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| Trump and Clinton at the most recent third presidential debate on the 20th.
Photo Courtesy of: cbsnews.com
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By: Vivian Nguyen
After watching all three presidential debates, I felt as if I could see the personalities/morals of the candidate's’ supporters. Both candidates (Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump) also revealed their true colors during the debates, and affected opinions that many people had about the candidates’ characters. An iconic example of this would be Kenneth Bone, who made his debut in the second presidential debate as one of the undecided voters (who just also happened to look like a character from Toy Story 2). Bone mentioned in a phone interview that he was leaning towards Trump at first, but after participating in the debate, Hillary “really impressed me with her composure and some of her answers” and that he was “a little let down” by Trump’s personal attacks towards Hillary.
After watching all three presidential debates, I felt as if I could see the personalities/morals of the candidate's’ supporters. Both candidates (Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump) also revealed their true colors during the debates, and affected opinions that many people had about the candidates’ characters. An iconic example of this would be Kenneth Bone, who made his debut in the second presidential debate as one of the undecided voters (who just also happened to look like a character from Toy Story 2). Bone mentioned in a phone interview that he was leaning towards Trump at first, but after participating in the debate, Hillary “really impressed me with her composure and some of her answers” and that he was “a little let down” by Trump’s personal attacks towards Hillary.
The first presidential debate was moderated by Lester Holt on September 26, 2016 and took place in Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. The 90 minute debate had six 15 minute segments that explored three topic areas: achieving prosperity; America’s direction; and securing America.
Although both candidates agreed to the two minute response limit, there were 84 interruptions in total. During the achieving prosperity segment, both candidates approached the questions differently with different perspectives—in fact, it was like that for many segments. An example of this is evident in the very first 15 minute segment of “achieving prosperity.”
Clinton believed that by having the “wealthy pay their fair share” and “closing corporate loopholes,” many Americans can benefit from a fairer economy where not only executives are receiving a majority of profits. Trump on the other hand, blames China and Mexico for stealing jobs from Americans, and believes that by reducing taxes from 35% to 15% for companies, companies will expand and jobs will be created.
Throughout the debate, Trump emphasized the effects of ISIS and how they needed to be stopped. Hillary’s emails and Trump’s tax returns were also brought up several times, but questions were never fully answered.
The candidates mentioned some inaccurate statistics and facts, but luckily fact checkers were available to the public to authenticate each candidate’s arguments live. The highlights of the first debate included opinions on the Iraq War, Trump’s speculation of the conspiracy theory of Obama’s birth, Trump’s praise of Vladimir Putin, bias that different races face with the law, and many others.
The second presidential debate was moderated by Anderson Cooper and Martha Raditz on October 9, 2016 and took place in Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. The format of the second debate was of a town hall meeting style where selected voters (at the debate) joined the moderators in asking the candidates questions.
Questions answered during the debate included whether the candidates are good role models/leaders, Clinton's emails, opinions on Obamacare and Islamophobia, whether wealthy Americans will pay their fair share of taxes, Syria and the humanitarian crisis in Aleppo, plans of uniting the country, the selection of Supreme Court Justices, and the energy policy.
During this debate, controversial statements from each candidate were brought up including Trump’s boasts of sexual assault (related to the tape released the previous Friday) and Clinton’s name-calling of Trump’s supporters.
Trump’s boasts were brought up while he was asked whether he thought he was a good role model for the youth. Trump responded by saying he was ashamed, but brushed it off as locker room talk (implying it as the norm while going on a tangent about ISIS.
Clinton's statement was about how she said half of Trump’s supporters are “deplorables, racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic” and was questioned about how she “can…unite a country if you’ve [she’s] written off tens of millions of Americans.”
Clinton responded by saying she apologized and meant her argument was about Trump’s hateful campaign against POC, immigrants, the disabled, women and POW. Other controversial and tension-filled events included Hillary and Trump’s choice to not shake hands at the beginning of the debate and the brief press conference Trump had with victims of Bill Clinton’s sexual assault prior to the debate.
The third presidential debate was moderated by Chris Wallace on October 19, 2016 and took place in the University of Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada. The format of the third debate is similar to the first, but the moderator has the ability to extend speaking time as necessary.
The questions covered each candidate’s interpretation of the constitution, support of the second amendment, abortion, border security, the economy and their plans to create more jobs, and their fitness to be president of the US. The questions involved a lot of comparing and contrasting between each candidate’s ideas and both Clinton and Trump used it as a strategy to defend themselves from each other’s accusations.
An example of this would be when Trump said Clinton had bad experience because “for thirty years [she] was in position to help” but did not do anything during that time. In response to Trump, Clinton mentioned what she did do for the country while pointing out that while she “was in the situation room monitoring the raid that brought Osama bin laden to justice, he [Trump] was hosting The Celebrity Apprentice.”
In comparison to the other debates, the final presidential debate had fewer interruptions than the first two, but it had many occurrences where Trump, Hillary, and the moderator spoke over each other like Pence and Kaine did during the hard-to-watch vice presidential debate.
Despite the sensitive and serious issues discussed during these debates, many moments from the debate became internet jokes, including contradictory quotes from Trump like “a small loan [of a million dollars],” and “Nobody has more respect for women than I do,” terms like “bigly,” “bad hombres,” and “puppet as president,” as well as icons like the fly that landed on Hillary’s face, and Ken Bone.
The questions covered each candidate’s interpretation of the constitution, support of the second amendment, abortion, border security, the economy and their plans to create more jobs, and their fitness to be president of the US. The questions involved a lot of comparing and contrasting between each candidate’s ideas and both Clinton and Trump used it as a strategy to defend themselves from each other’s accusations.
An example of this would be when Trump said Clinton had bad experience because “for thirty years [she] was in position to help” but did not do anything during that time. In response to Trump, Clinton mentioned what she did do for the country while pointing out that while she “was in the situation room monitoring the raid that brought Osama bin laden to justice, he [Trump] was hosting The Celebrity Apprentice.”
In comparison to the other debates, the final presidential debate had fewer interruptions than the first two, but it had many occurrences where Trump, Hillary, and the moderator spoke over each other like Pence and Kaine did during the hard-to-watch vice presidential debate.
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