Who won the first Trump-Clinton U.S. Presidential debate? by Ted Gorman
Answer by Ted Gorman:
EDIT: The simple fact that Donald Trump claimed the debate was “unfair” should tell you who won.
This is probably going to be the most relevant question to the topic. It doesn’t matter who came off as more eloquent, less brusque, more intelligent, less factual the answer as to who won the election is simple:
The candidate who gained the most voters, or who convinced the most voters that they were the better candidate.
Having said that, Donald Trump did very well! For the first five minutes, poor guy. During the first round of questions he came off as eloquent, charming, conciliatory, he even complimented Hillary Clinton. But the second she made a barb towards him he lost composure. It probably didn’t help him that she was laughing at him throughout the entire debate, that probably contributed to his frustration.
The genius of her strategy was that she obviously practiced insulting and mocking him and making fun of him without resorting to mudslinging. She used his own tactics against him in a civil manner. My personal favorite barb was when he made fun of her for practicing for the debates, and she simply replied “Yes, I practiced for the debates. I also practiced for becoming president.”
While he on certain points did actually talk about policy, most of his arguments were about how bad China is (how many times did he in fact say China was cheating us? Does anyone have a number on that?).
His continuous Grandiosity, while appealing, and effective in the primaries, worked to sabotage his position during the presidential debate.
Quite frankly, his pre-debate strategy backfired on him. While she spent the time practicing and reviewing debate tactics, he spent his time campaigning. I can only assume that he hoped to attract as many republican viewers as possible to the debate to boost his post debate ratings, assuming that he would be able to embarrass her on a public forum. If that was the case it backfired spectacularly.
The one point that will probably go unnoticed but if it is covered by the mainstream media was the statement that totally betrayed his true feelings about the middle class. When she was discussing how he was hoping the housing market would collapse so he could go in and build something and he interjected “that’s called business”. I wonder what the middle class would think if they heard that soundbite.
But in the end, as I stated, the true victor of a presidential debate is not who seemed to have been humiliated or seemed to have trounced their opponents, rather the winner is the one who gained the most votes/support from the contest.
*EDITED* I misquoted Secretary Clinton regarding a specific incident in the second to last paragraph, it has been corrected.