Blow-by-Blow Analysis of the Decisive Moment of the Debate - through the eyes of a former debate coach

I wasn’t planning to do a second blog about ‘the debate’ but two days after it, as we start to await the first polling to show its impact, I feel the need to write one more blog. I do believe this debate decided the election. I think many will come back to look at that Monday night as the time when Trump folded, and some will also see the brilliance of how Hillary skewered Trump and trapped him to make that debate far worse for Trump than it might have been. So, with the very rare opportunity for me to write a debate review on this blog, why not do something more serious about the blow-by-blow. How did it go? Lets get into the weeds. How did Hillary demolish Trump. I am using the full recording of the debate via Real Clear Politics which had the ABC network feed.

Trump needed to remain Presidential throughout the first debate, he’d then get something near a tie. Hillary had to clearly win the debate, a tie was not good enough, she was expected to be the superior debater and had to now deliver.

SHADOW BOXING

Hillary had several tactics to get under Trump’s notoriously thin skin. The first thing was calling him ‘Donald’. He prefers to be called Mr Trump. Trump came in with a plan to call Hillary ‘Secretary Clinton’ and asked permission to use that term - where the team had clearly intended him then to use ‘politician like Secretary Clinton’ but Trump was very clumsy in using this phrase, sometimes using it, sometimes reverting to Hillary. It didn’t in any way rattle Hillary and this being a general election audience, to call her a ‘politician’ would not be nearly as damaging as to a die-hard Tea-Party edge of the Republican voters that would attend typical Trump rallies.

The ‘Donald’ use started at the handshake and then right from her first response about jobs, she went into ‘Donald its good to be with you’. And used Donald throughout the debate from that point onwards.

FIRST BLOWS

In Hillary’s second response Hillary took the first attack, but mangled the pronounciation of ‘Trumped-up Trickle Down’. But in that second response at the about 08:00 mark, Hillary hit Trump with the million-dollar loan. Trump tends to phrase it as a ‘small one million dollar loan’. In reality, his father Fred Trump gave a series of loans and gifts to his son that amounted to 14 million dollars to get him started, and to rescue Donald several times from financial ruin. So the correct number is 14 million. Trump doesn’t like to talk about this, and he prefers the STARTING loan, the original, at one million, which Trump clearly likes to think is ‘small’. Its bad enough, but the starting loan of 14 million is far bigger than most lottery winners. Hillary got the 14 million dollar number in. This is part of the many things that bothers Trump. He was still keeping calm, not interupting, and Hillary was holding steady.

The third question and Hillary’s answer at about the 12:00 mark had Hillary pivoting from the original answer to hit Trump about rooting for the financial crisis, saying he hoped for the crash so he could buy failing real estate. That brought Trump’s first interruption. Trump’s attention span and concentration only lasted 12 minutes, but being needled, he started to break down from here.

At about 13:00 Hillary hit Trump with Donald thinks climate change is a hoax invented by the Chinese. Trump interrupted again. The fact-checkers went crazy and Trump’s campaign team ended up deleting his infamous Tweet that said so. These were still single interruptions and probably part of Trump’s brain reminded him, don’t interrupt.

At 15:45 Trump has passed his self-control threshold and interrupts Hillary three times in a row. Hillary smiles. She has Trump rattled. This is the argument about Hillary job as Secretary of State and that she actually helped increase US exports including to China.

At the 18:00 timing Hillary hits Trump with her second pre-set audience line ‘Well Donald I know you live in your own reality’ which gets the big laugh she wanted. She’s now found her rhytm. Trump is frustrated and Trump interrupts Hillary 9 times within the two minute response that ends with Hillary saying, and I wrote a book about it.

Trump’s response is now wordsalad and his pitch goes up, he’s agitated, and out come a couple of biglys. (Trump says ‘big league’ similar to ‘big time’. As in we’re going to win, big-league. But it sounds like bigly and its a clear sign he’s now splashing in the pool nearly drowning). Hillary suppresses a big smile as she looks down at her podium and writes some notes.

At the 20:45 mark Hillary takes over for the first time from Lester Holt, that she can’t let this stand, and Holt, knowing Trump has run all over him stealing tons of time, lets Hillary have this, and she plugs the fact-checking website. Their website ends up taking 2 million visitors during the debate. Not bad, 3% of the audience who was watching the debate, came to Hillary’s website to check on Trump’s claims. Clever gimmick and obviously Hillary will also be tracking who visited and offering them the chance to join her team.

Next few minutes both sides play the audience. Trump scores with the General MacArthur would not show his plans online. Hillary follows with, but I have a plan. But at the 24:30 mark Hillary hits Trump with another probably pre-written line, although this could be spontaneous Hillary in good mood, thinking on her feet - by the end of the debate I’ll be blamed for everything. Gets a big laugh.

PAYS NO TAX TRAP

Hillary needles Trump on trickle-down saying that a lot of smart people think it doesn’t work. Smartness is something also that hits Trump personally (he’s apparently been often told that he isn’t that smart because he’s so defensive about it). Trump continues his interruptions. In his speech he offers popular Republican talking point about the evil Fed that is a dud in this room. Trump is bewildered that his famous killer lines don’t work.

The tax returns are obviously a sore spot for Trump. It gets worse as Lester Holt comes back at Trump following up and pressing, so you can release them, its just that you don’t want to? Trump says he’ll release if Hillary shows emails which gets a big response from the room. It sounds like its for Trump but he reacts like its against him and Hillary reacts as if its for her, so I think the TV view didn’t convey the right image (to me). She clearly seems the winner of that exchange and Trump doesn’t push it. But Lester Holt scolds the audience asking them to be quiet and they mostly do for quite a while.

Hillary takes the tax returns attack, building to the accusation that Trump hasn’t paid any taxes. Trump is clearly uncomfortable at his side as this proceeds. Hillary hits Trump with ‘or Donald hasn’t paid any taxes’ to which he now feels compelled to interrupt to brag, ‘That makes me smart’. This is five minutes since Hillary spoke of smart people and smart is what Trump often says when people ask him about paying taxes. That its smart to pay as little as possible. He has hinted before that he has paid no taxes, that would be smart, but as far as I know, he hasn’t actually admitted in open, that yeah, he’s smart for paying NO taxes. I believe this was a carefully set trap, to first introduce the word smart - that Trump likes to associate with his own taxes - then WALK Trump into the reason he doesn’t show taxes - and end with ‘or he has not paid any taxes’.

Hillary could have said ‘or Trump pays minimal taxes or ‘very low’ taxes - and he’d have still said ‘and that makes me smart’. But Hillary got Trump to admit, he pays no taxes (even if Trump perhaps pays a 2% tax rate or something bigger than zero). I am sure they did not know that Trump would do this, but they knew he MIGHT. The key was to get Trump first upset, so he won’t notice there is a MASSIVE difference between saying you’re smart for paying as little in taxes as you need, to paying NO taxes. VERY smart play, very well planned and executed.

Note Trump is tone-deaf to his wealth and what it looks like. Hillary said Trump owes 650 million dollars. He owes 650 million. Trump doesn’t say he doesn’t have that loan, only that its now less than that. But he dares to say that 650 million is not much in loans. Sure, and it will not make you at all vulnerable or liable or in someone else’s pocket haha. I believe that will be in upcoming attack ads. But then Trump ended his next reply with more tone-deaf attempts to connect with average American voters. The USA is like a third world country and go to the airport of Dubai, its far better than JFK. Yeah. Normal American voters always fly to Dubai and wonder at its airport. But now the quick wit of Hillary

This could not be planned. She deadpanned yeah, American airports are in such bad shape because you don’t pay your taxes, Donald. (This is at the 35:45 mark) And now the audience is again laughing at Trump, after the prohibition to reactions. He is starting to feel the paranoia of everybody ganging up against him. Lester Holt challenged him several times about the taxes, Hillary mocks him and the audience laughs at Trump. He is getting more upset.

Hillary continues twisting the knife with more items that bug Trump. Don’t the workers deserve an apology who were stiffed by you? Donald has gone bankrupt six times. He says he’s the king of debt. I believe these were baits she set out there which didn’t catch.

Trump reacts with his hotel ad for the new hotel near the White House, throwing his line that he’ll get to Pennsylvania Avenue (White House address) one way or the other. It usually gets a good laugh from his audiences but not this audience. Trump is feeling his audience is deserting him.

STOP-AND-FRISK TRAP

At the 40 minute mark the debate topic shifts to an unannounced topic, race relations. A very bad topic for Trump. It is relevant because of the race riots that previous week and the debate commission said news events could result in changes to the topics. Hillary gets the first question which she handles like a pro. At about 42:00 Hillary wraps up her first reply about violence in inner cities with the phrase ‘get guns out of the hands of the people who should not have them’. She has again trapped Trump. She wants him to go to stop-and-frisk - without mentioning the term. She  KNOWS Trump’s argument portfolio and expects she’s triggered that thought.

Trump has no idea this is a trap. Trump, very lost on fixing race relations has exhausted all his word salad by one minute 30 seconds of his reply, and then tosses out stop-and-frisk. Trump essentially acknowledges this ‘life line’ from Hillary, he points at Hillary as if to ask for her acceptance, that isn’t this exactly what you meant, Hillary, with taking dangerous guns from the gangs in inner cities. No Donald, that was not a lifeline, that was a noose, and you just stuck your head into it. As Hillary gets ready to repond, Lester Holt jumps in, to demand that stop-and-frisk is unconstitutional (for those who haven’t seen the debate or don’t know the person, Lester is a black man) and Hillary smiles. She knows Trump is cooked. Trump is hung. Trump is done.

For the next 10 minutes. For the next ten MINUTES of the remaining debate, the discussion circles around stop-and-frisk, a policy that was ruled unconstitutional by the courts, that is HATED by blacks and other minorities, and that was found to be less effective than other methods for policing. Yet the racist angry white man is forced to defend this policy, even arguing about it not with Hillary, but a clearly agitated black man as the moderator of that debate. To finish it off, Hillary acts as the judge of the argument that Trump is wrong and Lester Holt right, yes stop-and-search was ruled unconstitutional. At the 54 minute mark the debate is lost by Trump and it will only now get worse. And at the 54 minute mark, Trump has permanently lost the black vote, and he damaged the overall Republican brand with the black community.

Note that this is BAD COACHING. Trump is coached by former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and this was one of his policies - yes, ruled unconstitutional and ended. The very right wing Giuliani still feels it was a wrongful decision and has advised Trump that this is a winning argument. Maybe it is for white racists audiencees, but not for a moderate undecided and mixed-race audience. Trump should have pivoted away from stop-and-frisk by the Convention. But he doesn’t attempt to honestly appeal to blacks or Hispanics. That is why even when he had his minority outreach, Trump was speaking to lily-white audiences promising.. stop-and-frisk.

At the 50:00 minute mark Hillary baited Trump to approve of the no-fly list to be used to deny guns being sold to potential terrorists. This is not the Republican party’s position and its totally against the NRA’s position. Trump likely agreed with Hillary based on a strategy to sound reasonable. To me this seemed like a major mistake and I expected/expect the Campaign to walk it back. Lets see how it plays. Trump was now under siege, being attacked by Holt and Hillary with the audience hostile too. He may have felt he needed to do a concession.

After several back-and-forths where Trump just felt the noose getting tighter, Trump ends that session with claims that he’s been trying to reach out to African-American communities while Hillary stayed at home. Bad move. Hillary hits Trump with certainly a prepared line but one that probably will be the most played line from the debate. At the 55:00 mark Hillary says I think Donald just criticized me for prepping for the debate? I also have prepared to be President. She gets big applause. Killer line, she waited for its time, she probably had a dozen such lines prepared for various attacks that might come. This one delivered. Hillary was now padding her margin of victory.

And for Trump it could not get worse than going from stop-and-frisk straight to Birtherism. I don’t know if Lester Holt intended this to be included or if he had options and decided to put this in, at this point. I would not be surprised if Trump brought this question in just for being the dick and racist he was in the previous ten minutes and daring to challenge Holt on the legality issue.

Trump tried to pivot the topic away from Obama’s birth certificate to ‘more important’ topics like ISIS and border security, but this topic area was race relations and Lester Holt was having none of that. And Trump now goes into bizarre alternate reality logic of ‘Sidney Blumenthal’ (which should mean something apparently, this must be Republican Breitbart reader shorthand) that Trump kept repeating for 3 responses in four minutes, and making such claims as he has a good relationship with African-Americans and he did President Obama a favor to produce the birth certificate.

After the audience had listened in increasing incredulity at Trump’s irrational reasoning, Hillary was given the chance to comment at 58:30 and she starts with ‘Just listen to what you heard’ a spontaneous response and a huge laugh, at Trump. Hillary hits Trump on racism from his refusing to rent to blacks to the pain he brought Obama (at which point Trump is bizarrely smug-looking in split screen - not a good look for a TV ad).

As the time passed 60 minutes, the topic mercyfully for Trump, switches to national security. Hillary gets the first question, hits Trump with Putin. He avoids that bait. Trump responds with the popular line that he’ll take the support of admirals and generals over political hacks. This must go well in his rallies but there is total silence now in the room. Trump is not getting the audience onto his side. They go back and forth for 10 minutes without a major moment although some amazing individual statements from Trump. Then we get to Hillary’s next trap.

NATO TRAP

Hillary is baiting Trump many times throughout the debate with various terms and phrases, some do connect but many do not. This is likely not that Trump didn’t notice, and almost certainly not that Trump avoided a trap deliberately. Its most likely that Trump FORGOT that point in the next two minutes even if he intended to get to it. Remember he is now very angry and frustrated as Hillary hits her, he had the long exchange about racism with Lester Holt and Hillary keeps hitting him. And then Hillary takes a question on how to stop domestic ISIS terrorism. Her answer is after Trump’s on the same question. Its at the 71:00 minute mark. Its a perfect debate answer.

Hillary starts by responding directly to what Trump just said. Trump had talked about Hillary and Obama causing ISIS. So Hillary first says, But Donald, you supported the Iraq invasion yourself. Trump angrily interrupts twice and Hillary holds firm. She also points out Trump supported the invasion of Libya. Then she explains that it was W Bush who negotiated the USA’s exit from Iraq, not Obama. All very firm and solid on the facts, explaining like an international policy professor giving a standard lecture. Very confident. As we think she’s finishing the reply, she pivots, but Lester, you asked about DOMESTIC terrorism (gosh thats right, Trump didn’t talk about domestic Terrorism) which Hillary then handles with aplomb. She is in a zone. Essentially a pitch-perfect 45 second summary of how to stop terrorism back home, that includes working with allies, including NATO. She finishes with the dig at Trump that he’s insulted Muslims.

Trump replies, starts off with some word salad but soon he is on NATO. And Trump gets into his fave riff about NATO. His canned response. The original response many months ago to NATO was a disaster, Trump said NATO was obsolete. But back then the campaign worked a good ‘save’ that Trump didn’t want to end NATO, he wanted to change NATO’s mission to fight terrorism. And this of course works reasonably well, for any voters who are relatively uninformed about NATO or terrorism. And on the Republican debates Trump was never challenged on this. So this story stood as a convenient reality for Trump that he often resorts to. Hillary knew this. And sure enough, Trump ran his standard NATO reply. Which is incredibly flawed when facing reality.

Trump was drowning in the debate. He thought Hillary threw her a life raft. She threw him an anchor. Trump’s standard story plays acceptably well to an audience that hasn’t heard it including no doubt at home. Until Hillary corrects it. But even before Hillary gets to it, because she attacked Trump on being for going to Iraq - Lester Holt picked this up, its a fair attack, and Holt presses Trump on being for the Iraq war. He says he wasn’t. Holt says he was. This goes back and forth three times. Its very clearly now that Trump is simply lying. At the 76:00 minute mark we get the Sean Hannity defense. Ask Sean Hannity (he is a rather dim-witted Fox News person who is on many people’s short list as one of the first to be fired in the Roger Ailes aftermath immediately after the election is over). No Trump, this is not Who Wants To Be A Millionaire where you can phone a friend. Trump is flustered and lost. He then at the 78 minute mark destroys himself with ‘I have the better judgment and better temperament’. The audience laughs at Trump.

Thats when Hillary then skewers Trump. She beams, starts with a Jeb Bushian ‘woo’ and then shimmies with her shoulders and laughs. The audience laughs more both with Hillary and against Trump. Hillary then goes through NATO and explains that NATO actually has been fighting terrorism WITH the USA in the Middle East for a dozen years already. Trump did not create the terrorism mission for NATO but Trump would want to start new wars if Iranian soldiers make gestures at the US Navy or he has a cavalier attitude about nukes and can be provoked by a Tweet. Trump interrupts her three times.

Hillary has won the tax argument, the racism argument, the national security argument and if you want to be generous, Trump maybe won the initial employment argument but I’d say that was more of a tie. In her last foreign policy response, at the 86:00 minute mark, Hillary took a VERY Presidential pitch straight-to-camera, to talk for the foreign audience, that the USA stands by its commitments and treaties. A calculated play towards the end of the debate, something Trump had no reserve for but Hillary had planned, this was part of her ending pitch. VERY strong, very ‘above this petty debate’ stuff, very Presidential, in which she also said, and stand up to bullies, home and abroad.

And the debate could have ended here. There was still another exchange on national security, but then the time was running out. Lester Holt asked Trump about why he thinks Hillary looks unpresidential. Hillary did a full-body pivot to rally 'invite' Trump to be critical of her and Trump was of course refusing to do that. 

THE WOMEN VOTE

And thats where I am certain, whatever Hillary’s second-to-last question would have been, whether about what is her favorite color or how to solve global warming, she would have found a pivot to women. It was her last full two-minute answer but as luck would have it, Lester Holt teed this one right up to her. Holt asked Trump about Hillary’s look. Why doesn’t she look Presidential. And Trump tried to switch as he faced Hillary, he didn't want to mention her looks, he meant stamina, Hillary doesn’t have stamina. Awkward even that way. And he waffled at that. So Hillary came with her closing argument.

All throughout the debate Hillary had been interrupted. I counted 54 interruptions in the last 80 minutes of the debate. If Hillary spoke about half the time, 40 minutes its more than one interruption every 44 seconds. That is incredibly annoying to anyone. It took nerves of steel to smile through that. But it did not hit me when I was watching the debate, I only understood it when I read the Twitter responses afterwards, that for women - this is a different level of annoyance. Many older male bosses do this to their women employees but not their men. I have seen it myself, often, but as a man, I don’t feel the ‘pain’ that it causes directly but I’ve seen women collegues cry after some meetings when they feel their bosses were so hurtful and cruel, just talking over them and bullying them. And reading those Twitter comments immediately made this strategy crystal-clear to me. This was their plan. They WANTED Trump to interrupt Hillary (that is why she was so serious in the beginning but when the interruptions started, Hillary actually smiled) They WANTED the interruptions.

Hillary played the martyr throughout the debate. Trump went on and on, utterly oblivious to how damaging this was to female voters, it is the stereotypical sexist older powerful bossy bigoted man, just bullying the woman. Hillary took it and smiled all through the debate. Then in her second-to-last full response, she cocked her pistol, she got the women’s attention -  I will stand up to bullies, both domestic and foreign. And I am certain many women angry at Trump’s bullying felt, but Hillary, please do something about the bully in the room right now.

Which she then did in that last full response. She had a perfect two minute response. One minute on stamina. You want stamina? I flew to 114 countries, negotiated peace treaties and release of hostages, etc. I stood 11 hours of a Benghazi hearing, don’t talk to me about stamina. Then, the other 60 seconds. Women. You Donald call women fat pigs, you call them slobs, you say women should not be paid the same. And bam-bam-bam-bam, right at the end, after all the abuse, the mild-mannered secretary took off her uniform to reveal Supergirl who just hit, and hit, and hit, and hit, and hit Trump so hard, he couldn’t think, his head was hurting so bad. Hillary ended with the story about the Miss Universe contestant Trump had called ‘Miss Housekeeping’ - for being a Latina. And that she had now become a US Citizen and would be voting. BAM.

Trump did not see this coming and could not have been prepared. In his response, totally confused Trump felt that the best way to win that argument was to say Rosie O’Donnell deserved to be mocked. And that the other smart thing to say, is that he could have been mean to Hillary, said something about her family (meaning Bill Clinton). Trump could have tried to salvage something at the end, only he was so lost, he was only making it worse. The last ten minutes sealed the election, not the debate, the election for Hillary, because all through the first 80 minutes Trump had trampled upon women and in the last 10 minutes Hillary struck him back but so hard, he didn’t even understand he was being hit.

The very last questions of less than a minute were about will the Candidate accept the election result. Even here Trump was so bad at answering, trying to fit in his closing statement, that Lester Holt had to ask him a second time, to which Trump said yes.

LAST THOUGHTS

So we can see Hillary came in prepared, with a strategy, with a plan, with multiple ways to needle Trump and several traps that worked, and no doubt many more that she tried to lay but Trump was too dazed to even notice, and talked right past. Trump was heading to a bad debate performance in any case, but the 3 traps that caught him (pays no taxes, Stop-and-Frisk and NATO) were all deadly and ensured Trump had lost the debate soundly. The strategy about women and interruptions, that was executed perfectly.Pays no taxes was an unbelievably lucky strike, dumb by Trump. Stop-and-frisk was lucky in the topic even being there (race relations) and that Trump did go there.  NATO was more predictable. We have no idea what other traps were there, that Trump now avoided by dumb luck or if Hillary at the time, decided to pursue an alternate direction on that issue.

I should note also that Hillary was constantly taking notes, Trump took almost none but I saw him glance down once looking at what must have been his notes so he must have written down something at some stage. The debater that is taking notes is more engaged and able to return to thoughts later, ie vital for any trap that is brewing to spring 5 to 10 minutes later.

HOW WOULD I GUIDE THESE DEBATERS AS A VISITING COACH

If I was invited to offer coaching after this debate, lets start with the easy one. Hillary, I'd say that was a perfect debate perfornance for now, but your rival will get better, so just continue doing what you do to prepare. You will need new prepared jokes for the next time. The delivery of 'Trumped-up Trickle-down' didn't go as smoothly so it bombed because of that, try not to pick such bad word-combinations. Its a trivially small stumble early on. There were some points you left on the table, in the response about 'don't your ex employees deserve an apology' you could have included that they also deserve to be paid. On Obama you could have added that he deserves his apology - trivial things but so slight this was a perfect performance including the body language. I'd even say the ratio of smiles vs serious expressions was picture perfect. 

On Trump. Gosh, where to start. Run practice debates. Do two per day. Videotape them with your team and have every response critiqued. Clear your schedule and do no public events. Give your full attention to debate prep. You are utterly out of your league and you have to devote all your time to try to pick up some of the basics.

Have really annoying people around you say nasty things at you all the time, and learn to not interrupt them once. Not once. Not one interruption. It is inherently unpresidential unless you intend to become elected in a country where only men vote. Even men don't like it but you might get away with it. So before you even think about arguments, get control of the interruptions.

Never argue with the moderator. Even if you're correct. This is not a Republican primary debate where you may score points if you do a masterful takedown of the liberal media. If the moderator corrects you, accept the correction. They know what they're asking about, you will be judged wrong even if you were right.

Take notes of what is the question and what the other debater says. Write something down constantly. Keep a pen in your hand, do not bring your tiny hands into view.

When you come to the podium at the start, write in big letters to the top of the page - LIBERAL AUDIENCE. Do not give any Republican red meat to a liberal audience. If you think this audience is liberal pinko left-wing communists, that you have to convince, you MAY strike the right tone. There is not one Republican in this room do not talk about Republican talking points like the Fed and Janet Yellen or Sid Blumenthal or the NRA or Sean Hannity.

Practice to stay on point for 2 minutes, and to speak in complete sentences. If you can manage those things you may sound more like an adult next time. Remember the camera is always on, so have a polite smile on your face or look serious if the topic is serious but don't do those mouth excercises that look like you're blowing kisses to people in the audience.

You are not here to sell rooms to your hotel or to brag about how much money you have made. Those things are at best a waste of your valuable time and for many less affluent voters they turn them off.

That would be what my advice would be to the novice debater we saw.

Comments

[paul]

One of the deadliest arguments, which is worth mentionineg, in the debate was the throw of Alicia Machado, the winner of the beauty pageants contest. Trump was totally caught off guard with that. Trump said to Hillary "Where did you find this?". This allowed Hillary following the debate a two-days attack on Trump regarding being a male chauvinist pig. That was a beautiful argument!

[grouch]

When she started talking about Miss Universe, it was the one time when she did not hush as the dumpster interrupted and simply continued talking over him to get Alicia Machado's name into the recording. Dealing with the bullies at home, indeed.

All those times allowing him to just rant after interrupting, with, at best, a couple of words spoken as loudly as his. I kept watching for the tactic that Tomi assured us before the debate that she would have worked out to deal with interruptions. She just let him run on and smiled. I thought the sole purpose was to just let people see the spoiled brat in action. That final trap made the whole thing snap into focus. I wonder if there were women cheering as Hillary raised her voice over dumpster's spewage -- "Donald, she has a name."

[cornelius]

@paul
I've already mentioned this in the other thread but now that you mention Alicia Machado, today (Wednesday) was "women calling women day" across the US at all call centers working for Clinton's campaign. I think this is not a coincidence. Can you image this level of coordination over at Trump's?

In other news Gary Johnson is riding into the sunset at full speed. At a recent interview he could name not even one foreign political leader. He is worse than Rick Perry. At least Perry could mention two items. And this is not the first time Johnson has this type of oops moment. I think Johnson just snatched the Captain Opps crown from Perry.

[paul]

Samantha Bee highlights Donald Trump's biggest, dumbest debate mistake

http://theweek.com/speedreads/651883/samantha-bee-highlights-donald-trumps-biggest-dumbest-debate-mistake

[cornelius]

I forgot the link

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/29/us/politics/gary-johnson-aleppo-moment.html

(I think I just had a Johnson moment)

[paul]

The best part of Alicia Machado part is that the answer to Trump's question "Where did you find this?" is that in Trump's book, where Trump mentioned it.

[Daktari]

Excellent debate recap and review. Thanks, Tomi.

[grouch]

Tomi:

Regarding the questions, Lester Holt said this in his intro:

"The questions are mine and have not been shared with the commission or the campaigns. The audience here in the room has agreed to remain silent so that we can focus on what the candidates are saying."

In the comments following your previous article, grogxd posted a link to The Atlantic. That story has the only reference I've seen in the press about the get out the vote tech. It's a single paragraph and is more tease than informative. Is this the end user part of that big data machine you've talked about?

Is This the Year Arizona Turns Blue?
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/arizona-election-2016/501569/

"The canvassers get direction on which houses to hit from their iPhones, which have an app version of the Democratic database tool VAN installed. (It’s called, naturally, MiniVAN.) After each knock, they record the appropriate response—yes, no, mail ballot, not home, moved—which syncs to the cloud."

[grouch]

The Daily 202: Trump stumbles into Clinton’s trap by feuding with Latina beauty queen

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2016/09/28/daily-202-trump-stumbles-into-clinton-s-trap-by-feuding-with-latina-beauty-queen/57eb0230e9b69b0ec0c0a85d/?tid=pm_politics_pop_b

"The GOP nominee’s decision to take the bait and rehash his past attacks of a former Miss Universe for gaining too much weight is now dominating the conversation."

[paul]

@cornelius

Mr. Stamina (a.k.a Trump) cannot learn about debating and politics until the next debate. There is no way on earth that he can do that. Of course that we will learn some catchy lines, he will learn to avoid some traps BUT still he will not be able to avoid the tons of traps which Hillary will have set for him. The only way to avoid all these for Mr. Stamina is to skip all the future debates. Of course he will be called chicken and so on but at least he will not damage himself anymore in front of the undecided voters. Do not get me wrong, though I personally want that Mr. Stamina goes to all debates with Hillary and the he will get sliced and diced (as Megyn Kelly said) every single time by Hillary.

[Winter]

Note that Hillary had ads and interviews ready for broadcast and publishing right after the debate:

http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/hillary-clinton-releases-powerful-new-ad-former-miss-universe-alicia-machado-173736

http://www.politico.com/media/story/2016/09/after-debate-cosmo-guardian-us-rushed-to-publish-dueling-alicia-machado-profiles-004785

[paul]

Hillary Clinton was the matador to Donald Trump's bull in first presidential debate

84 million TV viewers — the largest presidential debate audience ever — watched Donald Trump get all flustered and act like a raging bull. I credit Hillary Clinton’s bright red suit.

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-sac-skelton-presidential-debate-hillary-clinton-donald-trump-20160929-snap-story.html

So, maybe even the bright red suit was part of Hillary strategy to annoy Trump?

[Tomi T Ahonen]

Hi Everybody

Well, its now back to normal for two weeks. And we have plenty going on. First off. Whats Mr Trump: Political Genius doing with his time? The most precious resource of any campaign? Is the Trumpster in Florida? Is the Trumpomon in Ohio. Is the Trumpomonster in Pennsylvania? No. He was in Wisconsin, and he heads to... Michigan. These are two states he will not win. They are yes borderline battlegrounds but he is BEHIND. He just LOST the first debate. He has 40 days left. And two of those days were just struck off the calendar. Trump threw away 2.5% of the most valuable resource he has.

Donald J Trump: Political Genius.

Meanwhile Michelle Obama, in Pennsylvania. Joe Biden is in Pennsylvania. Bernie Sanders is in New Hampshire. Bill Clinton is in Ohio. He was scheduled to go to Florida but now with Shimon Perez's funeral, Bill cancelled and flies to Israel. President Obama did a TV event for Hillary. Its not just that Hillary and Tim Kaine are hitting the battleground states, they have a vast array of their surrogates on the road, also in those states.

Yeah. One team plays smart and the other team plays kindergarden.

Ok then what about endorsements. So one of the most famous recent Republican Senators, John Warner of Virginia endorsed Hillary. And a bunch more newspapers endorse her (and one always-Republican newspaper snubbed Trump by endorsing Johnson). So far, Trump has ZERO, count it ZERO newspaper editorial endorsements. Now, few people decide anymore because of newspaper endorsements but most loyal readers of a given newspaper will read that endorsement. Its not going well for the Orangeman. Oh and there was again some old Bushie admin guy again who endorsed Hillary.

So then palace intrigue. Trump campaign leaking (bad sign) that there is in-fighting (bad sign) that Trump KIDS angry at Campaign leadership that they put Trump into that debate unprepared (this is usually the prelude for someone getting fired). They ALSO worry that Trump's properties suffer in value as a consequence (GOOD !!!) Yeah, I think it could be Conway, it could be Bannon, it could be.. both.

Hey, then that mysterious Bossie superduper filthy-nasty attack 'swift boat' attack? That big 140 million dollar ad buy has started running and .. its just normal Trumpian nonsense ads of no real consequence. They're not even good political ads as such. Are they holding for the big push for its optimal timing, or is that Bossie attack not ready yet, or have they maybe shot down the idea. Lets keep monitoring that space.

BUT Trump was so 'gentlemanly' not to push the stories about Bill Clinton's infidelity in the actual debate, how magnainmous of him - but now the campaign HAS told the surrogates to push the stories in THEIR TV interviews. Yeah, sleazebag stuff. Typical of Trump wanting to have his cake and eat it too.

Talking about Trumpian lunacy - someone mentioned it in the comments already, gosh, that former Miss Universe girl? Trump is FEUDING WITH HER.

In what f*cking universe is that a good idea? It wastes his time and ever shrinking ability to control the news cycle. It PERPETUATES the story that Trump is a sexist - and clearly also he has a problem with overweight people - well, that was one group he had not yet insulted or offended. And it keeps that whole women anger going past the debate. Trump is tone-deaf. He has no sane voice RUNNING his campaign, which would have the balls to tell Mr Trump - this you have to stop now. STOP IT NOW. And a voice that Trump can trust and will obey. Obviously he is totally unhinged and now doing really dumb stuff. I'd say he's doing dumb sh*t.

Well, then talk about a bad job - the Campaign is considering hiring a paid full-time debate coach for now (haha) to help with prep for the next debate in two weeks. Yeah good luck with that, whoever schmuck takes that hopeless task. Make sure you get paid in advance!

But just as it can't get more weird, at an event in Iowa, Trump asked who was in the audience who was NOT a conservative Christian. Some hands went up. Trump asked the audience if they should be allowed to stay. Gosh this is so three-steps-from-Hitler right now. So Trump's current logic says, the way to win this sucker is with racial and religious purity. Yeah. Why not just roll out the Swastikas and start with the Heil Trump salutes?

Haha Trump Campaign sent an angry memo to surrogates insisting they all must now claim Trump won the debate (based on what?)

So on the debate itself, Google reports that 2 million watched the live YouTube stream so the total audience was more than 86 million, with 84 million TV networks and 2 million just in YouTube (plus misc other online streams).

Not sure if I mentioned this before, but meanwhile Johnson seems determined to end his run. He had another Aleppo moment. He was asked to name a fave foreign leader and could not think of one. Yeah. Smoking too much pot sometimes does that to your brain haha...

Oh, and Chris Engel one of the major foreign correspondents on NBC mentioned in an interview his second biggest concern after the debate, from a foreign policy expert's point of view (first being nuke war) that Trump wants to launch a Mafia-style extortion racket internationally. To squeeze money out of US allies and friends, and threaten to take away their various treaty obligations that have stood for decades. Yeah we had that discussion forever-ago, but yeah, Trump did now suggest this in the main debate and clearly Trump has not abandoned his pet idea on how to get rich fast.

He really needs to lose BIGLY.. This type of candidate CANNOT run again, ever. Gosh he is horrible for not just the USA, the Republican party but the world.

Oh but in good news, Alex Baldwin is in rehearsals doing his Trump impression for Saturday Night Live. I'm sure they'll be doing their version of the debate. I can't wait to see it. Most SNL debate parodies are good, this should be epic. I can imagine the whole team there, from writers to actors to other staff - essentially hate the very essence of what Trump has revealed of him and his campaign. They should be murdering him on Saturday. It is likely to be similar to Sarah Palin 'I can see Russia from my house!' haha. It could be that 'Sean Hannity, Sean Hannity, Sean Hannity' becomes a national joke. And a brutal SNL parody could do a lot to get the youth more energized to really hate Trump (and get semi-enthusiastic about Hillary).

Thats a quick check on major news stories, I'm sure I'll see more shortly

Tomi Ahonen :-)

[Tomi T Ahonen]

Hi Everybody

And of course I forgot something. The Pulitzer-attempt big expose stories by major press. I said to start to expect them now. And they are coming. Newsweek has a story that Trump engaged in illegal trade with Cuba (cover story). Its a major crime. It is not recent (happened in 1999) but conveniently, that was ALSO a Trump political run, as an Independent third party candidate (brief run attempting to get the nomination for the Reform Party).

Trump was then in Florida talking to the fiercely anti-Castro very conservative Florida Hispanics that he will never deal with Cuba and he is all for the sanctions against Castro. haha while he was dealing secretly with Cuba. This will not endear him with what remains of his Hispanic support in the Sunshine State.

So yeah, I think we can expect tons of nasty news stories coming, now that the end is near. And lots of them will be 'big surprise' type of nasty stories - like haha Cuba. Seriously? The ONE country that all Republicans still hate and Trump went and essentially funneled cash into the pockets of the evil Castro regime. Oh, good move Trump.

Tomi Ahonen :-)

[Tomi T Ahonen]

Hi paul

Thanks for the Sam Bee clip. BRILLIANT and as per usual, she is very sharp and superfunny. She should have gotten either Jon Stewart's main show The Daily Show, or if Comedy Central had been really smart, they would have locked Stephen Colbert to do that when Stewart left, and given Sam Bee the follow-up time slot for what now is that Full Frontal show. Comedy Central management, pinheads or boneheads, you make the call haha..

Very funny and yeah. Women REALLY like it when a man makes fun of their weight. And Trump is so tone-deaf he can't see he's just making this worse. And he has nobody there in his Campaign (including his kids) to tell him that he HAS to stop. This is a place where an apology would be in place but haha, if Trump isn't apologizing to Obama for 5 years of Birtherism, he won't apologize for a Miss Universe winner either

Tomi Ahonen :-)

[paul]

It starts to look really bad for Trump's team.

Megyn Kelly Goes After Kellyanne Conway On Trump’s Misogyny

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/megyn-kelly-goes-after-kellyanne-conway-on-trumps-record-with-women_us_57ece199e4b024a52d2cf0cb

[TheTruth]

...aaaand here we have it: Microsoft is no longer going to make smartphones:

http://www.lepoint.fr/chroniqueurs-du-point/guerric-poncet/microsoft-renonce-aux-smartphones-grand-public-pour-quelques-annees-28-09-2016-2071926_506.php

[Winter]

After the debate, the old skeletons are dug up. Not helpful:

Watch Donald Trump Say He Hired a Female Employee Just Because She Was Hot
He also called beautiful women his "alcoholism."
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/watch-donald-trump-hire-woman-hot

And Conway slips up and let the truth come out:

Trump Campaign Manager Accidentally Refers to His ‘Abuse’ of Women on Live TV
http://nymag.com/thecut/2016/09/trump-campaign-manager-slips-refers-to-his-abuse-of-women.html

Trump should have stuck to Paul Manafort. At least Manafort does not have a conscience that might get entangled with the "truth".

[cornelius]

Here is Trump complaining that Holt "was much, much tougher on me than he was on Hillary". Poor Trumpy, he's so delicate, so innocent. It's a shame. There is no justice in this world.
Also Trump is complaining about Google favoring Clinton with the search results. It must be true because the accusation has originated from a report from Sputnik News, a Russian state propaganda outlet.
Here is the link:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/29/donald-trump-attacks-biased-lester-holt-and-accuses-google-of-conspiracy

And speaking of Russians. Everyone knows about Putin's paid trolls army that comments on all discussion boards and spreads propaganda nonsense. And it doesn't really make sense that all online polls have declared Trump the winner of the debate, often by ridiculous amounts like 80% for Trump to 20% for Clinton. I was wondering if Putin's troll army had anything to do with Trump's landslide win in online polls.

[Tomi T Ahonen]

Hi Everybody

Rasmussen has a 4-way poll out. Hillary up by only +1%. Sounds bad until we see what R said last week. They're the nutters who had Trump up by -5% so even right-leaning Rasmussen managed to dig up a 6 point swing towards Hillary.

Meanwhile PPP has a bunch of in-state polls out in key swing states right after the debate, all gone back to blue. I await RCP to update its pages but we are likely to see some changes in RCP's map today.

Tomi Ahonen :-)