In the desert of the writer's strike, a fake news oasis.

Poll: Mitt Romney Is Candidate Most Voters Want To Get Into Bar Fight With

See you on Monday, if not sooner.

EVENT REVIEW: Republican YouTube Debate, 11/29/2007

Well, that's finished.

The Republican YouTube debate is in the books, and, I must say, it wasn't nearly as painful as I expected it to be. The producers seem to have learned from some of their mistakes at this summer's Democratic equivalent, because, on the whole, the number of questions asked or produced by assholes or internet crazies seemed to be way down. Kudos, also, for avoiding what I christened the "Stupid Fucking Cartoon" trap. Of all of the questions asked last night, I only counted three that I would place in this category. Plus, one of them featured this guy:



...which I'm basically ok with. I got home a bit late from class last night, so I missed taking notes on two of the early debate highlights. Right off the bat, Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney proved their Presidential mettle by... arguing like fishwives over home improvements. Uh-huh. Then, our favorite supervillain and yours, Tom Tancredo, proclaimed that, when it comes to immigration, all of the candidates are trying to "out-Tancredo Tancredo". Nobody out-crazies Ophelia, either.

After that, we have real notes, so... well, here they are:

8:35 - I'm not sure what the question was, but Mitt Romney is suffering from a fierce case of sweat-lip. Bickering on live television will do that to a guy, I guess.

8:37-8:40 - A question comes up regarding spending cuts. Thompson evades, looks hangdog. Ron Paul goes state's rights. Huckabee scores big with a pledge to boot the IRS. Pretty standard, and a nice way to get myself acclimated.

8:40 - Stupid Fucking Cartoon #1!

8:41 - John McCain is booed by Ron Paul supporters for... making rational point about foreign policy commitments. Watch out, because this becomes a trend, and quickly.

8:42 - Paul counters McCain's charges of isolationism with a right hook on troop donations. Back home, we'd've followed that up with a resounding "booyah", but here, Paul opts for looking spooked and pointing to the crowd. It's just a difference.

8:44 - We have a Tancredo sighting. The man has eyes like a shark. A SHARK!


Tom Tancredo in happier times.

8:45 - Giuliani responds to the charges leveled in this Politico story by saying that his spending was justified because there were, and I'm quoting directly here, "y'know, threats". My, what rousing detail.

8:49 - The video provided by Tom Tancredo's campaign features him having an imaginary conversation with Hillary Clinton. I'm sure imaginary conversations aren't all that uncommon when Tom Tancredo's involved. He follows up this corker by answering a question about the safety of Chinese imports with an impassioned stand against toy immigration:

It is illegal to import that kind of thing. The problem is, of course, no one really pays a lot of attention to a lot of our laws, with regard to immigration of both people and, now in this case, of course, items, goods and services.

Optimus Prime just wants a better life, Tom. Really.

8:52 - Thompson's video airs, and the long knives emerge. I know he's desperate and all, but I'm surprised he chose to go negative. Looking like a bloodhound in a man-suit can only give you so much credibility, and this kind of ad isn't helping in the push for more.

8:59 - Once again, we're getting boos for rationality. Giuliani's call for reasonable gun regulations almost gets him winged as 200 angry audience members lock and load at once.

9:04 - Question You Won't See At The Next Democratic Debate, Take One:


9:06 - The camera pans to Tom Tancredo, who wastes the unexpected face time by brooding like Emperor Palpatine. This man is my favorite.

Cue to 1:05, Jedi.

9:13 - There it is. The line of the night. Mike Huckabee cements his lock on the down-home, folksy wisdom vote with the following exchange:

Cooper: I do have to though press the question, which -- the question was, from the viewer was? What would Jesus do? Would Jesus support the death penalty?

Huckabee: Jesus was too smart to ever run for public office, Anderson. That's what Jesus would do.

9:16 - Question You Won't See At The Next Democratic Debate, Take Two:


9:19 - The ad from the Romney campaign also doubles as a sleep aide.

9:20 - MVParents.com gets their numbers from the Search Institute. That's like going to eat at a place named Restaurant. It's just not done.

9:23 - Giuliani's ad is up, and he goes for the humor vote. If King Kong likes him, he must be doing something right. Knocking over building, mostly, I'll bet.

9:24 - How do we repair our image in the Muslim world? Simple, say the candidates: attack more! I must say, John McCain owns the debate over the next few questions. If only he'd sounded like this the whole time...

9:27 - John McCain says "I said 'good day', sir!". Mitt Romney responds by reeking of maple syrup and old grease.


9:33 - McCain scores again, diffusing Iraq-Vietnam comparisons by noting that "Vietnam didn't want to follow us home". If not for Huckabee's earlier score, this might've been the night's most memorable exchange.

9:40 - Stupid Fucking Cartoon #2, and a solid run for JohN McCain, who concludes his power play by not only sneaking in a direct shot at his old nemesis, George W. Bush, but also reviving the old "straight talk" slogan that captivated us eight years ago. Man, that was a strong 15 minutes for the senator from Arizona.

9:47 - This question regarding gays in the military, while interesting enough in its own right, is made all the more interesting by the following fact: the gay retired Brigadeer General who asked the question in the first place, was later revealed to be a possible plant by the Clinton campaign. Here's a better recap, courtesy of Outside the Beltway.

9:52 - Mike Huckabee accepts the support of Log Cabin Republicans, noting that you can disagree about issues and still like each other. For his part, Mitt Romney accepts Log Cabin pancake syrup on all of his delicious waffles.

Really now. How is this...


... all that different from this?


Damning, this evidence.

9:53 - Stupid Fucking Cartoon #2 1/2. Yes, I'm counting the dollar bill.

9:57 - Stupid Fucking Cartoon #3, because slideshows count for half a point. Huckabee regains some of his early debate thunder by suggesting we send Hillary Clinton to Mars, followed by numbers suggesting that, on the whole, African Americans might not find him completely repellent, sorta. Well, I guess you really gotta know your crowd.

10:04 - They're talking about infrastructure, and I'm starting to fade. Even Ron Paul's starting to lose his normal, elf-like appeal. Oh, he's also ruling out an independent run, for now, which pokes a fairly large hole in my theory that Paul is actually just a robot controlled by Ross Perot deep within Antarctica's own Fortress of Solitude.

10:07 - What better way to end a debate on serious issue than with a baseball question? Shockingly enough, this is the one issue that Mitt Romney has made up his mind about. Well, you gotta have something, I guess.

WINNERS
Mike Huckabee - In the span of three weeks, this guy's gone from the candidate with the funny name to leading in Iowa and looking more presidential than most of his counterparts combined. He stayed above the fray, answered thoughtfully, and actually showed some signs of humanity. I may not like his policies, but his prowess for televised debate is unquestionable. It wouldn't surprise me if tonight's broadcast served as a new jumping off point for the Huckabee campaign.

John McCain - Where has that been this whole time? McCain's gravitas factor was way up tonight, and his extended time in statesman mode towards the end of the debate might remind people of why they liked him in the first place. Though it's probably too late to mount a serious challenge at this point, it's nice to see McCain recapture some of that old fire, if only for one evening.

Ron Paul - If fundraising and applause meters are to be believed, Ron Paul is having a rosy campaign indeed. While a general lack of name recognition and the novelty factor of Paul's grassroots, libertarian-tinged campaign hindering Paul's poll numbers, he's still proving that there are huge swaths of the Republican Party not being addressed by the other candidates.

LOSERS
Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani - The frontrunners took some serious heat early and never fully recovered. Now, guys, I know it's tempting to one-up each other on national television, but it doesn't make for very entertaining, or informative, programming. Sniping and interrupting isn't presidential; it's not even polite. Whether it's shifty practices and policy positions (Romney) or not-so-secret liberal leanings (Giuliani), both of the frontrunners fell rather flat this evening.

Fred Thompson - Did he even show up? For all the hype surrounding his candidacy announcement, Fred Thompson has done little to nothing to excite voters about his run to the White House. Tonight was no different. He went negative early, but no one else took the bait, he got out-folked by Mike Huckabee, and, when he actually chose to respond, his answers seemed vague and evasive. Not a great way to revive an already-flagging campaign.

So, that's that. Did anyone else watch this thing?

YouTube Republican Candidate Debate: Video preview

The Republican YouTube debate is this evening at 8PM EST, and I'll be providing a recap with some notes and thoughts late tonight or tomorrow. Until then, enjoy wading through some of the candidate questions that could very well be featured in tonight's debate (except probably not). I'm sure the judges did.

















Because, really, when I think of the Republican party, the first things that spring to mind are cartoons, furries, and Dick Armey.

If you feel like killing the rest of your evening, by all means, start here.

Internet celebrities to government: WTF?

I touched on net neutrality and its growing impact on the campaign landscape a couple of posts back, but I would be remiss if I didn't share this video. Apparently, it's been around for a while, and I'm not sure how it took me 18 months to see it, but that's how it goes. If this is old or uninformative to you, I apologize. However, if I know my audience (and I think I do), then the cameos alone will be worth your price of admission.


Interested? Let Leslie Hall of GemSweater.com tell you more.


Now there are two causes I can support: keeping the internet free, and lovingly chronicling some awful fucking sweaters. Head to their website, linked above, to learn how you can get involved.

And, just for fun, here's a less political recap featuring a few other net residents.

Campaign killers? Net skulduggery and political ads.

A quick programming update before I hop the next train back to Washington. Wednesday night, after the no doubt farcical exchanges of the Republican YouTube debates, CNN will actually air a program I'm interested in for once. Entitled "Campaign Killers", the show is a part of CNN's Broken Government series. This particular episode deals with negative campaigning and its effect on the American political process. While I'm not exactly sure what bases they'll cover over the course of an hour, a press release from earlier this month promises some interesting coverage:

The documentary examines political mudslinging, the history of negative advertisements and the role of the Internet as a viral weapon in politics today.

Nice to hear the Internet mentioned in the same breath with important political discourse that doesn't primarily involve fundraising. One of the most interesting media developments in the last couple of election cycles has been the ease with which individual citizen can personally affect a candidate's campaign. Before this, voicing your opinion required organization; even as late as the 2004 presidential election, the major sources of ads and media, outside of the campaigns themselves, were PACs and other interest groups. Now, anyone who has access to a camera and an opinion can, with a little talent, a few well-placed connections, and some luck, produce a video that can garner national attention over night. While this kind of impact seems like a logical step towards greater political freedom, it remains to be seen how the candidates and their campaigns can exploit this new communication tool.


Sadly, the good old days.

One obvious double-edged sword in all of this is the potential for responsibility-free negative campaigning. Traditionally, campaign ads have an easily-traceable origin point. While people can debate the intentions and validity of groups like the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, they remain an identifiable group. Placing the advertising online at sites like YouTube makes that kind of background check almost impossible. Candidates could, conceivably, run a proxy smear campaign online with much less chance of immediate repercussions than they could using the Internet's broadcast-style predecessors. Though the people have more power, they also have a higher chance of attracting focused manipulation on the part of the candidates.


How do we deal with this?

Or this?

The political world has a lot of catching up to do when it comes to internet campaigning. At worst, the focus on user-generated campaign materials signals a potential excuse for laziness on the part of the political strategists. After all, why would they spend valuable campaign dollars on internet marketing when we have supporters who will do a decent job for free? However, that kind of attitude risks ignoring the innovations possible when investment dollars and talented minds collide. So far, this election has shown that the internet isn't going away. Whether or not a candidate can exploit the true potential of internet organizing and advertising in the next 12 months, however, remains to be seen.

That said, have a personal question about negative campaigning: why are the Democrats so bad at it, especially in the general election? My friend Lisa and I talked about this last week, and we couldn't figure it out. During the primaries, the knives come out, and the vitriol spews. Just ask Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Edwards. Once the nomination is sewn up, though, a strange thing happens: everyone becomes nice. All of the anger and frustration that the candidates aimed at each other disappears once the real opponent enters the room. What's the deal? Is it a moral highroad issue? Are Republicans just meaner? What's behind the Democrats' lack of teeth when it comes to advertising?

Your opinions are, as always, welcome.

Linksgiving - A Bounty Indeed.

Happy Turkey Night, everyone. After an entire day devoted to food, football, and lounging like a hedonist, I'm actually looking forward to doing some work for a change. I might have a couple of entries cooked up for the weekend (or even later tonight, depending on how much energy this Colt-Falcons game takes out of me), but until then, it's time to give thanks. Here are a few things that make my world better these days:

- The Capitol Limited. For my money, the best way to travel the DC-to-Chicago route.

- The Vice President, for cracking a joke that's actually sort of funny, coming from a cyborg deathbot.

- CNN, for giving me more things to laugh at.

- The Internet, and all of the interesting freedoms it promotes and defends. Something tells me that I'm not alone on this one. You hearin' us, candidates?

- Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parades, from today and yesterday.

- James Wright. For this, and others:

Autumn Begins In Martins Ferry, Ohio

In the Shreve High football stadium,
I think of Polacks nursing long beers in Tiltonsville,
And gray faces of Negroes in the blast furnace at Benwood,
And the ruptured night watchman of Wheeling Steel,
Dreaming of heroes.

All the proud fathers are ashamed to go home.
Their women cluck like starved pullets,
Dying for love.

Therefore,
Their sons grow suicidally beautiful
At the beginning of October,
And gallop terribly against each other's bodies.

Substantive reporting returns when my turkey coma wears off. Until then, have a wonderful night, and leave some things you're thankful for in the comments, if you're so inclined. If not, I'll see you on Black Friday.

Mike Huckabee Supporter-Watch 2007: It gets better.

First, there was Chuck Norris. Then, Ted Nugent. Now, finally, Mike Huckabee has hit the trifecta of roughneck celebrity supporters. His latest find? The Nature Boy himself!

From CNN:

Huckabee is getting ready to rumble: wrestler Ric Flair, a.k.a. The Nature Boy, is supporting the former Arkansas governor in his bid for the White House.

CNN has confirmed the former WWF and WWE star wrestler is on board with Huckabee, and will co-host a campaign tailgate with the candidate at the South Carolina vs. Clemson football game on Saturday afternoon in Columbia, South Carolina. More details are forthcoming.

Man... I'll say it again: we're entering the realm of real entertainment. With that in mind, have a few Ric Flair clips to brighten up your morning.

Just another fist.

Holy damnit Christmas. Say what you will about his policies, but right now, at this very moment, I'm in love with Mike Huckabee.

EVENT REVIEW: The American Forum, 11/14/2007

Last night, I attended a taping of The American Forum, a panel discussion series hosted by American University's School of Communications. Entitled From Grassroots to Netroots: The Impact of the Internet and Other Media on Politics, the program featured a panel made up of, among others, Josh McConaha and Cyrus Krohn (the e-campaign directors for the DNC and the RNC, respectively), as well as Adam Green (the campaign director of MoveOn.org). For anyone interested in hearing the program for themselves, it's available online right here, and broadcast on Sunday evening at 6pm on WAMU (88.5 FM).

For those of you who're too lazy for radio, here are a few of the key points brought up during the program:

- When asked to comment on the success of online campaigning, many people on the panel were quick to point out all of the great things being done with politics on the internet. Cyrus Krohn, however, gave a more realistic assessment: when it comes to the effectiveness of internet campaigning, it's still too soon to tell. He mentioned the ebb and flow of site popularity, and the fact that we still don't have enough net-mediated elections under our collective belts to begin drawing serious patterns. With all of the techno-utopianism that accompanies a program like the one I'm in, it's always nice to hear someone admit that, really, we're still not exactly sure what we're doing.

- Later in the panel, Krohn had his feathers ruffled by Adam Green's comments regarding MoveOn's lack of a right-wing equivalent. Green's argument was that, while progressive causes like the ones championed by MoveOn tend to lend themselves well to grassroots organization, the right tends to support causes better suited to what he referred to as a top-down "culture of disempowerment" that favors interests and politicians over voters. Though Krohn offered some interesting thoughts on MoveOn's Petraeus ad, I felt that the real counter-example came from Dottie Lynch, who pointed out the internet's role in organizing the Harriet Myers backlash from a few years ago. She noted that, while it may not be considered grassroots, the Republican presence on the internet is still a powerful one.

Also, as someone in my group pointed out, it's ironic that Green would criticize the Republicans for lacking bottom-up, grassroots chops. For all of its plays towards citizen activism, MoveOn is primarily run through ordered, top-down direction.

- I was also glad to hear someone bring up 10Questions.com and their recent success regarding Barack Obama and net neutrality policy. For anyone interested in the site, check it out. It really might be the antidote to those dog and pony shows that are the YouTube debates. Also, for anyone interested in Barack Obama's stance on net neutrality and other technological matters, check out this question and answer session from Wednesday evening.



- Finally, the panel also had some interesting views on the viral video phenomenon that I touched on last week. Most of the panelists were split when it came to deciding if these easily-disseminated, unscripted moments were good or bad for the political landscape. Jeanne Cumming claimed that the threat of embarrassment would cause candidates to stick to the official message more, rendering them lifeless, while Green claimed that this new form of citizen journalism would lead to a "cleansing of the idiots", weeding out the slow and uninformed. Cummings also brought up an interesting point: in the case of viral videos, the subject matter is always negative. Why do you suppose that is? Why don't videos of Barack Obama helping old ladies across the street or Mitt Romney getting cats out of trees make the rounds on YouTube? Are we just not interested?

Anyway, that's your preview. To hear the panels opinion on the youth vote, the internet's role in local organizing, user-generated mudslinging, and more, tune in.

Urr... urgh.

I think I have the hantavirus. Posts are back tomorrow.

BOOK REVIEW: Unleashing the Ideavirus

One thing that I've been really rotten about when it comes to this whole blog assignment is actually keeping up with the mandatory postings. For instance, did you all know that I've been charged with weekly book reviews? No hands? I'm not surprised. Well, in the interests of catching up, here's the first of four belated book reviews.

Today's book is Seth Godin's much-lauded Unleashing the Ideavirus. When I first started reading this examination of the new start of marketing in the 21st century, I was expecting something akin to the starry-eyed proclamations usually reserved for something Scott McCloud dreamed up after reading old Katzenjammer Kids strips backwards while double-fisting purple drank. That is, something revolutionary in its unreality. However, Godin's ideas remain firmly grounded in the implementable, and, though sometimes colored by a little irrational exhuberance, remain solid strategies for marketing in a new landscape.

One of the ideas that really struck a chord with me was Godin's thoughts on access in relation to products and ideas. He notes early on that "one of the dumbest things marketers do is put artificial barriers in the way of trial". While it seems like common sense to say that, in order to become popular, a given object or idea has to be available to the right people at the right time, we don't have to look very far to see that companies still haven't quite grasped this inevitability, especially in the digital marketplace. From the recording industry to Major League Baseball, old-school organizations continue to frustrate users and drive down sales through the use of antiquated, protectionist DRM schemes. Instead of protecting the integrity and pocketbooks of the artists and corporations who use them, these obstructions of use and ownership are simply fueling a consumer-led backlash. Why buy from iTunes when you can slip over to eMusic and get mp3s that are actually yours?


Where have we heard that before?

As Godin point out in his book, digital media, when freely distributed, is one of the best ways to get people hooked on not just a song, but a band's entire output. This kind of loyalty is exactly the type of behavior that Godin looks for in taste-makers from all venues, people that he refers to as "sneezers":

Music execs know that you’ll pay nothing to hear a song on the radio, but if you like it, you’ll gladly pay $15 for the CD. And that if you love the CD, you’re more likely to pay $40 for tickets to the local concert, where you might be converted to a raving sneezer, much more likely to infect your friends and neighbors with raves about the band, the song, even the souvenirs!

Now that I have some of that DRM-rage out of my system, I'd like to turn my focus onto how all of this applies to politics. Now, I think it's safe to say that, generally speaking at least, creating and maintaining the same kind of ideavirus that Godin talks about is harder to do in the world of politics than it is in the world of product marketing. As an example, here are videos from two memorable viral videos that have emerged in the political world over the past few years: the "Hillary 1984" clip, George Allen's "Macaca moment", and




Clearly, these clips had some impact: the 1984 clip generated some serious buzz and cost its creator, Phillip de Vellis, his job at Blue State Digital, while Allen's slip was used deftly by his opponent, Jim Webb, to sway voters in Virgina's ultra-close Senate race (which Allen went on to lose by a razor-thin margin). What made both of these videos so powerful was precisely the thing that is the hardest to recreate: spontaneity. No one scripted the macaca comments, and no one hired de Vellis to make his commercial. Both events occurred outside the realm of planned marketing/image-making, a world which was then forced to respond. While examining the strategies that each campaign employed after the release of the videos may be telling, it ignores the most important part of the equation: the lightning-in-a-bottle nature of most videos.

Godin tells us that, when marketers beat people over the head with ads and come-ons, they tend to be ignored. However, in national politics, a land of ideas and heavy scrutiny, there isn't much room for developing secret campaigns. If you're not found out and laid bare to begin with, chances are good that your plan will be identified strongly enough with marketing strategies that many people will be turned off. For a viral video to really work in politics, it has to come from someplace outside of "the system". Fortunately, as citizens become savvier with net video technology, more and more of these homebrewed political commentary clips will pop up. Of course, it then becomes an issue of weeding out the good from the bad, but the blogosphere hasn't had much of a problem so far, so it's unlikely it'll develop one out of thin air.

Take that, Andrew Keen.

The real problem comes when they people don't want to talk about the same things that you want to talk about, or when the wrong people are doing the talking. Going back to some of Godin's ideas, it's fine when a candidate has the support of influential sneezers who are out there taking their message to the streets, but what about candidates who are on the outside looking in? How does a campaign drum up grassroots support (and content) without creating a little of its own first? I don't know the answer, exactly, but that's why I'm not the one writing the books.

Of course, this doesn't take into account attempts at politics-related humor that go viral. In cases like this, standard rules apply, I guess.


However, other sites have tried to blend humor with genuine campaigning. Some of the people behind the "Obama Girl" video, including actress Amber Ettinger and writer Leah Kaufman, are on record as willing to use the viral credibility earned from their first video to develop other videos across candidate, and party, lines. Call it viral-for-hire, I guess, though I have a feeling that the good feelings earned from the initial video could wear off quickly if we're faced with eight or nine more.


The curse of the one-trick pony?

Godin is right when he notes that maintaining these kinds of viruses is challenging work:

People no longer clamor to dance the Hustle or to get into Studio 54. They don’t visit the once hot jennicam website or pay a premium for front row seats at Cats. Why? Because instead of institutionalizing the process of improving, honing and launching new ideaviruses to replace the dying ones, the “owners” of these viruses milked them until they died.

Does anybody need Giuliani Girl? Probably not. By focusing on replicating the past instead of innovating towards a new, desirable form of video, sites like BarelyPolitical.com guarantee themselves a short cultural half-life. Again, it's an interesting challenge.

The challenge of replicating viral marketing in political forums might be best-suited for local or state elections, where focused campaigns, a narrower market, and a relative lack of big media scrutiny might afford political marketers some of the mystery and allure needed for these ideas to catch on. Nationally, however, hoping the replicate artificially the power of naturally-occurring viral media is a disaster waiting to happen.

For more on Seth Godin, check out his site for more insights and optimism. And, for those of you who love political videos, here's a countdown of the 10 best, according to these guys.


I'll be back later with my reviews of The Interplay of Influence, The Cluetrain Manifesto, and News That Matters, along with the usual pithy banter.

Debating the debates: a cry for mercy.

My last post introduced my dissatisfaction with the clusterfuck that is the primary debate system, but simply putting up a video of Dennis Kucinich being even weirder than usual didn't satisfy my need to vent about, and perhaps propose a solution to, this latest problem on the political landscape.

To put it simply: the debates that we've seen so far this season have, plainly, ranged from unsatisfying to downright detrimental. On the low end of the problem spectrum, the YouTube debates wrapped style over substance in the attractive papers of voter interaction. What should have been an interesting exercise in political participation devolved quickly into a cavalcade of schmucks and amateur actors all trying to out-quirk each other in hopes of their 15 minutes. The point, as they say, was missed.




Now, in the latest example of gimmick politics, we've been presented with the latest ratings-grabber: the Lightning Round! What a great way to derail an otherwise passable debate: with outmoded gameshow strategies!

Seriously, enough. Enough now. This has to stop. I'm as politically charged as the next Georgetown student, but if I have to see one more waste of airtime like this, I'm buying a yurt and moving to Montana. Instead of engaging in real discussion and, you know, debate, the candidates are once again reduced to soundbites. Oh, and often, too. By my (read: Wikipedia's) count, the Democrats and Republicans will, by the end of the primary season, have combined to engage in 36 of these dog and pony in just under nine months.

Wow.

As I stated earlier, I'm all for debate. However, to really catch my interests, it has to fulfill two very important criteria: it must be fair, and it must be in-depth. The primary debates tend to miss both of these by wide margins every time they hit the air. The sheer number of candidates, coupled with the media's maddening desire to turn everything into a horse race, tends to lend itself to exclusion rather than inclusion. Front-runners get most of the airtime, while great policy minds like Joe Biden and Chris Dodd are left to fight their way out of their very own Catch-22 - they don't get the coverage because they're not popular, but part of the reason they're not popular is because no one's talking about them. Thus, you end up with these disadvantaged candidates resorting to sniping or outlandish statements as means of getting ink.

As you might've figured, the well-reasoned portion also goes out the window as soon as you start factoring in the numbers. With all of these candidates trying to make their own mark on a discussion that covers a wide range of topics, the audience ends up with all breadth and no depth. Nowhere is that more apparent than the latest inclusion of a Lightning Round, but it does get worse. Does anyone else remember the debates this summer that actually made use of show-of-hands voting to settle the important issues?



Fuck me. Are we in 6th grade again?

All of this talk about the problems with the primary debates reminds me of what Neil Postman said in Amusing Ourselves to Death: television, at its core, is primarily an entertainment medium designed around selling advertisements. Whenever you try to mix it in with serious discourse, bad things tend to happen.

Now, while I don't completely agree with that sentiment in regards to this situation (these debates tend to be covered without commercial interruption, for instance) I still think that we can do better. An, in the interest of not bitching without offering a solution, I think I have a few suggestions.

1) Themed debates. This would completely clear up the problems inherent in trying to cover all of the issues in every debate. Maybe, in addition to a few all-purpose debates scattered throughout the season, the candidates could participate in debates centered around narrow, predetermined topics. You could tune in to Hillary Clinton explain herself in "The Democratic Healthcare Debate", for instance, or listen to John McCain pop a few veins in his forehead during "The Republicans present: The War in Iraq". This type of setup would not only would this give the candidates ample time to touch on the finer points of a given debate without the distraction of other topics, but would also aid viewers who are more interested in some topics than others.

2) Showdowns. The media wants a horse race? Let's give them one. What if, instead of pitting all of the candidates against each other during every debate, the networks instead devised a system of head-to-head debates between each of the candidates? It could be like watching the NBA draft: each match-up could be randomly selected, giving lesser known candidates the chance to steal the spotlight from one of the big guns. Who wouldn't love to see Barack Obama get into an honest, lengthy debate with Dennis Kucinich? Once everyone's gone around once, maybe there could even be a second round featuring different pairings. With the natural lure of competition that's so attractive to our sporting culture, we could even open this whole thing up to voting. Perhaps an expert panel, plus some input from the public, could decide who moves on and who plays for consolation. Why not have a debating tournament? Maybe it's the NFLer in me, but if we can do this every weekend in January at high schools around the country, why can't we do this with our politicians?

Are these the perfect solutions? Of course not. Do they open up some interesting possibilities? Maybe. Are they better than what we've got so far? Well, obviously, I think so. What about you?

PS: For those of you really interested in the whole debate scene, check out this section of the New York Times' coverage. Personally, as someone who's had to slog through transcript after transcript from these kinds of events, this service is remarkable.