{"id":12388,"date":"2016-09-27T06:25:56","date_gmt":"2016-09-27T06:25:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/?p=12388"},"modified":"2016-09-27T06:25:56","modified_gmt":"2016-09-27T06:25:56","slug":"5-takeaways-from-the-first-presidential-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/elections\/5-takeaways-from-the-first-presidential-debate.html","title":{"rendered":"5 takeaways from the first presidential debate"},"content":{"rendered":"

5 takeaways from the first presidential debate<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

5 takeaways from the first presidential debate<\/strong> : There were a couple of not-so-very-subtle signals here inside of Hofstra University that Donald Trump lost Monday night\u2019s highly-anticipated debate against Hillary Clinton, and badly.<\/span><\/p>\n

The first was the audible sound of groaning by some of his supporters (picked up by my attentive colleague Steve Shepard) inside the debate hall as Trump meandered self-defensively through a succession of answers meant to defend himself against a very focused, very energized and very well-rehearsed Hillary Clinton.<\/span><\/p>\n

Another tell that the night was a dud: After the 90-minute sparring match finished, Clinton\u2019s team practically bounded into the spin room \u2013 more in glassy-eyed disbelief than visible elation that things had gone so much better than expected. The GOP nominee\u2019s people, by contrast, dribbled into the media pen like surly seventh-graders headed for homeroom the day before summer vacation. \u201cF\u2014k, let\u2019s do this,\u201d a prominent Trump surrogate said before diving into a scrum.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trump and his new-ish messaging team have labored mightily to turn the avatar of populist rage into a reasonable facsimile of someone who you could see sitting in the Oval Office. But this best-laid plan unraveled on Monday \u2013 amid Clinton\u2019s steely assault and the dignified interrogation of NBC\u2019s Lester Holt, who struck a deft balance between facilitator, BS detector and lion tamer.<\/span><\/p>\n

Within minutes, Clinton\u2019s attacks forced domesticated Donald to go feral \u2013 he bellowed, interrupted her repeatedly, grunted, and toward the bedraggled end, became muted and pouty.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt was bizarre,\u201d said Barack Obama\u2019s campaign manager David Plouffe, who seemed visibly relieved. \u201cHe was clearly rattled, and clearly focused on defending himself, which I\u2019m told narcissists are prone to do, and he clearly faded at the end. It\u2019s not like she\u2019s going to jump out to a 10-point lead, but this was good.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Whether or not this reverses Trump\u2019s momentum, or reestablishes her dominance is an open question. Who won is not. Here are five takeaways.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trump was wimpy on defense. Trump is supposed to be the big meanie but it was Clinton who hit him where it hurt most. It doesn\u2019t take a Jung (or even Dr. Phil after a couple of Bud Lights) to figure out that the GOP nominee \u2013 who boasts like a barfly with a winning Lotto ticket \u2013 just might be over-compensating for something. Hence, Clinton, who started the debate a little tentatively, quickly launched into a carefully planned program of Freudian mind-games, contrasting her own middle-class businessman dad (who had his own issues) with Trump\u2019s imperious, larger-than-life father Fred who launched his son\u2019s business career but also was said to be extremely tough on him.<\/span><\/p>\n

First she started in with a paean to her father\u2019s toil running a small printing business in Chicago (This might be the first time a candidate has described, in detail, the silk-screen squeegee process on a debate stage) \u2013 then pivoting to mocking supposedly self-made Trump\u2019s acceptance of a $14 million loan to start his real estate business. \u201cYou know, Donald was very fortunate in his life and that’s all to his benefit. He started his business with $14 million, borrowed from his father,\u201d she said icily.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMy father gave me a very small loan in 1975 and I built it into a company that’s worth many, many billions of dollars,\u201d he responded weakly \u2013 and so it went on a range of topics.<\/span><\/p>\n

Whether it was because Clinton was so well prepped, and Trump was so breezily unprepared \u2013 or a simple case of opening night jitters \u2013 the bully-boy nominee abandoned his most effective mode of debate combat, answering an attack with a harsher one. She went right for Trump\u2019s ego \u2013 questioning his questionable $11 billion net worth, his boastful record on job creation and picking apart his tough talk on fighting ISIS.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/object><\/span><\/p>\n

In 2007, preparing for a primary race she\u2019d eventually lose, she told me that the key to presidential political campaigns was understanding that the most effective attacks weren\u2019t about exploiting someone\u2019s weaknesses but challenging an opponent\u2019s perceived strengths. When confronted with that assault, Trump wilted and offered a series of meandering answers that had his Republicans wincing. \u201cIt was a draw,\u201d former Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown said. \u201cBut he was on the defensive far too much. That\u2019s a direct result of his inexperience.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

What about the Clinton Foundation? The former secretary\u2019s debate team (including longtime aide Phillippe Reines, who snapped a pre-debate photo in a Trump circled-finger pose) expected him to savage her on the various questions raised about her family\u2019s foundation. They were worried about it. While he hammered her ever-so-briefly on emails, he was so engaged in self-justification, he flat-out forgot to pursue an attack that could have made the night a lot less lousy.<\/span><\/p>\n

His \u201c30 years\u201d attack worked \u2013 and he\u2019ll use it again. Trump may have lost the first debate, but he\u2019s proven to be a fast learner, and is likely to come back stronger in early October for the second debate, a town hall style affair, in St. Louis. And there were a few gold nuggets strewn in the wreckage of Hofstra \u2013 the most valuable an assault (demonstrable and fact-checker-friendly) on Clinton\u2019s effectiveness in 25-plus years of public life.<\/span><\/p>\n

The been-there-not-done-that argument was particularly useful when coupled with his usual slams on Bill Clinton\u2019s passage of the increasingly unpopular NAFTA agreement from the 1990s and Hillary Clinton\u2019s election-year flip-flop from TPP booster to opponent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBut in all fairness to Secretary Clinton, when she started talking about this, it was really very recently,\u201d Trump said of her opposition to the trade deal. \u201cShe’s been doing this for 30 years. And why hasn’t she made the agreements better? The NAFTA agreement is defective. Just because of the tax and many other reasons, but just because of the fact.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

When Clinton claimed that she planned to \u201creally work to get new jobs and to get exports that helped to create more new jobs.\u201d He scoffed, and shot back, \u201cBut you haven’t done it in 30 years or 26 years.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Clinton effectively attacked his business career. Trump\u2019s attempt to head off debate-night questions about his five-year campaign promoting the birther slander against Barack Obama was a humbling face-plant. His attempt to pin the origin of the charge against Clinton associate Sid Blumenthal was semi-effective with the political press, but it withered under the insistent interrogation of an African-American moderator determined to extract an apology or reasonable explanation. Trump offered neither \u2013 and suggested Obama should actually be grateful he pursued the canard because it\u2019s now been resoundingly put to rest.<\/span><\/p>\n

Politically, his tortured explanation helps energize black voters \u2013 who already oppose him in historic numbers. But later in the debate, Clinton plucked the strains of what could be a genuine crossover hit this fall among ever-elusive white working-class voters and independents: Trump\u2019s failure to turn over his tax returns. Clinton went there with a vengeance \u2013 engaging in a little Trump-esque fact-free speculation about the motives of the billionaire developer-turned-reality TV star.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSo you’ve got to ask yourself, why won’t he release his tax returns?\u201d Clinton mused, with relish. \u201cAnd I think there may be a couple of reasons. First, maybe he’s not as rich as he says he is. Second, maybe he’s not as charitable as he claims to be. Third, we don’t know all of his business dealings… Or maybe he doesn’t want the American people, all of you watching tonight, to know that he’s paid nothing in federal taxes, because the only years that anybody’s ever seen were a couple of years when he had to turn them over to state authorities when he was trying to get a casino license, and they showed he didn’t pay any federal income tax.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s answer did more harm than good:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThat makes me smart,\u201d he said \u2013 referring to his business, not his political, acumen.<\/span><\/p>\n

Her most effective attack \u2013 and his worst answer. If the GOP nominee needed any more proof that preparation trumps bombast in a general election debate, he got it when Clinton launched a merciless attack on his habit of stiffing contractors who have labored on his construction projects over the years. Again, Clinton brought it back to her father, describing how bad he would have felt if one of his clients had accepted his work without paying his bill.<\/span><\/p>\n

“I\u2019ve met dishwashers, painters, architects, marble installers, drapery installers, who you refused to pay when they finished the work you asked them to do,\u201d Clinton said, delivering a carefully scripted attack. \u201cWe have an architect in the audience who designed one of your clubhouses at one of your golf courses. It’s a beautiful facility. It immediately was put to use. And you wouldn’t pay what the man needed to be paid, what he was charging you to do.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This is a particular dangerous issue for a candidate whose entire campaign is rooted in fighting for the working class — and his flippant response, yet again, gave even greater comfort to his enemies.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe he didn’t do a good job and I was unsatisfied with his work,\u201d Trump quipped.<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/strong> : http:\/\/www.politico.com\/story\/2016\/09\/clinton-trump-debate-takeaways-228758<\/span><\/p>\n

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