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| First TV debate: Hillary Clinton dusts Donald Trump easily |
Hillary Clinton was the winner in a one-sided debate at Hofstra
University in Hempstead, an Emmy award winning American political
psychologist said, a verdict that was generally upheld by many debate
watchers in America.
A CNN poll gave Hillary 62 per cent and Donald Trump 27 per cent. Eleven per cent were undecided.
Political psychologist, Dr Bart Rossi in an interview with New York
Daily News said Hillary appeared strong, focused, her responses had
depth and clarity.
“She looked smart, composed and presidential. She flashed a winning
personality by being consistent, appealing to everyone and presenting as
comfortable in her own skin.
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| Trump: rambled and offered simplistic answers |
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| Trump: not presidential in TV debate |
“Trump had overly simplistic answers. He stayed on the defensive with
the birther issue, bankruptcy and his tax returns. There was a lack of
focus, no vision, limited knowledge and for first time, appeared
agitated and uncomfortable: not presidential timber. There was
essentially no appeal beyond his base. If graded: Hillary Clinton would
get an “A minus” and Donald Trump, a “C,” he said.
Rossi’s verdict is echoed by Jim Manley, a former communication advisor for Senator Harry Reid.
“Hillary won the debate and Trump lost. He was rattled and she was
not. She looked presidential and he looked way out of his league. I feel
a helluva lot better about our chances of winning in November after
tonight”.
Josh Greenman, columnist for Daily News also gave the debate to Clinton :
“In his first debate with Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan famously calmed
voters skeptical about whether he could cross the threshold of gravitas
and look like a President. After that, election lore says, it was all
over.
“While Donald Trump lost no hardcore supporters last night — to them,
as has repeatedly boasted, he can do no wrong — he failed the Reagan
test. His uneven, often rambling, occasionally passionate performance
won’t win over wary and worried voters.
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| Hillary Clinton on debate night: She was poised and regal |
“Hillary Clinton was poised and prepared. She for once exuded a
happy-warrior aura. She parried every thrust. She eviscerated his tax
plan, a giveaway to the richest.
“Even Republican message guru Frank Luntz deemed her “presidential, ”Greenman wrote.
In Reuters report of the debate, Democrat Hillary Clinton accused
Republican Donald Trump of racism, sexism and tax avoidance during a
heated presidential debate that could reshape the 2016 campaign for the
White House.
Trump, a real estate tycoon making his first run for public office,
said Clinton’s long years of service represented “bad experience” with
few results and suggested her disavowal of a trade deal with Asian
countries was insincere.
For Trump, 70, the debate was a chance to appear disciplined. For
Clinton, 68, it was an opportunity to reassure voters she could be
trusted. It remained to be seen how voters would judge their
performance.
In a sign investors saw Clinton as the winner, Asian shares recouped
early losses on Tuesday and the dollar edged away from a one-month
trough against the yen. Markets have tended to see Clinton as the
candidate of the status quo.
In one of the more heated exchanges, the two candidates attacked each
other for the controversy Trump stoked for years over whether President
Barack Obama was born in the United States.
The president, who was born in Hawaii, released a long form birth
certificate in 2011 to put the issue to rest. Only this month did Trump
say publicly that he believed Obama was U.S.-born.
“He (Trump) has really started his political activity based on this
racist lie that our first black president was not an American citizen.
There was absolutely no evidence for it. But he persisted. He persisted
year after year,” Clinton said.
Trump repeated his false accusation that Clinton’s failed 2008
presidential campaign against Obama had initiated the so-called
“birther” issue.
“Nobody was pressing it, nobody was caring much about it … I was the
one that got him to produce the birth certificate and I think I did a
good job,” Trump said.
African-American voters overwhelmingly support Clinton, but Trump in
recent weeks has said he believes his policy agenda would benefit them
and said the policies of Obama and Clinton had failed to help black
Americans.
He said Clinton’s arguments were disingenuous.
“When you try to act holier than thou, it really doesn’t work,” Trump said.
RED AND BLUE
Clinton wore a red pantsuit, and Trump wore a dark suit and a blue
tie to the encounter that could shift the course of the tight race for
the Nov. 8 election. She called him Donald. He called her Secretary
Clinton for much of the debate before switching to her first name.
Toward the end of the debate, Trump said Clinton did not have the endurance to be president.
“She doesn’t have the look, she doesn’t have the stamina,” he said.
Citing her own public record, Clinton retorted: “As soon as he
travels to 112 countries and negotiates a peace deal, a ceasefire, a
release of dissidents … or even spends 11 hours testifying in front of a
congressional committee, he can talk to me about stamina.”
Each accused the other of distortions and falsehoods and urged viewers to check their campaign websites for the facts.
Clinton called the New York businessman’s tax policies “Trumped-up
trickle-down” economics and Trump accused the former secretary of state
of being “all talk, no action.”
“I have a feeling I’m going to be blamed for everything,” Clinton,
the first woman to win the presidential nomination of a major U.S.
political party, said during one tough exchange.
“Why not?” retorted Trump, a former reality TV star.
Clinton knocked Trump for not releasing his income tax returns and
said that decision raised questions about whether he was as rich and
charitable as he has said. She noted that the few years of tax returns
he had released showed that despite his wealth, he had paid no federal
income tax.
“That makes me smart,” Trump said.
“I have a tremendous income,” he said at one point, adding that it
was about time that someone running the country knew something about
money.
Clinton criticised Trump for failing to pay some of the business
people with whom his company had contracted. She said she had met a lot
of people who had been cheated by her opponent.
Trump said such incidents of non-payment had taken place when the work was unsatisfactory.
TRADE AT ISSUE
Trump attacked Clinton for her trade policies and said she would
approve a controversial trade deal with Asian countries despite opposing
it as a candidate.
“You were totally in favor of it, then you heard what I was saying,
how bad it is, and you said, ‘Well, I can’t win that debate,’ but you
know that if you did win, you would approve that,” he said.
Clinton rejected the criticism.
“Well Donald, I know you live in your own reality, but that is not the facts,” she said.
Moderator Lester Holt struggled to rein in the candidates, with
discussions about trade policy suddenly shifting to the fight against
Islamic State as Trump accused Clinton of giving away information to the
enemy by revealing on her website how she planned to defeat the group.
Clinton said that unlike Trump, she at least had a plan for fighting
Islamist militants.
Opinion polls have shown the two candidates in a very tight race,
with the latest Reuters/Ipsos polling showing Clinton ahead by 4
percentage points, with 41 percent of likely voters.
A second Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Monday showed half of
America’s likely voters would rely on the debates to help them make
their choice.
Two other presidential candidates – Libertarian Gary Johnson and
Green Party candidate Jill Stein – were not invited to take part in the
debate because neither had obtained at least 15 percent support in
national polls, the threshold established to qualify.
Source: Reuters and New York Daily News
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