NPI's Cascadia Advocate

Offering commentary and analysis from Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, The Cascadia Advocate provides the Northwest Progressive Institute's uplifting perspective on world, national, and local politics.

Sunday, October 9th, 2016

Liveblogging the second presidential debate of 2016 from the great Pacific Northwest

Good evening, and wel­come to NPI’s live cov­er­age of the sec­ond pres­i­den­tial debate of 2016. NPI staff and board will be watch­ing and shar­ing impres­sions of the debate between Demo­c­ra­t­ic nom­i­nee Hillary Clin­ton and Repub­li­can nom­i­nee Don­ald Trump as it pro­gress­es. The debate, spon­sored by the Com­mis­sion on Pres­i­den­tial Debates, is being broad­cast on all major net­works as well as Face­book and Twitter.

We rec­om­mend C‑SPAN if you’re livestream­ing the debate as opposed to watch­ing it on a cable or broad­cast tele­vi­sion network.

Wash­ing­ton Uni­ver­si­ty in St. Louis, Mis­souri is host­ing the debate, which will be mod­er­at­ed by CNN’s Ander­son Coop­er and ABC’s Martha Raddatz.

The for­mat is as follows:

The sec­ond pres­i­den­tial debate will take the form of a town meet­ing, in which half of the ques­tions will be posed direct­ly by cit­i­zen par­tic­i­pants and the oth­er half will be posed by the mod­er­a­tor based on top­ics of broad pub­lic inter­est as reflect­ed in social media and oth­er sources. The can­di­dates will have two min­utes to respond and there will be an addi­tion­al minute for the mod­er­a­tor to facil­i­tate fur­ther dis­cus­sion. The town meet­ing par­tic­i­pants will be uncom­mit­ted vot­ers select­ed by the Gallup Organization.

Our live cov­er­age begins below.

UPDATE, 5:42 PM (Andrew): We are about twen­ty min­utes away from the sched­uled begin­ning of the debate.

UPDATE, 5:44 PM (Andrew): The town hall audi­ence is get­ting their instruc­tions from debate organizers.

UPDATE, 5:59 PM (Andrew): Pres­i­dent Clin­ton, Mela­nia Trump, and oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers have entered the audi­to­ri­um where the debate is to take place and tak­en their seats.

UPDATE, 6:00 PM (Andrew): Mod­er­a­tors Ander­son Coop­er and Martha Rad­datz are also in place.

UPDATE, 6:04 PM (Andrew): The mod­er­a­tors are ready. The debate is about to begin.

UPDATE, 6:05 PM (Andrew): The can­di­dates have arrived. No handshake…

UPDATE, 6:06 PM (Andrew): First ques­tion goes to Clin­ton. It’s about whether the pre­vi­ous debate fea­tured appro­pri­ate con­tent for young audiences.

UPDATE, 6:08 PM (Andrew): Trump begins his two min­utes by declar­ing “I agree with every­thing she said”.

UPDATE, 6:08 PM (Andrew): Trump: “I guess I am a politician”.

UPDATE, 6:09 PM (Andrew): Trump not answer­ing the ques­tion at all. He’s just using the time to make an open­ing state­ment. And mak­ing an obvi­ous attempt to keep his voice down.

UPDATE, 6:10 PM (Andrew): Ander­son Coop­er wastes no time in ask­ing about the tapes.

UPDATE, 6:10 PM (Andrew): Trump again insists it was “lock­er room talk”. NO, IT WASN’T.

UPDATE, 6:11 PM (Andrew): Trump vac­il­lates between attempt­ing to excuse his con­duct and claim­ing he’ll take out ISIS.

UPDATE, 6:12 PM (Andrew): Trump: “No one has more respect for women than I do.” Laugher…

UPDATE, 6:14 PM (Andrew): Clinton’s turn to speak. “I think it’s clear to any­one” that the video “rep­re­sents exact­ly who he is”.

UPDATE, 6:14 PM (Andrew): Trump pulling a Pence and shak­ing his head as Clin­ton talks. But not inter­rupt­ing. Not yet.

UPDATE, 6:16 PM (Andrew): Trump: “It’s just words, folks”.

UPDATE, 6:16 PM (Andrew): So is the mic defec­tive again… ?

UPDATE, 6:17 PM (Andrew): Sniff. Sniff. Sniff…

UPDATE, 6:17 PM (Andrew): Words mat­ter, and Trump’s words hurt.

UPDATE, 6:18 PM (Andrew): Trump unloads on Bill Clin­ton while Hillary Clin­ton watch­es with a steely gaze.

UPDATE, 6:18 PM (Andrew): Sniff.

UPDATE, 6:20 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton quotes Michelle Oba­ma and the audi­ence cheers. Rules are made to be bro­ken, apparently.

UPDATE, 6:22 PM (Andrew): Trump is deter­mined to be as vicious as possible.

UPDATE, 6:22 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton smiles as Trump dri­ves into con­spir­a­cy the­o­ry territory.

UPDATE, 6:23 PM (Andrew): Trump just direct­ly threat­ened Hillary Clin­ton in front of like a hun­dred mil­lion peo­ple. If he wins, he’s com­ing after her.

UPDATE, 6:25 PM (Andrew): This debate has become a dump­ster fire.

UPDATE, 6:26 PM (Andrew): Trump just demon­strat­ed why we call him a neofascist.

UPDATE, 6:28 PM (Andrew): The audi­ence tonight is more than just the peo­ple Gallup chose to be part of the town hall, which part­ly accounts for the cheer­ing, boo­ing, etc.

UPDATE, 6:29 PM (Andrew): Trump is clear­ly very agitated.

UPDATE, 6:30 PM (Andrew): Nev­er seen any­thing like this before, ever.

UPDATE, 6:35 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton doing her very best to show her com­mand of pub­lic pol­i­cy as Ander­son Coop­er asks a fol­low-up ques­tion about the Patient Pro­tec­tion Act.

UPDATE, 6:35 PM (Andrew): Why is Don­ald Trump fol­low­ing Hillary Clin­ton around?

UPDATE, 6:36 PM (Andrew): “You’re going to have plans that are so good,” Trump boasts. Emp­ty talk, emp­ty talk, emp­ty talk, emp­ty talk.

UPDATE, 6:38 PM (Andrew): Trump is one of the biggest stok­ers of Islam­o­pho­bia there is.

UPDATE, 6:38 PM (Andrew): Long sniff there. Is Trump going to say tomor­row that he was giv­en a defec­tive micro­phone again?

UPDATE, 6:39 PM (Andrew): Don­ald has noth­ing but sound bites and vicious attacks to offer tonight — punc­tu­at­ed by sniffs.

UPDATE, 6:42 PM (Andrew): Martha Rad­datz demands Trump answer the question.

UPDATE, 6:46 PM (Andrew): Trump lies and lies and lies.

UPDATE, 6:47 PM (Andrew): “I’m going to force them right back into their coun­try,” Trump declares.

UPDATE, 6:47 PM (Andrew): Trump keeps bring­ing up Bernie Sanders. Seems irri­tat­ed that Sanders is doing so much cam­paign­ing for Clinton.

UPDATE, 6:48 PM (Andrew): What a ter­ri­ble question.

UPDATE, 6:50 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton uses Raddatz’s awful ques­tion as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to talk about Russia’s inter­fer­ence in the 2016 U.S. election.

UPDATE, 6:52 PM (Andrew): Trump going off on a tan­gent again.

UPDATE, 6:52 PM (Andrew): Trump asserts he pays “hun­dreds of mil­lions of dol­lars in tax­es.” Show us!

UPDATE, 6:53 PM (Andrew): Next, a ques­tion from the audi­ence about fair taxes.

UPDATE, 6:55 PM (Andrew): How can Clin­ton be “rais­ing everyone’s tax­es mas­sive­ly” when she’s not in office?

UPDATE, 6:56 PM (Andrew): Won­der if Trump is strug­gling to con­trol him­self. When it’s not his turn to talk, he seems very rest­less instead of sit­ting and listening.

UPDATE, 6:57 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton doing well here, talk­ing about invest­ing in hard­work­ing fam­i­lies by requir­ing the wealthy to pay their fair share.

UPDATE, 6:58 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton knocked Trump by say­ing he lives in an alter­na­tive reality.

UPDATE, 7:00 PM (Andrew): Ander­son Coop­er again reminds Trump: She didn’t inter­rupt you.

UPDATE, 7:01 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton has shown incred­i­ble restraint and resolve so far in this debate. Very cool under fire.

UPDATE, 7:02 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton defend­ing her record as a Unit­ed States Sen­a­tor — and explain­ing a lit­tle about how our sys­tem of gov­ern­ment actu­al­ly works.

UPDATE, 7:03 PM (Andrew): Martha Rad­datz puts her foot down this time: We’re mov­ing on. Thank goodness.

UPDATE, 7:05 PM (Andrew): Clinton’s com­mu­ni­ca­tions shop is work­ing hard to keep a steady stream of fact check­ing emails com­ing as the debate progresses.

UPDATE, 7:06 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton inter­rupts for the first time to cor­rect Trump — and again, he’s irritated.

UPDATE, 7:07 PM (Andrew): Trump is speak­ing to his base tonight. He’s not drop­ping out of this race. He wants all of his peo­ple to turn out. Take note, progressives.

UPDATE, 7:10 PM (Andrew): Trump is hav­ing his own Alep­po moment. This guy doesn’t know what he’s talk­ing about.

UPDATE, 7:10 PM (Andrew): Trump no longer mak­ing much of an effort to keep his voice down.

UPDATE, 7:10 PM (Andrew): “How stu­pid is our coun­try?” Trump says. Martha Rad­datz interjects.

UPDATE, 7:11 PM (Andrew): “Tell me what your strat­e­gy is,” Rad­datz asks. Trump ignores her.

UPDATE, 7:12 PM (Andrew): Not much time left, and no ques­tions asked about afford­able col­lege, revers­ing the dam­age to the cli­mate, women’s health, LGBT rights, or many oth­er topics.

UPDATE, 7:14 PM (Andrew): Mod­er­a­tors keep hav­ing to defend them­selves because Trump keeps accus­ing them of unfairness.

UPDATE, 7:14 PM (Andrew): That wasn’t much of a question.

UPDATE, 7:16 PM (Andrew): Trump tries to weave some vari­a­tion of “Hillary Clin­ton lied” into each and every answer he gives.

UPDATE, 7:16 PM (Andrew): The guy who is all talk has some nerve com­plain­ing Hillary Clin­ton is all talk.

UPDATE, 7:17 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton is shin­ing here. Talk­ing about her his­to­ry of fight­ing for chil­dren and families.

UPDATE, 7:18 PM (Andrew): “Chil­dren lis­ten to what is being said,” Clin­ton notes, decry­ing the fear caused by the “Trump effect”.

UPDATE, 7:20 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton points out that Trump nev­er apol­o­gizes, nev­er owns his fail­ures (while she has admit­ted that she’s made mistakes).

UPDATE, 7:20 PM (Andrew): Don­ald Trump, you have no idea what’s in Hillary Clinton’s heart.

UPDATE, 7:22 PM (Andrew): Trump brings up Beng­hazi. How predictable.

UPDATE, 7:22 PM (Andrew): Trump on Twit­ter: “It’s a very effec­tive form of communication.”

UPDATE, 7:24 PM (Andrew): A ques­tion about the Supreme Court, and a good question.

UPDATE, 7:25 PM (Andrew): Good — Clin­ton says she wants to see Cit­i­zens Unit­ed reversed.

UPDATE, 7:26 PM (Andrew): “I want a Supreme Court that doesn’t always side with cor­po­rate inter­ests,” Clin­ton says.

UPDATE, 7:26 PM (Andrew):

UPDATE, 7:27 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton ham­mers the Repub­li­can Sen­ate for refus­ing to give Mer­rick Gar­land a vote.

UPDATE, 7:27 PM (Ren­nie): I was late tun­ing into the debate, but the first thing I noticed is that Trump must have stud­ied a bit this time – quot­ing pover­ty and unem­ploy­ment figures.

UPDATE, 7:27 PM (Andrew): Great answer by Hillary Clin­ton on the Supreme Court.

UPDATE, 7:28 PM (Andrew): Trump wants to know why Clin­ton isn’t “putting mon­ey into your own campaign”.

UPDATE, 7:30 PM (Andrew): Anoth­er false­hood from Don­ald Trump. The fos­sil fuels industry’s prob­lems are prin­ci­pal­ly of its own making.

UPDATE, 7:30 PM (Andrew): There is NO SUCH THING as “clean coal”. Just like there’s no such thing as a Don­ald Trump apology.

UPDATE, 7:31 PM (Ren­nie): Trump claims EPA is attack­ing our ener­gy com­pa­nies and claims that wind and solar aren’t enough. Then starts push­ing the “clean coal” myth.

UPDATE, 7:31 PM (Ren­nie): Trump wants the EPA to not do their job when it comes to reg­u­lat­ing energy.

UPDATE, 7:32 PM (Ren­nie): Clin­ton speaks about Chi­na dump­ing steel into our econ­o­my and Trump buy­ing for his buildings.

UPDATE, 7:33 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton stress­es that her ener­gy pol­i­cy would focus on revers­ing the dam­age to the climate.

UPDATE, 7:33 PM (Ren­nie): Clin­ton is push­ing nat­ur­al gas as a “stop gap” mea­sure on the way to get­ting more clean energy.

UPDATE, 7:34 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton deft­ly han­dled that question.

UPDATE, 7:35 PM (Ren­nie): Clin­ton claims to have a plan to revi­tal­ize “coal coun­try” – help peo­ple who work in the coal indus­try as coal prices drop.

UPDATE, 7:36 PM (Ren­nie): When asked on what each can­di­date respects in the oth­er can­di­date, Clin­ton says she respects Trump’s children.

UPDATE, 7:36 PM (Andrew): Trump says he respects that Clin­ton doesn’t give up. Well, he doesn’t have a choice but to respect that.

UPDATE, 7:36 PM (Ren­nie): Trump respects that Hillary does not quit and does not give up.

UPDATE, 7:37 PM (Ren­nie): The debate is ending.

UPDATE, 7:37 PM (Andrew): That con­cludes the dump­ster fire…. er, debate.

UPDATE, 7:37 PM (Andrew): Clin­ton and Trump shook hands at the end.

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