The first presidential debate occurred Monday, Sept. 26. It was moderated by Lester Holt of NBC. Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump faced off for the first time this election season. It was like free entertainment. American politics are wild.
Snuggled in a hall packed with fellow Wellesley students, we tuned into watch our alum crush the Donald, and crush Donald Hillary did. Hillary Clinton was basically more knowledgeable, prepared, polished, presidential and witty than Donald Trump.
It goes without saying that Clinton won the debate. No competition. Even her critics have to admit that she has the facts on her side, and Trump was way out of his depth.
Trump interrupted Clinton a whopping 51 times during the debate, cementing his lack of respect. He was baited by Clinton time and again into losing his cool. He frequently said he “didn’t say” statements he indeed did say.
A prime example is this: Hillary Clinton called out one of Trump’s many inaccuracies, starting with: “Donald Trump said that climate change is a hoax made up by the Chinese.” Donald Trump, of course, responded with “I never said that!” Fact check? Here’s a tweet from Trump himself: “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” from November 6th, 2012.
Clinton did not shy away from pointing out how much Trump has bent the facts. Some of her biggest hits of the night:
“Manufacturing jobs went up in the '90s - if we’re actually looking at the facts.”
“That is just... not accurate.”
“Now that I know you live in your own reality... ”
Honestly, it was fun watching her call out Trump’s bullshit, but I’m still endlessly dejected that we have Trump as a serious candidate for president of the United States.
Some say moderator, but all I saw him doing was pointing out the flaws in Trump’s campaign that were undeniable. Holt said to Trump, “You speak on the burden of taxes, yet you haven’t released your tax returns,” which brought up the important issue of Trump’s financial evasion. As Hillary pointed out, Trump can only be concealing his tax returns if he’s not as rich or charitable as he tells us he is.
A stand out moment of the night was when Clinton admitted that “We all have implicit biases” when questioned by Holt on biased police officers. It’s a good reminder that biases are pervasive throughout the American people, which needs to be worked on. She went on to explain that for police officers, however, those biases often have fatal consequences. I was actually impressed by that truthful answer.
I’ll leave you with this great quote from (hopefully!) our future president, referring to her irate debate opponent:
“He said it’s a secret plan, but the only secret is that he has no plan.”
Go out and vote if you actually want a president with a plan for America!
