WINNERS:

Hillary Clinton: Who knew just standing there with an amused look on her face while letting Trump’s increasingly desperate jabs bounce off her without a trace could be so effective?

The 2014 FIFA World Cup: Lester Holt’s moderation was a delightful throwback to the lenient refereeing in that Brazil vs. Colombia game that ended with Juan Zúñiga breaking Neymar’s back

Men repeatedly interrupting women: Many pundits are saying that Trump was at his strongest in the opening half hour, during which he interrupted Clinton 25 times, showing that this evergreen staple of sexism is still alive and kicking even in our progressive modern age

The many proud distillers and assorted alcoholic-beverage makers of these great United States of America: Made a killing last night

The frayed nerves of Hillary supporters increasingly worried by the events of the past few weeks: Enjoyed some much-needed relief

Turn-of-the-century Northern European industrial-metal anthems that perfectly sum up this election season: First Rammstein’s “Amerika” was a pretty much spot-on description of the Republican National Convention; now, Pain’s “Shut Your Mouth” describes what we all want Trump to do, while a “Suicide Machine” is what we’ll all be begging for by the time this horrible election season is over

Hillary Clinton: Mentioning her twice because she fucking killed, y’all

LOSERS:

Lester Holt: Repeatedly attempted to interrupt or correct Donald Trump only to have Trump speak over him, a scenario where he routinely offered as much resistance as—well, if we’re continuing the World Cup theme, as Brazil in that game against Germany

The concept of fixed linear time: If a twenty-second answer takes as long as it did last night, and Hillary Clinton has been fighting ISIS for her entire adult life, who knows what else has gone wrong with the time stream?

Absolute worst-case scenarios: By not being quite so incensed by Clinton’s brushing off his attacks that he lost his temper and did something like call her a “bitch”, Donald Trump ensured that this category of events would not have its way with him

Ted Cruz: A nationally-ranked debater in college and a first-class political intellect, as he watched last night he must have come to the dismal realization that in a primary season that featured twelve different debates, sometimes literally one every week, he managed to lose to that man

Taxation: The great prophet Trump has spoken, and now it is written: paying your taxes makes you bad and stupid, unlike the great prophet Trump, who is very smart and has lovely big hands

Donald Trump: No, I didn’—I didn’t lose. I didn’t lose. *sniff* I’ll tell you why. You look at the polls—all the polls, *sniff* the informal and unscientific ones conducted on cable news websites, they all have me winning. Not Crooked Hillary. Me. *sniff* She only won the CNN poll—the only one that was conducted with even a modicum of actual methodology instead of just being a web survey—and let me tell you, *sniff* let me tell you, that poll was biased. Believe me. They asked more Democrats than Republicans in that poll. A lot more. *sniff* This talk of me “losing”? That’s the mainstream media for you. You ask a sample of real Americans, and they’ll say I won, I guarantee you. I guarantee. *sniff*

Chris Christie: Each of the scant few remaining days that he spends as a free man is a precious gift that he inexplicably has decided to squander by remaining in the presence of Donald Trump

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