North Texas Daily

Presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump faced off against each other Monday in this year’s first presidential debate at Hofstra University.

If anything can be gleamed from that night, the Republican candidate was ill-prepared to take on the former secretary of state. The reality is, once all of the misinterpretations, vague half-truths and blatantly obvious lies have been cleared away, Trump did not have the stamina to compete. It was almost as if he was deliberately trying to fold his hand.

If you watched the presidential debate,  you would have seen Clinton overwhelm Trump in the third section of debate when it came to issues like national security and gender equality.

There is no denying Trump tried his best. While the Republican candidate hammered Clinton in the early stages of the debate, the former First Lady proved her metal by forcing the real estate tycoon into a defensive posture.

Trump turned to jelly as Clinton berated him for the many overt sexist comments he has made over the years. “This is a man who has called women pigs, slobs and dogs,” Clinton said. “And someone who has said pregnancy is an inconvenience to employers.” Indignation of sexism aside, there is no getting away from the fact Trump was the leading voice of the birther movement targeting President Obama. Birthers have somehow maintained the ridiculous notion Obama was not born in the United States. With the release of his birth certificate in 2008, Trump intimated that a few of his comments were only “said in entertainment,” not that everyone was entertained by what the three-time traditionally married Trump had expressed.

Trump argued with moderator Lester Holt about the constitutionality of the controversial police practice stop-and-frisk. Trump was steadfast in his belief stop-and-frisk had not been ruled unconstitutional.

On Thursday, during an interview on CNN, New York City mayor Bill de Blasio spoke about  Trump in connection with stop-and-frisk.

“Donald Trump talks about stop-and-frisk like he knows the facts. He has had no experience with policing, no experience with public safety,” de Blasio said. “He should really be careful because if we reinstituted stop-and-frisk all over this country, you’d see a lot more tension between police and communities.”

While people have a tendency to point to how New York City performed stop-and-frisk, it was Chief Justice Earl Warren that wrote, “The Fourth Amendment provides that ‘the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated. This inestimable right of personal security belongs as much to the citizen on the streets of our cities as to the homeowner closeted in his study to dispose of his secret affairs.” Trump clearly did not have an ear to listen to what the debate moderator was saying.

Those, relatively speaking, are just a few of the highlights of the first presidential debate. The second presidential debate is scheduled for 8 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 9, at Washington University at St. Louis. Until then, we will see vice-presidential candidates Tim Kaine (D) and Mike Pence (R) square-off against each other in the vice-presidential debate, scheduled for 8 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 4, at Longwood University in Farmville, Virginia.

Featured Illustration: Samuel Wiggins