The State of the Debates

[Stinky The Clown]

On Wednesday, the two 'leading' candidates for the Democratic nomination to run for the seat of the retiring Senator Paul Sarbanes met at a public television station's studios to debate. The debate, like most in our country, was under the purview of the League of Women Voters.

The debate itself was gentlemanly as the two 'top' candidates, Rep Ben Cardin and former Rep Kweisi Mfume, faced off - after a fashion.

But outside the studios, a perhaps more important debate was played out. At least two 'minor' candidates assembled, with some supporters, to attempt to get into the studios to participate. They knew, even before they arrived, they would not be admitted. One of the candidates, along with his wife and campaign manager, were arrested and charged with criminal trespassing (a misdemeanor). (It is unverified, but it is being reported that) One of the other candidates posted their bond and off they went.

Cardin and Mfume are both fine men. But so are the ones who were left out in the cold. Allan Lichtman and Josh Rales deserved, in my view, to be heard. I could have supported Lichtman. Rales, not so much. But neither man is a nut.

The threshold to participate was a 15% level of support as defined by polling. I can understand the need for this. I can see that, were some sort of barrier to participation not in place, any nut job or clown (me, for example) could show up and say whateverthehell he wanted on live teevee. Such antics tend to suck the air out of the room and do nothing to help the voters learn something. But this same exclusion that protects the debate from debasement keeps serious, albeit little-known, candidates with something serious to offer out of the public eye.

I think that's wrong.

But how do we separate out the nut jobs from the serious candidates? I wish I knew. Like ducks, it is easy enough to recognize a nut. It is harder to codify nuttery.

And then there's the matter of sheer numbers. How many participants is too many? A, let's say, three way debate would allow for all participants to be heard. A, let's say, nine way debate just cheats us of hearing enough from *any* of the participants. (Think back to the 04 Democratic primary debates and how your favorite, in your view, never got enough time to show who he really is.)

And then there's the format. We all know what a classic debate looks like. Direct give and take with a moderator who acts more as a referee. Discussion is free and wide ranging. Thrust and parry. Throw a punch/take a punch. What we've come to, however, is a staged and perhaps overly regulated series of mini campaign speeches.

Are you happy with the format in use today? I'm not.

And what about their importance? Do these debates even matter? Does anyone other than us political junkies even watch them? Do they do anything more than give us some fodder for ongoing natterings?

I'm proposing nothing in this post. I **am** asking for your thoughts. I used the Maryland debates simply as example; they are not the subject of this thread.

[acmejack]

1. Democracy without all the participants?

Kind of like New York and Tasini, huh? Shut them out & shut them up! You can have all the democracy you can buy, ask HRC and her 22 Million or whatever she has in the Corporate cash register now! Ask the filthy republiclowns, they'll second that contention.

[Stinky The Clown]

2. There's no doubt some 'exclusion' is calculated .....

..... but I think what I saw in Maryland was simply institutional. And that's what I'm hopin we can discuss in ths thread.

As in the example cited, Cardin and Mfume made the cut. Rales and Lichtman didn't. I suspect if Cardin or Mfume were where Lichtman or Rales were, we'd still have the same issue, but with different names.