Next US president has many social rifts to heal

The final debate in the 2016 US presidential election was held on Wednesday. The most memorable thing about the debates has not been the two candidates' positions and visions on the important issues concerning the United States and the world, but rather the personal attacks exchanged between "a liar" and "a cheat", as they called one another.

It seems the ding-dong insults and accusations have appealed to people as viewers - if not as voters - as the final debate between them set a 60-year record in terms of audience ratings, with people eager to see if the two candidates' verbal punching would leave either of them lying bloodied on the canvas or reveal any new scandals.

In fact, although Thursday's debate still entertained with the two candidates' histrionics, it lacked the venom of the previous two debates. It was Trump's refusal, which he made twice, to clarify whether he would accept the outcome of an election if he lost, that attracted the most attention, with most rebuking him for being a bad loser if not his strategy to attract votes by claiming a rigged election against him.