The First Debate– 9/26/16

Thought the debates consisting of childish name-calling and arguing about anything but the given topics were over?

Well, as Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said 11 times during Monday’s debate; “wrong.”

The first of three presidential debates took place Monday night and it was 95 minutes of an emotional rollercoaster like none other. Anger, excitement, fear, grief– it was all there.

During the first 20 minutes, Trump kept his temper under control and stayed on message. However, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton was able to get under his skin quickly. Fact checking was a major focus in this debate due the fictional claims thrown around by both campaigns. Clinton even went as far as adding a live fact-checking feature to her website.

As far as winners and losers go, Clinton came away with a victory due to her ability to stay on message while joking around and letting Trump run off on meaningless tangents.

Trump exhibited his lack of self control by taking bait from Clinton to discuss and defend himself instead of focusing on his message. Trump definitely won the lack of manners portion of the debate by interrupting Clinton fifty-one times during the ninety minute debate.

By the end of the debate, the nonsensical exchanges just could not be controlled by moderator Lester Holt.

The Vice Presidential Debate– 10/04/16

The only vice presidential debate happened  Tuesday night and it was significantly less epic, as expected. Democratic nominee Tim Kaine and Republican nominee Mike Pence fought it out to defend their running mates and spread their messages.

This debate had the candidates seated across from each other at a table which definitely felt awkward watching at home. Mike Pence started out strong by thanking Norwood University which was not where the debate was being held. However Pence’s overall performance was strong because he resisted Kaine’s attempts to drag him down the hole of discussing Donald Trump’s many, many insulting and disrespectful actions and ideas. Kaine would bring something up and Pence would deflect it by saying his running mate hadn’t said that even if he had.

Both men are extremely qualified; however, their ideas are vastly different. Pence is a conservative and bases all of his ideas on “Christian values” while Kaine, who is a very observant Catholic, believes the Constitution and its modern interpretation are important and is much more liberal compared to Pence.

While Pence had a more decisive victory as he was able to stay focused on issues, Kaine also had a pretty good night and was able to keep some momentum for his campaign going into Sunday night’s presidential debate.