At 9:03 PM, Monday, September 26th two titans entered the debate stage at Hofstra University, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, two names that today are inescapable even to those “living under a rock.”
So many questions: What were the highlights of the debate? How will this debate affect the election? Who won? Answers will differ, depending on who you ask.
But for a debate that was anticipated to be “unpredictable,” or “unprecedented,” it was exactly as expected.
Looking at a candidate’s technique really provides a tremendous level of insight: Hillary was almost 100% scripted, rehearsed, and pre-planned. You could tell every sentence out of her mouth was rehearsed countless times with her advisors, prior to stepping onto the stage. The upside to this is cohesion, clarity, good articulation, and her words coming out exactly as planned as she attempted to capture that “Presidential” tone she so desperately wants.
The downside to her technique is she sometimes comes across as overly-scripted and overly-rehearsed, which at times makes her seem robotic, insincere, or “out-of-touch” with the American people (who would ever get that impression between her and Bill’s combined net worth of over $110,000,000+?).
Trump, on the other hand, is not nearly as scripted or rehearsed; many of his comments are made “off the cuff” or “off the top of his head.” There were even pre-debate leaks suggesting Trump barely prepared for the debate, instead using this time to continue traveling the campaign trail.
The upside to this is he sounds less scripted, and more honest, ultimately using a more casual, “everyday” manner of speaking that is more familiar and appealing to everyday Americans. Layman’s terminology, not expert terminology, worked incredibly well for him in the primaries and will continue to now in the general election.
The downside of his technique being, every now and again, these comments get him in trouble as his wording of certain ideas comes out sounding wrong, or is misconstrued–part of the political “spin” process we’ve seen take place in politics for decades where one campaign distorts and twists the message of another.
The debate could almost be summed up with: Trump displayed “too much” passion and emotion while giving his proposals, while Clinton displayed “too little,” both as a result of their respective speaking styles and techniques.
While Hillary may have had better answers to Lester Holt’s questions, or at the very least better worded answers, Trump had better replies, rebuttals, and comebacks, which are more in line with his off-the-cuff nature and quick-wit.
It was very obvious that another part of Hillary’s strategy going in was to use pre-planned “sound bites” against Donald, hoping they would gain traction in the media cycle following the debate.
An example would be when Donald outlined his tax plan, which included lowering taxes across the board for all Americans, claiming he would have the biggest tax cuts since President Reagan, which will create jobs and stimulate the economy. Hillary fired back, referring to this plan as “Trumped-up trickle-down,” obviously a reference to the highly controversial “trickle-down” economics of Ronald Reagan, that even his own Vice President George H.W. Bush once referred to as “voodoo economics.”
Hillary went on to claim “trickle-down didn’t work, it got us into the mess we were in, in 2008.” Did it? This is where fact-checking is key: while there is evidence trickle-down backfired for Reagan, causing wealth to flow upward towards the wealthy, instead of downward stimulating the economy, the real cause of the 08’ recession could be…none other than the policies of President Bill Clinton.
In 1999 President Clinton signed into law the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which effectively repealed the provisions of the 1933 Glass-Steagall act that Bill Clinton publicly declared “no longer appropriate.” This piece of deregulation made it once again possible for affiliations to exist between commercial banks and securities firms.
Many economists, such as nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, argued Bill Clinton’s repeal of these provisions was a major factor in causing the 2008 financial crisis.
As the debate began to pivot towards national security and defense issues, Trump stated, “Just go to her (Clinton’s) website, she tells you how to fight ISIS on her website. I don’t think General MacArthur would like that.” Hillary responded, “At least I have a plan to fight ISIS.” To which Trump replied, “You’re telling the enemy everything you want to do!”
The suggestion, of course, being that Hillary telegraphed our military strategies to the Islamic State, who have internet access, while Trump kept his proposed strategies “under-wraps” to defeat ISIS using tactics they would be unprepared for.
When asked by Holt about why he’d not yet released his tax returns, Trump went in depth about how he intended to release his returns once his IRS audit was complete, and that he already made full financial disclosures to the Federal Elections Commission when he announced his campaign. Hillary went on the offensive, claiming that every major candidate for the past forty years had released their tax returns. This is false. President Reagan only released his tax returns once, as reported by the Los Angeles Times, in 1979 prior to taking office, and never released them again, citing “privacy.”
Trump then made an electric comeback, “I will release my tax returns against my lawyers wishes, when she releases her 33,000 emails that have been deleted…almost every lawyer says don’t release your returns until the audit is complete. When the audit is complete I’ll do it, but I would go against them if she releases her emails.”
A few comments towards the end of the debate really struck at the core of what is happening this election. When on the topic of nuclear weapons, Hillary stated, “his cavalier attitude about nuclear weapons is so deeply troubling. That is the number one threat we face in the world, and it becomes particularly terrifying if terrorists ever get their hands on nuclear material.”
Trump rebutted that Hillary has just as many shortcomings with her temperament and then said, “Hillary has experience, but it’s bad experience… this country cannot afford another four years of that experience,” to which the audience erupted in cheers and applause, breaking the audience rules for the debate. Trump also stated, “Typical politician, all talk, no action, sounds good, doesn’t work…our country is suffering because people like Secretary Clinton have made such bad decisions.”
Trump was almost echoing none other than President Obama’s 2008 radio campaign ad when Obama competed against Clinton in the 2008 democratic primaries: “Hillary Clinton, she’ll say anything, and change nothing.”
What was most interesting about this debate was the impact of bias and perception. Supporters of Clinton were satisfied, seeing her as cool, calm, collected, prepared, decisive, and well-spoken, i.e. Presidential.
Supporters of Trump were also satisfied, seeing him as they wanted him: aggressive, unabashed, honest, real, willing to hold Hillary accountable for her vast controversies, and willing to criticize the political establishment for its “ineffectiveness.”
This is known as “confirmation bias,” which is defined by A Winning Personality as “the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one’s beliefs or hypotheses while giving disproportionately less consideration to alternative possibilities.”
Confirmation bias is why this could easily go down as the closest election in American history, not just the most colorful, or unique. Many supporters within both camps view their respective candidate as “the lesser of two evils,” which is why the undecideds, who some polls indicate could be as high as 10% of the electorate, as reported by The New York Times, will be so crucial in electing our next President of the United States.
