My impressions:
- Trump was extremely sedate, looking drugged. I think he needed some middle ground, but the calm version is much better than the loony one.
- In fact, the entire debate was a more sedate tone, even when they were just all talking over one another and refusing to stop.
- Hillary came across as more knowledgeable, even though many of her claims were false. The problem was, Trump rarely had hard facts with which he could respond to her and show she was lying. Debate prep is necessary.
- Still, Trump did occasionally have a conservative argument at hand (some debate prep stuck!). He was able to get an occasional riposte in, for a zinger. The responses rarely had hard facts, but they did land hard at times.
- Trump blew it by not explaining that he'd question the election results, not that he'd just refuse to accept them. Big difference. Everyone's trying to portray it as the latter, when it's really a "wait-and-see whether to challenge" -- something entirely different.
- I think both had personal-best performances last night, not that anything really shone.
- It's a toss-up who won. The "I won't say I'll accept the results" answer is going to hog the news, so that's a negative for Trump. Hillary seemed like she had a command of the facts, and that will help her. On the rest of the debate, I think Trump won slightly because he didn't melt down and was able to get some big question marks on Hillary.
- Throughout the debate, as with previous ones, I kept thinking "if only..."
Thanks for the meaty reply. I was curious how you and
@Weird Tolkienish Figure saw the debate, because I see you both as, for lack of a better term, undecided voters. It's not that either of you would ever vote for Clinton, but I get the sense that if Trump had a few good days and said the right stuff you might be persuaded to hold your nose and vote for him, or if Clinton said something really egregious that too could push you to vote for Trump.
I didn't find much to get excited about last night except Trump's solid answers on abortion. The other thing that Trump benefited from was the Project Veritas video “Rigging the Election,” which angered me a great deal.
