The hardest punch

"I don't know which bothered me the most. The stupid chipmunk smile that Hillary had been coached to paste on her face, or the constant look on Donald's face like he had just sucked on a lemon."

"Oh dear God, please make it stop!" I could almost hear that cry going up from the huddled masses last night. Yes, I forced myself to watch the entire thing. Did not shut it off once. More surprising was my wife - she also forced herself to watch the entire thing with me. And like with the first two, I felt the need to take a shower, a bath, a something once it was over.

I don't know which bothered me the most. The stupid chipmunk smile that Hillary had been coached to paste on her face, or the constant look on Donald's face like he had just sucked on a lemon. I kept thinking about if either one was meeting with a world leader and a disagreement broke out. Is either one of those faces the face of America? "Oh dear God, please make it stop!"

I was a wee bit disappointed with Chris Wallace last night. This was the debate that many were hoping for the candidates telling what they were for, and not how effed up the other one is. Fell way short in my book. Also, Hillary told the biggest whopper of the campaign season and Wallace let it slide. When she said (and she has said this before) that her "plan" will give free college, more Social Security benefits, more this and more that and - (drum roll please), not add one penny to the debt, I almost threw up in my mouth.

In every debate, the wonks and the pundits are always waiting to see who can have that one line, that one punch that really lands hard. The one where significant damage is done. Well last night we had such a punch. It was a hit to the gut, the uppercut to the jaw. Who landed it? Donald Trump did. Who did he hit with it? Himself.

When Donald Trump said he did not know if he would honor the election, it was a total show stopper. As my son-in-law would say from time to time when he would hear something flabbergasting - "I have no response to that". I think that is what Chris Wallace really wanted to say once Donald muttered those now famous words. Me? I heard something quite different once those words were out in the open.

I could hear the door slamming shut. I could hear the election being handed with a bow on it to the most crooked person ever to run for this high office. I could hear the Supreme Court being remade in the image of Hillary, chipmunk smile and all. I could hear the United States Senate being let by Chuckle Schumer for the next umpteen years.

But the thing I heard the loudest, was that one tortured cry, coming from every nook and cranny from this great country. "Oh dear God, please make it stop!" Amen to that prayer, amen indeed.