student of politics and history, I was more than a little saddened by what we had to go through because of Mr. Trump.
I have now listened to and watched 2 hours of commentary. I have heard nothing to convince me I am wrong.