Donald Trump’s questionable debate performance appears to
have been the result of nervousness.
How else to explain his repeated defensiveness and apparent
inability to counter Hillary Clinton’s personal attacks? Also missing was a sense of humor.
Relying on my many courtroom experiences, I can tell you
that nervousness is the foe of relaxation.
When at ease, the speaker’s friend is flexibility. He can think on his feet and crack a
joke. Tenseness, however, causes one to
stick to the script in one’s head. And
if, like Trump, the script is missing, the verbal wandering is aimless.
So why did the candidate who seemed so comfortable on the
debate stage during the primary season have a brain freeze? Does Donald Trump finally realize that,
although his foes may laugh at him, his candidacy is no longer a laughing matter? He might actually become President of the
United States!
A note on media bias:
Pre-debate reviews of moderator Lester Holt were generally favorable,
the consensus being that he was a low-key straight-shooter. The accolades were undeserved. Trump was the sole target of aggressive questioning. The GOP nominee was forced to deal with
challenges to his prior statements on tax returns, “birther” comments and Iraq (none
of which he handled effectively for the reasons noted above). Hillary?
She was asked to respond to criticisms of her email activities. She called them simply “a mistake”. The moderator’s question wasn’t even phrased
in a manner which suggested the damning nature of her conduct.
And why have there been no references to the disrespectful
act of Hillary Clinton’s repeatedly calling her opponent by his first
name? This was, after all, a debate
between the two main presidential contenders.
Of course, they are hardly friends so nothing more than minimal courtesy
should have been expected. Surprisingly,
given Trump’s penchant for rude and vulgar speech, he actually said, at the
outset, that he would refer to his opponent as “Secretary Clinton” and
consistently did so. Hillary did not
reciprocate the courtesy.
The media either didn’t notice or chose not to recognize
that Donald Trump could actually be polite.
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