As I wrote earlier, I didn’t think Donald Trump would lose his cool this quickly or that Hillary Clinton would be able to bait him that effortlessly. But it turned into such a mess that there were almost countless little comments from Trump, each one of which was in its own way quite ridiculous or damning or both. Many will likely come up again after people get a good night’s sleep and start picking out these almost countless nuggets.
A few examples. You may not remember this but after Clinton brought up Trump’s quote about hoping there would be a housing crisis because he could make a killing off it he piped it, “That’s business!” That’s not really much a rebuttal. It’s just repeating what was already a damaging line the first time. He can’t not act impulsively or out of anger. That crack is like a 30 second ad right there in itself.
Then there was that bizarre digression when he claimed 2002 bull sessions with Sean Hannity in which he professed his opposition to the Iraq War. Now that’s his proof. Just call Hannity. He’ll verify it.
Then there was the moment when Hillary strongly suggested that Trump pays no taxes. I don’t have the transcript in front of me at the moment. But he blurted out that it would have been wasted if he had. Was that Trump admitting he pays no taxes? This stuff may work as trash talk. But there are transcripts of what he said.
Other moments were just disjointed and a glimpse into a 70 year old man with profound arrested emotional development. At one point he claimed he was thinking of saying something terrible about Clinton and her family, but decided it wasn’t appreciate appropriate. Appreciate the congrats, he seemed to be saying. That’s such a shining moment for you Donald.
I mentioned during my live blog that Trump managed to restate virtually every major lie he’s stated during the entire campaign. Iraq War, Libya War, IRS audit, birtherism – new ones like denying his claims about Climate Change being a Chinese hoax. It was such a contentious back and forth that it was hard to keep track of all this stuff. It will be easier when journalists can go back and read through the transcript at some leisure. But there’s just so much.
