Naivete of the Young or A Different Time

[ShinyTop]

In 1960 we had the first televised debates between presidential candidates. I was 12 at the time but distinctly remember the debates and the uproar over the results.

But I also remember thinking that in a debate like this nobody would dare lie since their opponent would obviously catch them and point it out to the world. And maybe I was partially right because the rules of the debate were drawn up by the League of Women Voters instead of an organization created by the political parties.

I can only assume it was a very different era or that I was as naive as a 12 year should be. I was naive enough to think the debate could actually mean something instead of two people trying to see what lies they could make the majority believe. How can we be so naive or stupid as to believe the points made under these conditions mean more than the records of the two individuals or the character they have displayed through decades of public life?

[Stiofán]

It's all a dog and pony show. These debates shouldn't matter, but the media controls a lot of what this country thinks, like it or not. And they live for this stuff, analyzing every minute detail and making their tiresome predictions nightly.

Go back even before you were born. The candidates came through your small town on the back of a train, stopped for 15 minutes and spoke and then left. Other than what you read in the newspaper (if you could read) or heard at the barbershop, that's all you knew before you cast you ballot. If you had a job, maybe you voted for the incumbant. If no job maybe you voted against him. You hope he didn't get you into a war.

[ravital]

Shiny,

I'm sure there were a lot of, shall we say, inaccuracies even in the Lincoln-Douglas debates, if you'll forgive the comparison. It doesn't make them completely useless. Last night, for instance, I learned the degree to which each candidate takes us for fools and the enormity of the lies they expect us to swallow. It's useful in a limited way, but useful.

But you know something? It's also - as you noted - a function of the people who are willing to let themselves be swayed by these miserable imitations of choreographed interviews that pass for debates. It's like people fuming at the papparazis that got Princess Diana killed - it's the same people who buy the tabloids and pay for that trash and consume it and lick their fingers. If we all boycotted the so-called "debates," they would either disappear or change format considerably.

I would like to see at the very least 4 candidates. In a real Town-Hall format, New-England style, with a moderator to keep things moving, one or two microphones and people lining up to ask questions. Start at 8:00pm, and no candidate leaves until midnight or the last question has been asked, whichever happens first. Hey, it's a job interview, they're the candidates and we're the employer, right? Because the way it's done now, it feels like the other way around.

[Kangaroo]

A better format. Strap the candidates down, administer an IV drip of sodium pentathol and start asking questions.