Should Our Choice of President Really Depend on the Debates?
The judgement of the debates will largely have two camps, reinforcing whichever candidate you are already strongly backing, since the candidates will stress their main lines of attraction. Those who have not followed over a year of total cable news and newspaper coverage have still been more exposed to stories about the candidates. They have been the main reality show all year.
Much is being written about the strategy for the debates. But should we really choose the next President based on gaffes, zingers, insults, length of bathroom break, retorts, choice of questions or attacks by interviewers, arguing who deserves time to respond and who continually runs over, or who sweats, or drinks water, or coughs? Should we choose the President based on fact checking, instant calls of distortion or not, or the luck of the draw of which issues the candidates prepared for?
Update: On the morning of the debate, the CNN anchor said this is a “make it or break it” debate. Sadly, that may be true for some uncommitted voters. CNN then showed famous gaffes from the past that did effect the candidates that made them. She then said “this would be the Greatest Debate in the History of Man”. This is probably because 100 million people are expected to watch. In terms of issues of real importance, it may fall short. The anchor, Carol Costello, then followed that with several sighs anticipating the wonder of the debate. Great sales pitch. Of course, she could have said Mankind instead of Man, since this is a debate that could lead to the first woman President. Or, in this case, the debate between the Last Troglodyte Man, and the Modern Woman. Now, a panel compared it to the Super Bowl, and the Commander in Chief Test. With days of universal hype, it tells the audience that they are to put much more importance to every detail of the debate than the details really deserve in the big picture.
Each of the candidates have given detailed talks of their approach to the issues, as well as ads for their hotels, and traded charges. There is no time in the short debates with shared time to even cover a minuscule fraction of these. The details are on their websites.
The debate over fact checking during the debate shows a basic flaw in the debate, since fact checking has a certain delay. How many are going to look afterwards at a newspaper or website to see what were facts or falsehoods? What the correct facts are probably also depends on which media, liberal or conservative, that you look at.
Trump has gotten billions of dollars worth of TV time on cable shows. The partisan cable networks of MSNBC and Fox have covered their candidates and charges against the other in great detail. The Conventions were were shown for a week along with pre and post rehash and commentaries. The liberal press and the conservative press and magazines have thoroughly examined the candidates and issues. Conservative talk radio has given complete coverage of their side. Hundreds of millions of dollars of TV ads have and will appear, especially in swing states. Mailers and phone calls will go into effect. We will all be anxiously awaiting for Election Day to arrive. In the meantime, we have to study ballot issues and choose between state and local candidates.
When you think of what the President does day to day, debates never occur in their duties, and how good a debater they are will have no relevance to their effectiveness as President. Treaties that the President might sign have been negotiated by diplomats over months or years. Meetings with foreign leaders mainly are statements of positions, and do not settle issues in a debate format. The President usually addresses Congress only in the well prepared State of the Union messages, without debate, and without having a moderator or taking question. It is up to the 535 CongressIonal members to do their own debating, usually to empty chambers.
In the old days, there used to be an equal time rule from the FCC on the time of coverage of a candidates interviews and speeches. A return to that would be a great return to fairness, especially when one candidate is a TV celebrity who’s crazy rallies and statements attract enormous TV coverage, and the other candidate’s presentations on issues do not.
