Rushing home from school Monday morning I was filled with excitement for the first Presidential Debate, feeling as if I were about to watch a WWE match. The two candidates Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton are unique characters, making this election truly unlike any others, a year to remember!
Seeing these two bitter rivals in close proximity with one another gave me goosebumps. The first twenty minutes of the debate saw Trump criticizing Hilary for her supporting NAFTA and changing her position on TPP. These trade deals, as Trump believes, are hurting American manufacturing and causing countries like Mexico and China to take advantage of us by doing things such as devaluing their currency or implementing a VAT tax. Trump clearly caught Hillary off guard, especially with the compelling argument that she’s been “in politics for 30 years and just now have ideas.”
However, when Hilary brought up Trump not releasing his tax returns it did hurt Trump’s momentum. It is very clear that Trump did not pay taxes for a couple of years, a scandal that clearly degraded his reputation. Trump briefly mentioned Hilary’s 30,000 unread emails but didn’t talk about it in detail. When the topic of Birtherism came up it was very clear that Clinton looked dominant in framing Trump to be a racist. Hilary also looked better prepared when discussing race relations having a detailed plan vs. Trump who only kept reiterating his basic plan of establishing “Law and Order.”
The last part of the debate discussing ISIS was largely a tie with both candidates having strong arguments. Trump made the claim that if Hilary couldn’t stop ISIS when they were small, what makes us think she could stop them now? Hilary laid out a detailed plan of us aligning with the Kurds and poked at the idea of Trump’s plan being a secret, stating the only “secret is that you have no plan”.
The debate didn’t end well for Trump, as Hilary rebuked Trump’s claims of her not appearing presidential because of her stamina and calling Trump sexist since he constantly calls women fat and ugly.
Overall, I do think that Hilary won the entire debate but only slightly. I think Trump in the first 30 minutes was doing far better but afterward, it just seemed Trump wasn’t prepared as Hilary was. His “Al Gore” sniffling didn’t really help his case either. I do however think Trump did far better than I anticipated. Hilary has trained and practiced her whole life for these political debates and was a part of the Yale debate team. I think that Trump would suffer a crushing defeat but this was not the case.
If anyone has anything else to add or disagrees with me on my analysis of the debate I strongly encourage them to come to the Jesuit Political Society. We have discussions over the 2016 election and political issues every Thursday during 6th period. I love hearing the wide spectrum of student’s opinions because it helps shape my own. I think it’s important since our generation will be the next leaders in our society that we begin to talk about political issues that will soon have a strong impact on us. If you missed out on the first presidential debate I would strongly encourage you to watch the next one on October 9 and then come to the Jesuit Political Society meeting on Thursday to discuss in depth what you heard.
