Numbers lie at the heart of politics; dictating what party wins the treasury benches, and what party is sent into political exile for another term.
And it’s no different today, in the aftermath of the Kamala Harris v Donald Trump debate.
The word soup, hosted by ABC News, ran for about 105 minutes, was watched by 51.3 million people, and was the No.1 program in the network’s history.
And while those figures were actually down on the first Joe Biden-Trump debate in 2020, it was other numbers – focused on the candidates’ performances – that have filled headlines for the past 24 hours.
For example, Harris won the tally of the best one-liners, it seems – headlined by “Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people … and clearly he is having a very difficult time processing that’’.
Certainly, Donald Trump’s claim that immigrants in Springfield Ohio were eating domestic pets took out the No.1 preposterous claim of the night, despite some strong competition across topics as varied as abortion, foreign affairs and funding.
Trump also spoke more, according to CNN, clocking up 42 minutes and 52 seconds, compared to Harris, who spoke for 37 minutes and 36........