Clinton beat Trump handily: In the first debate, he was unsteady and mendacious; she was poised and self-assured

Josh Greenman

9/26/2016

In his first debate with Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan famously calmed voters skeptical about whether he could cross the threshold of gravitas and look like a President. After that, election lore says, it was all over.

While Donald Trump lost no hardcore supporters last night — to them, as has repeatedly boasted, he can do no wrong — he failed the Reagan test. His uneven, often rambling, occasionally passionate performance won’t win over wary and worried voters.

Hillary Clinton was poised and prepared. She for once exuded a happy-warrior aura. She parried every thrust. She eviscerated his tax plan, a giveaway to the richest.

Even Republican message guru Frank Luntz deemed her “presidential.”

Displayed in a split-screen, Trump made faces. He glowered. He interrupted. He interrupted again. And he inte . . . — you get the idea.

Perhaps the dumbest of these interruptions was to blurt out “it’s called business!” when Clinton charged him with rooting for the housing crisis.

And he lied, boy did Trump lie.

He insisted that he never called climate change a hoax. He tweeted that exact idea five times.

He denied ever saying that pregnancy is an inconvenience for employers. In fact, he said that in 2004. Google it.

He said murder rates in New York are up. They’re down. He said stop-and-frisk was the way to bring down shootings and homicides. The NYPD, in real time, said otherwise.

Running interference for Vladimir Putin, he claimed the Democratic National Committee hack could have been anyone. Experts are sure it was Russia.

He falsely said he was against the Iraq war before it started, promising, like a teenager caught taking the car out without permission, that his best buddy Sean Hannity could back him up.

He again had no credible excuse for why he’s hiding his taxes, a treasure trove of likely conflicts and embarrassments.

And yet again, he thought he could get away with perfunctorily renouncing the poison of birtherism without an inkling of an explanation for why he suddenly reversed course after leading the brigades for four solid years.

The reason he can’t explain is likely that he still believes it.

When it counted most, standing in front of millions, Donald Trump couldn’t hide who he really is.