Raju Korti
The sparring between presidential aspirants, Republican Donald Trump and Democratic Hillary Clinton, during the presidential debate yesterday reminds me of a James Hadley Chase thriller. The stronger boxer loses the fight because he does not remember the cardinal principle of boxing: When you hook with your right, make sure your left side is protected.
I doubt whether any presidential election has defied conventional wisdom in recent times as this one. For one, it pit a political neophyte and reality TV star against the better half of a former president and two, no other debate was perhaps as hotly anticipated for reasons more than one. Both didn't let down as acidic barbs flew thick and fast as expected since the Twitter was already an excited host to their fireworks.
In a preview of the combat on the small screen, both needled each other. Electoral planks and issues figured at the centre of what both claimed as outright lies. There has been enough evidence in the past that the first debate is compelling enough to make or mar a candidate. In majority campaigns in the television age, the opening debate has shaped the trajectory of the elections -- John Kennedy in 1960 and Ronald Reagan in 1980 being the prime examples. They typically have had the most impact when an incumbent president isn't running and when the candidates come in with something to prove and when the contest is close and fluid. I am not sure if there ever was a contest as close and as fluid as this one.
During the entire campaign, we saw Trump in two different avatars. The debate before the debate was about which Donald Trump would show up -- a provocative and outrageous Trump who unexpectedly claimed Republican nomination when there were at least a dozen others with stronger political resumes or the one who toned down his grandiloquent rhetoric in the run up to the debate. In the rough and tumble of such a mutated scenario, it is tricky to answer what made Trump pull even with Hillary on the national battleground. As is his wont, the original Trump showed up.
It was no surprise that the debate degenerating into a slang match,headed overtime with both the rivals socking each other in a fierce exchange. It was Trump as promised as he portrayed his foe as a political hack and describing her as all words and soundbites. The number of times he interrupted when she spoke would have given our own Arnabs, Rajdeeps and Barkhas a run for their money. The only difference was the moderator of the debate tried with only limited success to keep control.
Hillary's demeanour showed her as a counter-puncher. But she was bang on target when she painted Trump as a questionable businessman with no plans in his head and a limited grasp of facts. She too repeated jabs at Trump's "Trumped-up trickle down" economic policies and accused him of racist for questioning Obama's birthplace. But her best salvo was asking him what was he trying to hide by refusing to reveal his tax returns while they were being audited.
By far the most amusing spectacle was the two blaming each other for almost everything including except why they were born. Sample this:
Trump: Mrs Clinton lacks presidential look and doesn't have the stamina.
Hillary: He can talk to me about stamina when he accomplishes as much. He has called women pigs, slobs and dogs.
Trump: I had planned to say something extremely rough to you and your family but decided against it.
Mercifully, Hillary didn't call Trump the son of a bitch and Trump didn't question her husband's stamina that was so much in evidence when he was having a fling with a 21-year-old White House intern. But while Trump huffed and puffed his way through, Hillary's responses were marked by more amusement than anger. Yet it was a debate between arrogance and experience if you know who should be the rightful claimant for those labels. In the complicated maze of truth, exaggeration and old falsehoods, it makes tactical sense for Hillary to let Trump caricature himself because no one else can do it better.
It is said that half of the American people have never read a newspaper. Half never voted for President. One hopes the other half uses discretion.
The sparring between presidential aspirants, Republican Donald Trump and Democratic Hillary Clinton, during the presidential debate yesterday reminds me of a James Hadley Chase thriller. The stronger boxer loses the fight because he does not remember the cardinal principle of boxing: When you hook with your right, make sure your left side is protected.
I doubt whether any presidential election has defied conventional wisdom in recent times as this one. For one, it pit a political neophyte and reality TV star against the better half of a former president and two, no other debate was perhaps as hotly anticipated for reasons more than one. Both didn't let down as acidic barbs flew thick and fast as expected since the Twitter was already an excited host to their fireworks.
In a preview of the combat on the small screen, both needled each other. Electoral planks and issues figured at the centre of what both claimed as outright lies. There has been enough evidence in the past that the first debate is compelling enough to make or mar a candidate. In majority campaigns in the television age, the opening debate has shaped the trajectory of the elections -- John Kennedy in 1960 and Ronald Reagan in 1980 being the prime examples. They typically have had the most impact when an incumbent president isn't running and when the candidates come in with something to prove and when the contest is close and fluid. I am not sure if there ever was a contest as close and as fluid as this one.
During the entire campaign, we saw Trump in two different avatars. The debate before the debate was about which Donald Trump would show up -- a provocative and outrageous Trump who unexpectedly claimed Republican nomination when there were at least a dozen others with stronger political resumes or the one who toned down his grandiloquent rhetoric in the run up to the debate. In the rough and tumble of such a mutated scenario, it is tricky to answer what made Trump pull even with Hillary on the national battleground. As is his wont, the original Trump showed up.
It was no surprise that the debate degenerating into a slang match,headed overtime with both the rivals socking each other in a fierce exchange. It was Trump as promised as he portrayed his foe as a political hack and describing her as all words and soundbites. The number of times he interrupted when she spoke would have given our own Arnabs, Rajdeeps and Barkhas a run for their money. The only difference was the moderator of the debate tried with only limited success to keep control.
Hillary's demeanour showed her as a counter-puncher. But she was bang on target when she painted Trump as a questionable businessman with no plans in his head and a limited grasp of facts. She too repeated jabs at Trump's "Trumped-up trickle down" economic policies and accused him of racist for questioning Obama's birthplace. But her best salvo was asking him what was he trying to hide by refusing to reveal his tax returns while they were being audited.
By far the most amusing spectacle was the two blaming each other for almost everything including except why they were born. Sample this:
 |
| Smiles before the scowls. |
Trump: Mrs Clinton lacks presidential look and doesn't have the stamina.
Hillary: He can talk to me about stamina when he accomplishes as much. He has called women pigs, slobs and dogs.
Trump: I had planned to say something extremely rough to you and your family but decided against it.
Mercifully, Hillary didn't call Trump the son of a bitch and Trump didn't question her husband's stamina that was so much in evidence when he was having a fling with a 21-year-old White House intern. But while Trump huffed and puffed his way through, Hillary's responses were marked by more amusement than anger. Yet it was a debate between arrogance and experience if you know who should be the rightful claimant for those labels. In the complicated maze of truth, exaggeration and old falsehoods, it makes tactical sense for Hillary to let Trump caricature himself because no one else can do it better.
It is said that half of the American people have never read a newspaper. Half never voted for President. One hopes the other half uses discretion.
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