Stalker

The very fact that Donald showed up was a victory in itself.  Not only that but he surrounded himself with Clinton victims beforehand in a brazen effort to deflect media attention away from the misogynistic tapes that grow by the day.  He even wanted to have the women join his family box at the debate, but was refused.  No doubt something he will emphasize this week, hoping to turn attention away from what was another dreadful debate performance.

He lost when he threatened to prosecute Hillary if he is elected President, and petulantly retorted when Hillary challenged him that she would be in jail now if he had been in charge of laws in this country.  He doesn't want to be President, he wants to be dictator, and like his good buddy Vladimir Putin wants to stifle opposition by putting his adversaries behind bars.  What a far cry from the man who just four years ago praised Hillary Clinton as a "great woman."

There was no handshake this time around.  They glowered at each other from the start.  Trump who didn't even try to contain his anger and contempt, in the end projected it on Hillary when asked what he would do to heal the country.  He once again claimed that She and Obama are the ones who divided this nation.

When it came to taxes, he readily admitted he used his monumental losses of 1995 to write off federal income taxes for years afterward, but once again turned the blame on Hillary by saying that she is the one who allowed the loophole in the tax codes for her friends Warren Buffett and George Soros.  I was surprised Anderson Cooper didn't challenge the utter absurdity of this claim.  It is hard to say what time frame Trump was referring to, although it seems he was referring to her time in the Senate from 2001-2009, which doesn't coincide to the time he began writing off his losses.

Trump was brash and unapologetic throughout the debate, determined to rally his alt-conservative base in the general election.  I'm sure in their eyes he came out a big winner, feeding straight into all their fantasies with one conspiracy theory after another as he blamed every ill over the past three decades on Hillary Clinton.  There was absolutely no attempt to ground any of his arguments in fact, whether claiming high crime rates or drugs flooding across the borders or holding Hillary personally responsible for Capt. Humayun Khan's death, saying there would have been no war in Iraq if he had been President.

Like so much that we hear from the alt-conservative universe, everything has become conflated into the last 8 years.  No one remembers that this war started in 2003 or that Capt. Khan was killed in 2004 under Bush's tenure, and that ISIS has been around at least that long.  In Donald's addled mind all the problems we see in the Middle East began in 2011 when we pulled out of Iraq, a war he steadfastly claims he never supported yet blames Obama and Clinton for ending.

Trump continued to talk over Hillary like he did in the first debate. but what was particularly creepy was the way he stalked behind her, reinforcing his predatory nature.  For her part, Hillary returned to her seat after her two minutes, not once interrupting Donald as he flew off on his harangues.  Why should she?  He damaged himself far more than she ever could.

Still, some news outlets are claiming Trump won the debate.  One would expect this from Hannity or Breitbart, but CBS News?   It just shows how much some news stations still want to see a horse race when Donald pulled up lame long ago.  At this point, all he has is his alt-conservative base.  What ever middle ground he was hoping to reach for is gone and he doesn't seem to care.  It's as if he expects some massive turnout of the underclass, like the Brexit vote, to carry him to victory.

Not surprising, Nigel Farage was in his corner after the debate, reminding us just how far this right-wing movement extends beyond our borders.  This isn't a referendum.  It is a Presidential election and Trump has far too many negatives to carry him to victory in November.  But, you have to hand it to Donald, he is not going down without a fight.