Presidential Debate #2: How did Anderson Cooper, Martha Raddatz fare as moderators?

Tonight, just about every major network is broadcasting the Presidential Debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, and of course this became a metaphorical slap-fight within a number of minutes.

We don’t want to spend too much time talking about the politics of it all, mostly because A) this is a total dumpster fire and B) there are about a million different places that you can go for that. The question we want to ask you is the one mentioned in the title. How did Anderson Cooper of CNN and Martha Raddatz of ABC News fare as moderators for the event? This is the hardest job of almost any out there right now, mostly because it is so easy to criticize them.

As a matter of fact, you can argue that Trump uses moderators as a part of his strategy for these debates, attacking them on their line of question and using them to create an “us against the world” mentality for his supporters. In suggesting that questions are biased in some way, he draws supporters effectively closer to him. He did this tonight with Anderson in particular over the subject of emails.

In general, we’d say that the moderators tonight were tougher on the candidates than in the first debate, but at the same time they faced the same struggles: Trying to quiet the audience, or responding to some of Trump’s criticisms in a way that did not make them appear robotic. This is an extremely hard job no doubt, and we do think moderators can work. The problem is that when you have candidates who show this level of vitriol towards each other, there is almost nothing you can do.

What did you think of the moderators tonight? Vote in the attached poll, or head over here for more TV-related debate coverage. (Photo: CNN.)