On Presidential Debates
Hard not to agree that the spate of Presidential debates for both sides is a process that almost forces them to pander and issue ill conceived statements. No matter who your candidate is, I should hope you expect them to be reflective enough to think through the implications of the decisions that they are making. These debates take that way and place the premium on sound bites. I am consistently amazed at how different that very first TV debate between Kennedy and Nixon was. It was very much a substantive debate that went into much policy detail. Certainly, there were efforts at sound bites but they didn’t dominate the way they do today. It is a sad state of affairs that Presidential contests are more like American Idol complete with ad hominen attacks than what they ought to be: a sober, thought provoking exchange between two differing viewpoints truly battling in the marketplace of ideas not personalities.
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