Trump v Clinton: The world is watching

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Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, contenders for the 2016 Presidency

Benjamin O'Connell, Staff Reporter

 

Presidential debates are a time for the comparing of various political philosophies and ideologies. Generally, it’s between two parties, a republican and a democrat, sometimes with a third party candidate such as Ross Perot thrown into the mix. The second presidential debate this past Monday was not a debate, nor was the first one. This presidential debate was between Donald Trump and Bill Clinton. Excuse me, I think I’m reading Donald Trump’s debate notes. This presidential debate was between Donald Trump and Bill Clinton’s wife, Hillary. I would read Hillary’s notes too but I can’t find them anywhere, they must have been destroyed.

The debate was between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, two of the most unpopular presidential candidates in American history. If you watched the debate, and have been paying attention throughout this election cycle, you know that the main argument propagated by both sides of the political spectrum is that you should vote for Clinton because she isn’t Trump, and vice versa. Both candidates love to divert attention from platform specifics by saying things like “read my book about it,” “check out my website,” or “my opponent is a liar and unfit to be president.”

Personally, I care about specifics in policies, and plans that are realistic and can actually work. Unfortunately, all these two main party candidates care about are personal attacks and why you shouldn’t elect the other one. In the past, it has been easy to pinpoint moments when the candidates shared their policies and platform in detail during the debates, but the debate was so overshadowed by the drudging up of old and new personal and political attacks by both sides. Even before the debate started, Donald Trump decided to live stream a panel of 3 women who accused Bill Clinton of inappropriate sexual behavior. This classless act to draw attention away from his own questionable comments set the tone for the muckraking of a debate. And above all, when we finally look at their policies, we have to keep in mind that they are filled with empty promises without Congress.

Donald J. Trump. What more can I say about a guy to damage his reputation than he already has? Everything about Trump is unprofessional and uneducated, but his die-hard supporters from the radical faction of the right do not seem to care. In the wake of his lewd remarks towards women caught on tape with Billy Bush, Trump tried to justify his words during the debate by calling it “locker room banter” and saying that he would “defeat ISIS.”

 

The die hard Trump supporters were not discouraged by his lewd remarks though, saying things like “it was 11 years ago,” and “he was only 59.” Really Trump supporters? Only 59? The man went on a twitter rant at 3am two weeks ago just to harass someone and tell everyone to go watch a sex tape. Billy Bush is being shown the door by NBC in response to the incident, because apparently the third hour of the Today Show has higher standards than certain factions of the American people. Without all of the offensive remarks and behavior of Donald Trump, we are left with policies.

Let’s chat about economic plans. According to a study by the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal budget, Donald Trump’s economic plan is estimated add $5.3 trillion to the national debt. You read that number correctly. This number may surprise you, but if you pay attention, you know that Donald Trump has filed bankruptcy four times. The sign of any great businessman. You’d think he would have a team dedicated to writing out detailed economic and domestic policies, but apparently no one who understands money and politics is willing to help him. He doesn’t even have the support of high ranking and well-respected republicans like Paul Ryan and John McCain. Domestically Trump’s plans are a joke. “We are going to build a wall, and Mexico is going to pay for it.” Congress would reject it; Mexico wouldn’t pay for it. A proposal he made recently was a “nation-wide stop and frisk” policy, which is very unconstitutional. You may try to dispute this, but in 2013 a U.S. District court judge in New York issued a 195-page ruling on the policy’s violation of the 14th amendment. Rather than spend more time outlining the shortcomings of Trump’s campaign, let’s move on to Hillary Clinton’s.

Hillary Clinton has made her living in Washington. She’s seen economics plans; she’s seen policies of all kinds. Yet, somehow, she still doesn’t know how to create an economic plan that won’t contribute to additional national debt. Clinton’s economic plan will add less to the national debt than Trump’s, but $200 million (from the same economic plan study by the Committee for a Responsible Federal budget) deserves to be just as scrutinized.

When you look at something like her $15 minimum wage proposal, a desperate attempt to attract Bernie Sanders supporters, so many problems become evident. There aren’t enough studies or evidence to be conclusive on the effect of a policy like this yet, but there are strong indicators that by making the $15 minimum wage mandatory, prices will rise and this minimum wage increase could be deemed irrelevant. This discussion is a moot point though, because if the Republicans maintain their hold on Congress, a $15 minimum wage will never become a reality.

The bicameral nature of our congressional system and our presidential model of government are such that you need to consider the possibility that there will be a divided government. Moving past these leftist policies, we can look at Hillary’s track record. The most questionable portion being her duration as secretary of state, Hillary lied and made some poor decisions in that time and in the years afterwards. Her state departments failure in the Benghazi situation has been heavily criticized due to the lives that were lost unnecessarily. As the head of this department their complete failure to act was not only the responsibility of the department, but Hillary Clinton’s. Then comes the email controversy. A secretary of state should not mishandle the situation as poorly as she did. It should be common sense that you shouldn’t handle official business on a private server. Nonetheless it was not common sense for Hillary. This mistake is without repercussion though, because some people are too powerful and influential to be held accountable for their actions.

The amount that both candidates lie is simply unreal. A recent study by Politico revealed that Donald Trump lies and average of every 3 minutes and 15 seconds, and Hillary Clinton lies every 12 minutes. Those numbers are too frequent for anyone, let alone two presidential candidates. The President is not only our executive, but is expected to present an image that other worldwide leaders can respect and work with. When you have two candidates that are as dishonest as these two, it becomes intolerable for other nations to deal with and can be detrimental to the reputation of the nation as a whole.