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This presidential debate was a mess. I have never laughed so hard, got so angry, or even wanted to turn the television off so bad during something so serious. In this case, I wouldn't call it serious. It was a pair of kids fighting with each other and the adult who was trying to separate them. This was a loss for the American people. We were not able to hear the true opinions of the presidential candidates, and be able to choose which one we will be voting for on November 3. The part that stuck out to me the most was how President Donald Trump could not condemn white supremacy. This made me think, huh. When even asked to do so on live television by both the moderator and Vice President Biden, our President could not condemn a group of people that hate a certain other group of people. This really was eye opening for me, because it was never said outright for the whole world to see that he didn't condemn such a group, but then we saw during the debate.

Honestly, I learned nothing from President Donal Trump about his plans for the nation. All I heard was a baby who couldn't keep his mouth shut when he was asked too, and always tried to deflect blame and the topic. He saved football, woooo! But what about the people who lost their jobs because of COVID? At least Biden was able to get some of his plan out their, including his plan for the police, global warming, and job. What I heard from trump was racism, fall promises, and more.

I learned that most of my opinions on Trump were valid. He is immature and ruined the entire debate for us, the people of America. I also discovered a lot about Biden and his family, in a not so pleasant way. While Trump was trashing Biden's sons, I learned that his son had passed away and his other son was a recovered addict. This gave me another perspective on Biden, as he understands more about struggles that some Americans have in their homes.

You would expect the people who hold the highest power status in America to want to be appealable and professional. However this debate proved that statement wrong, especially on the Republican side. I have never seen a political event be this all over the place and frustrating. It honestly made me scared for the future of America. The tactics of Trump were clear, he wanted to frustrate and exploit Biden, making him unable to speak the whole time. However, he used this same method when speaking to the moderator. In fact he was blocking Chris Wallace from doing his job, which was just to ask questions and make sure everything ran smoothly. Trump blatantly disrespected Wallace’s basic task by continuously interrupting. This was a continuing trend throughout the debate. No one could talk except President Trump and almost everything he said had no value to the debate. From both sides we saw the candidate dodging the questions they were being asked and bringing up things that really didn’t matter to the debate at all. One moment of this that stuck up to me was Trump bringing up Biden’s family, especially his dead son. It is completely unprofessional and just a waste of time to talk about subjects like this. Another example of this is when Trump started to talk about Biden’s education. Instead of attacking him on his policies or something useful he decided to talk about Biden’s personal life.

This brings me to what was talked about that could actually help someone who is undecided. Honestly there is little to no information that was given in this debate. However Biden briefly spoke about things like the Green New Deal, however he was almost immediately pushed away by Trump yelling over him. However, on both sides we saw definite avoiding of questions. Biden danced around some things that could’ve had direct answers and so didn’t Trump. They clearly didn’t want to make any groups of people with certain ideas to not vote for them because they said the wrong thing.

This debate really shows the character of our candidates. We already knew that Trump is a loud bully who uses his aggression to his advantage. We also knew that Biden has had some troubles with speaking and has a speech impediment which hurt him in this debate. We see that Biden gets walked all over by Trump however, he wanted to try to keep it civil to a point. At one point he did tell Trump to shut up but it really didn’t stop him from talking. Trump’s extremely short temper made him get really made at small things. Biden also was extremely frustrated and even called Trump a clown. I totally do believe both of their characters are important to the election because it can predict how they are going to act while in the office. Also you have to have a certain charm about you in order to get people to like you and honestly neither Trump nor Biden seem to have this charm.

I honestly believe that this election might encourage even more people to not vote. It made both of the candidates look bad and unprofessional. People who are undecided or on the fence about voting will feel even less inclined to pick a candidate because they don’t trust or believe in either of them. It is very important to vote especially in these times because your vote can help decide the future of our country.

Originally posted by SlothsPoopOnceAWeek on October 01, 2020 16:39

Honestly, I learned nothing from President Donal Trump about his plans for the nation. All I heard was a baby who couldn't keep his mouth shut when he was asked too, and always tried to deflect blame and the topic. He saved football, woooo! But what about the people who lost their jobs because of COVID? At least Biden was able to get some of his plan out their, including his plan for the police, global warming, and job. What I heard from trump was racism, fall promises, and more.

@SlothsPoopOnceAWeek makes some very good points here. I too noticed that Trump's deflection tactics. For me, they severely weakened the credibility of anything he had to say that actually addressed the question because all I could think about was each instance when he refused to answer a question. I think this tactic hurt him in the eyes of the majority of Americans as well. One of the main things people were looking for in this debate was clarification of each candidate's specific positions and plans to combat the issues our country is facing. By trying to highlight the single positive things Trump has done, like saving football, which are extremely insignificant in the face of issues like racism and healthcare in America, he has blatantly pointed out to the people that those minor successes are the best he could come up with.

Much like others who have already posted their thoughts on the first presidential debate, I am experiencing feelings of embarrassment, confusion, and most of all fear. The goal of these televised debates are to inform the public about the possible candidates running for president, a job that is the highest position of power one could possibly achieve in the United States, (just as stated by @alberic25). Yet when watching, I feel that I am less informed than I began. I had already seen clips from Trump’s debates during the 2016 elections, and recall his methods being loud, obnoxious, and with no real substance. But, I came into this searching for answers, keeping an open mind to both parties, not wanting to view the whole thing with any strong biases. It was naive of me to think that this time would be any different with Trump and my reluctant support for Biden has only increased. The entire time, I found myself struggling to keep up with these men’s attacks at each other, grown men I may add, and I was disappointed with the lackluster responses of both parties. This being said it was extremely difficult to find out what both parties have planned for the future of our country if they are voted into office.

Originally posted by SlothsPoopOnceAWeek on October 01, 2020 16:39

This presidential debate was a mess. I have never laughed so hard, got so angry, or even wanted to turn the television off so bad during something so serious. In this case, I wouldn't call it serious. It was a pair of kids fighting with each other and the adult who was trying to separate them. This was a loss for the American people. We were not able to hear the true opinions of the presidential candidates, and be able to choose which one we will be voting for on November 3. The part that stuck out to me the most was how President Donald Trump could not condemn white supremacy. This made me think, huh. When even asked to do so on live television by both the moderator and Vice President Biden, our President could not condemn a group of people that hate a certain other group of people. This really was eye opening for me, because it was never said outright for the whole world to see that he didn't condemn such a group, but then we saw during the debate.

Honestly, I learned nothing from President Donal Trump about his plans for the nation. All I heard was a baby who couldn't keep his mouth shut when he was asked too, and always tried to deflect blame and the topic. He saved football, woooo! But what about the people who lost their jobs because of COVID? At least Biden was able to get some of his plan out their, including his plan for the police, global warming, and job. What I heard from trump was racism, fall promises, and more.

I learned that most of my opinions on Trump were valid. He is immature and ruined the entire debate for us, the people of America. I also discovered a lot about Biden and his family, in a not so pleasant way. While Trump was trashing Biden's sons, I learned that his son had passed away and his other son was a recovered addict. This gave me another perspective on Biden, as he understands more about struggles that some Americans have in their homes.

I completely agree with everything you said. Throughout the debate, Biden was actually trying to describe his plans and Trump was talking about the minimal things he has done and shouting out "47 years!" It seemed as though Trump was overly confident to the point where he thought I can say anything I want, I have the election in the bag. Biden actually explaining his plans for the country also shows that he cares more about the election than Trump might.

Also, that's a really good point you made at the end, saying that Biden "understands more about struggles that some Americans have in their homes." I didn't think about that, but it's so obvious now. In my opinion, Trump pointing out Biden's struggles actually makes him a better candidate because it shows that he is human like the rest of us. Trump on the other hand, the billionaire with a toupee, doesn't have many people who can relate to him.

Originally posted by Bumblebee on October 01, 2020 08:49

Since watching the debate last night, I have had many discussions both in and out of classes about its content. The majority of people I’ve spoken with seem to have had the same impression while watching: when can we turn this off? I have to agree with them.

From the moment the debate began, it was a mess. The points that stick out to me the most include when in the very first segment, Trump’s arguing with the moderator, Chris Wallace, got to the point where Wallace had to tell Trump, “You’re debating [Biden], not me.” Like Hector_Zeroni said, this was a common theme throughout the whole debate, during which Trump not only raised his voice at Wallace, but interrupted Biden almost every other word. Though Biden did his fair share of interrupting as well, it was nowhere near Trump’s level.

I think Wallace should have done a much better job controlling both candidates, and if he wasn’t capable, then someone else should’ve been selected to moderate. I acknowledge that keeping the peace between the two was a very difficult task, but that is basically the moderator’s whole job.

Another moment that stood out to me was when Trump attacked Biden’s dead son, who served in the military, along with his other son who struggled with addiction. It deeply saddened me to hear Trump defame Beau Biden, and I can’t imagine how Biden must have felt on the podium at that moment. It is one thing to attack your opponent, even though that is still disgraceful for a presidential candidate to do, in my opinion. It is another thing completely to attack your opponent’s deceased family members who are not there to defend themselves, and who have no relevance to any of the issues that were at hand.

The last moment that stood out to me, similar to Hector_Zeroni, was when Trump refused to denounce white supremacists. Though it did not come as a surprise to me due to Trump’s support of supremacist organizations like the KKK in the past, I was disgusted to see so blatantly that a presidential candidate can refuse to denounce racist hate groups and still be considered a valid candidate for American voters.

I did not learn much from either candidate about their plans due to the fact that the constant talking over each other was so chaotic it made it difficult to concentrate on what either one was saying in the first place. However, what I could make out did not impress me. I heard from Trump that his plan to combat the wildfires in California caused by climate change is to pick up the leaves. I also learned that Trump believes a vaccine will be available very soon, despite no evidence to support that claim and accredited scientists saying it will not be available until the summer.

I also wouldn’t say I “learned” anything about either man’s character, but I did see demonstrations of what I already knew. Trump proved once again that he is a lying, racist, childish person with no class, and that was in the first 45 minutes. Though Biden was more consistently levelheaded, he acted immaturely at many points in the debate as well, even going so far as to say, “Will you shut up, man?”

The whole debate felt more like an argument between children who both wanted to get the last word, which aren’t the characteristics of leadership that I would look for in a president. However, in my opinion, character is extremely relevant to leadership, which is why it is so disappointing that that of both presidential candidates is questionable.

I also agree with Hector_Zeroni in the sense that this debate will not affect the election that much. Mail in voting has allowed many people to cast their votes before the debate even took place, and in addition to that, most people watching the debate have already made up their mind. If Trump’s or Biden’s actions in the past haven’t been enough to change their respective supporters’ minds already, then it is doubtful that anything they said last night would accomplish that task. Overall, I thought this debate was an embarrassment to the country. Razzledazzle8 said it perfectly. "That was the most disrespectful and unprofessional debate in American history."

I completely agree that both the candidates were acting extremely childish during the debate. Had they(mostly Trump really) stopped interrupting, We could have actually learned about their thoughts on issues going on right now. However, I disagree that Chris wallace did a terrible job as moderator. It s not his fault that Trump was unable to cooperate, follow rules, or be civilized. I just think that he did not expect things to get so out of hand. I understand that he could have done more, but we need to consider that in the moment there was so much chaos that he probably did not know how to stop them. That being said, I do think he should have grilled them more when they were not answering the questions.

Originally posted by alberic25 on October 01, 2020 18:17

You would expect the people who hold the highest power status in America to want to be appealable and professional. However this debate proved that statement wrong, especially on the Republican side. I have never seen a political event be this all over the place and frustrating. It honestly made me scared for the future of America. The tactics of Trump were clear, he wanted to frustrate and exploit Biden, making him unable to speak the whole time. However, he used this same method when speaking to the moderator. In fact he was blocking Chris Wallace from doing his job, which was just to ask questions and make sure everything ran smoothly. Trump blatantly disrespected Wallace’s basic task by continuously interrupting. This was a continuing trend throughout the debate. No one could talk except President Trump and almost everything he said had no value to the debate. From both sides we saw the candidate dodging the questions they were being asked and bringing up things that really didn’t matter to the debate at all. One moment of this that stuck up to me was Trump bringing up Biden’s family, especially his dead son. It is completely unprofessional and just a waste of time to talk about subjects like this. Another example of this is when Trump started to talk about Biden’s education. Instead of attacking him on his policies or something useful he decided to talk about Biden’s personal life.

This brings me to what was talked about that could actually help someone who is undecided. Honestly there is little to no information that was given in this debate. However Biden briefly spoke about things like the Green New Deal, however he was almost immediately pushed away by Trump yelling over him. However, on both sides we saw definite avoiding of questions. Biden danced around some things that could’ve had direct answers and so didn’t Trump. They clearly didn’t want to make any groups of people with certain ideas to not vote for them because they said the wrong thing.

This debate really shows the character of our candidates. We already knew that Trump is a loud bully who uses his aggression to his advantage. We also knew that Biden has had some troubles with speaking and has a speech impediment which hurt him in this debate. We see that Biden gets walked all over by Trump however, he wanted to try to keep it civil to a point. At one point he did tell Trump to shut up but it really didn’t stop him from talking. Trump’s extremely short temper made him get really made at small things. Biden also was extremely frustrated and even called Trump a clown. I totally do believe both of their characters are important to the election because it can predict how they are going to act while in the office. Also you have to have a certain charm about you in order to get people to like you and honestly neither Trump nor Biden seem to have this charm.

I honestly believe that this election might encourage even more people to not vote. It made both of the candidates look bad and unprofessional. People who are undecided or on the fence about voting will feel even less inclined to pick a candidate because they don’t trust or believe in either of them. It is very important to vote especially in these times because your vote can help decide the future of our country.

I completely agree with everything you said, especially when talking about how Trump acted throughout the debate. "The tactics of Trump were clear, he wanted to frustrate and exploit Biden, making him unable to speak the whole time. However, he used this same method when speaking to the moderator. In fact he was blocking Chris Wallace from doing his job, which was just to ask questions and make sure everything ran smoothly. Trump blatantly disrespected Wallace’s basic task by continuously interrupting. This was a continuing trend throughout the debate. No one could talk except President Trump and almost everything he said had no value to the debate." It was almost as if he wanted to make the debate The Trump Show. Sorry Donald, your reality tv show ship has long sailed. Trump barely added anything to the debate (actually, with all of his interruptions, he probably took away more than he added). Biden clearly had thought out his answers and had plans while Trump was repeating H1N1 numbers and patting himself on the back for starting the football season. Hooray, 200K Americans are dead from COVID, but at least we get to watch the Pats again!!

Originally posted by butterfly123 on October 01, 2020 15:54

There were several moments in this debate that stood out to me. This was the first presidential debate I have ever watched, and while I was not surprised at what happened based on my previous knowledge of the candidates, I was still disappointed that there wasn’t more real information about either of their plans. The first moment that stood out to me was Trump's failure to condemn white supremacy. As razzledazzle8 said, he deflected the question and switched the topic to ANTIFA. There should have been no hesitation to condemn white supremacy groups at all. There shouldn’t have been deflection, he shouldn’t have diverted the conversation, his immediate response should have been ‘of course’. I think this is a very telling moment. It shows what he stands for, what he is willing to do, and where he hesitates.

Another interesting thing that I noticed throughout the debate is that whenever anyone mentioned something Trump had done wrong, or something his administration had done badly, he would answer with “that's not true”,or something along those lines. I found this very frustrating because in a situation like a debate it is hard to prove that facts are true in the moment, so most of the time the conversation just moves on. This really made me think about what people who are already Trump supporters and not interested in further educating themselves and fact checking what he says must think. Without doing their own research and simply listening to everything Trump says, they must think that he is doing a great job, so as 239bid0073 said, it is unlikely that this debate changed anyone who was already supporting Trump’s opinions.

As for what I learned about either candidate's plans, the answer is pretty much nothing. I learned that Biden doesn’t support the Green New Deal which I didn’t know before, and is disappointing, but that he does have his own plan related to climate change. While personally I support the Green New Deal, at least Biden would address climate change instead of pretending it doesn’t exist like Trump does. Overall this debate showed a lot about the candidates characters, and overall it raises concerns about the future of our country.

I also was so frustrated when Trump would respond during Biden's answers. i would be trying to listen to Biden, but Trump's unnecessary replies were too much. he kept trying to distract everyone from what Biden was saying, and that contributed to the chaos. In addition, i agree with your stance on his failure to condemn white supremacy. it makes it really scary for people of color in this country, because now the white supremacists feel supported by the current president, and who knows what they will be willing to do now.

I have watched a few clips of presidential debates in the past but this one was worse than I had imagined. Debates are supposed to be a formal discussion where both sides put forward their arguments and respectfully disagree with the opposing side and provide evidence to back up their argument. In this debate, I only saw constant interruption and speaking over each other. Neither of the presidential candidates were able to describe their plans for the future. There are multiple moments that stood out to me: when Biden told Trump to shut up, Trump talking about how Biden hasn’t done anything when he was in office for 47 years (Trump hasn’t done anything in his four years of presidency) and Biden repeatedly calling Trump a liar and that he has no plan. I agree with razzledazzle8 that high school discussions were more civilized than this debate. I simply could not understand how Trump can become the president of the United States without knowing how to follow the rules of a debate. By constantly interrupting Biden, Trump was able to take advantage of Biden’s speech disorder and prevented him from getting his ideas out. After watching the debate, I have learned more about their personal history and scandals rather than their plans for the nation.

One of the topics mentioned in the debate was economic recovery during the pandemic. Although allowing businesses to reopen can help America recover from the recession, this completely destroys the effort of the healthcare workers who are working on the frontlines and risking their lives to save others. I don’t understand how Trump can take the hundreds of thousands of lives lost due to COVID so lightly. Trump continues to blame everything on China instead of proposing a possible solution to end the pandemic or at least slow down the spread of it. Both Trump and Biden mentioned many scientists and argued over mask wearing in public. I think they should focus on themselves and their plans for the nation instead of bringing other people into the debate. Trump attacks Biden’s son for his addiction, which I think is disrespectful and irrelevant to the debate. At this point, both candidates are trying to appeal to their supporters. As Facinghistorystudent mentioned, Trump refuses to denounce white supremacy to appeal to his supporters while Biden avoided talking about law enforcements and the Black Lives Matter Movement.

I agree with other students that this debate is unlikely to change anything since people already made their decisions before the debate. Trump supporters only believe in what Trump has to say and refuse to educate themselves on issues such as climate change and white supremacy. Hopefully, the debates in the future will be less chaotic and more informative discussions.