Clinton was most effective when she painted Trump as a typical Republican and hung his party's past errors around his neck. She thankfully abandoned her tactic of claiming that Trump was an aberration from Republican norms. That bid for GOP support likely swayed very few presidential voters, but it kneecapped Democrats running for Congress and robbed her of a powerful line of attack against Trump. By tying Trump to his party instead -- a move he failed to counter -- she robbed him of his populist theme and linked him instead to the failed GOP policies of the past
Unfortunately, Clinton also characterized Trump's economic ideas as "trumped up, trickle down." That's the kind of phrase that delights politicians and their campaign staff but leave voters cold or confused. Given her struggles to appear spontaneous, it's also precisely the sort of overly wordsmithed, artificial-sounding phrase Clinton should avoid.
Clinton then mentioned the plight of the middle class, the burdens of student debt, and the need for debt-free college. They were good, if somewhat inchoate, thoughts. But she failed to tie them together into a single economic theme or vision, and that will work to her detriment. Nor did she attack Trump on his misguided deficit fixation -- a fixation shared by too many Democrats in the Clinton camp.
On climate change, Trump denied Clinton's charge that he had characterized it as a Chinese hoax. But he did, and climate denial is the GOP's default position. At a time of planetary crisis, that alone should disqualify him for the presidency. But there was far too little discussion of the policies that are needed to protect the planet.
The Divide
Lester Holt mentioned recent police shootings of African Americans in Tulsa and Charlotte and asked the candidates how they would "heal the divide." Clinton spoke about her policies for criminal justice reform, while Trump talked about "law and order" and boasted about his endorsements from police groups. (I thought for a moment he was about to announce the support of the warden from "Cool Hand Luke.")
Trump sounded like a feudal overlord, or worse, when he spoke about law enforcement. Instead of projecting compassion, he seemed to have his mind on his money (and vice versa):
"And when I look at what's going on in Charlotte, a city I love, a city where I have investments ... we need law and order in our country."
"You don't have good community relations in Chicago. It's terrible. I have property there."
Trump brought up his support for "stop and frisk" policing, a tactic which has been found unconstitutional, and repeated a great deal of misinformation about urban crime trends. He and Clinton went a few rounds on his favorite topic -- law and order -- before Holt gamely tried to reassert control by saying, "This conversation is about race..."
Clinton pushed back on Trump's assertions and commendably addressed sentencing reform, saying: "We have to come forward with a plan that is going to divert people from the criminal justice system, deal with mandatory minimum sentences which have put too many people away for too long for doing too little. We need to have more second chance programs."
She did, however, wrongly claim that "we're ending private prisons in the federal system." The federal prison system is phasing them out, but Homeland Security still detains immigrants in for-profit prisons, and for-profit companies will continue to provide services in public prisons.
But Clinton clearly has a much better grasp of this issue than Trump does. "We have to address the systemic racism in our justice system," she said.
Policeman of the World
The conversation on national security was equally frustrating. "We cannot be the policeman of the world," said Trump, a thought that deserved a meaningful exchange. Both candidates should be asked to explain where, when and how they would intervene militarily around the world. But Trump immediately added: "We cannot defend people when they're not paying us," a statement that made the United States sound like a private security patrol company. The right questions were never asked.
Neither candidate found the high ground in Iraq. Trump claimed the United States could've crushed ISIS by claiming Iraq's oil revenue for itself. That position is at once unlawful, unethical and impractical. Clinton failed to offer a coherent plan to stop ISIS in either Iraq or Syria. And neither candidate acknowledged the deaths, not only of thousands of young Americans, but of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and other Middle Easterners.
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