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Are Political Debates Useful?

landtuna

landtuna

I'm not talking about the politics or the candidates here but rather the presentation.

The one thing that will push my pre-set button quicker than anything else is if there is a conversation going on-air and everybody is trying to talk at once. Within several minutes of the start of the Democrat debate last night it began again. One candidate would do into his/her explanation of the talking point, several others would raise their hands but after a few seconds they would just begin talking and no one's voice could be understood.

I have two suggestions for the next debate (as useless as they seem to be):

1. Raising one's hand seems so elementary schoolish. Why not have a button on each stand that would advise the moderator's of the wish to speak and track the sequence?

2. Cut off the mic's of everyone who isn't currently speaking.

Seems to me we are using an 18th century process here and it isn't very effective.
 
I'll just say there are too many people running among the Democrats and that also happened with the Republicans in 2016, and there are too many debates.
 
I don't know if they're useful, but they can be damned entertaining!

Not having a dog in that fight I thoroughly enjoyed the one last night!
 
landtuna said:
I'm not talking about the politics or the candidates here but rather the presentation.
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From a Network perspective, given all that's invested to broadcast a debate, the answer is absolutely yes.

landtuna said:
1. Raising one's hand seems so elementary schoolish. Why not have a button on each stand that would advise the moderator's of the wish to speak and track the sequence?
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Probably wouldn't work because their lights would be on constantly. The currency for candidates during a debate is air time, more the better.

landtuna said:
2. Cut off the mic's of everyone who isn't currently speaking.
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There are typically two different mics and mixes for the podiums; one for the house PA system and one for broadcast. Either that, or the single mic is split and sent to the two mix locations. They are mixed separately, one in the venue for House PA, and one in the broadcast production truck outside. Each microphone is also recorded individually (iso record), so if a candidate says something under their breath, or maybe drowned-out by other's talking at the same time, an isolated recording would exist for reference. Turning each of the individual mics on and off for both broadcast and PA, would be difficult, if not impossible. Oh yes and I almost forgot a potential third mix: Monitors. The candidates have monitors (speakers) either in the podiums or front of stage, so they can hear the moderators as needed.
 
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They are only useful once you are down to 2 or 3 people. 6-10 people yelling over each other doesn't do much.
 
FreddyE1977 said:
I don't know if they're useful, but they can be damned entertaining!

Not having a dog in that fight I thoroughly enjoyed the one last night!
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It was one of the better ones, for sure, if only for the Bloomberg disaster. How could he have not known what he was in for, and prepared for it better? Unless he benefits from a huge outpouring of voter sympathy (For a multibillionaire? Among Democrats?) he is done, and deservedly so.
 
CTListener said:
It was one of the better ones, for sure, if only for the Bloomberg disaster. How could he have not known what he was in for, and prepared for it better? Unless he benefits from a huge outpouring of voter sympathy (For a multibillionaire? Among Democrats?) he is done, and deservedly so.
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I'm hoping he spends another billion or so on TV. My end of year bonus is counting on it!
 
They're telling us what the other guy is going to do to us, not what they're going to do for us. Like the attack ads, I have no use for them.
 
In their current form, on commercial television, debates offer little in the
way of new information, political view, etc. One can better spend their
time studying each candidates online message and make informed decisions
based on what they read, if the messages are truthful and accurate. Last
nights debate, for me, was little more than a two hour long laugh-a-thon.
Was rolling on the floor with some of the one liners and statements.....
 
CTListener said:
It was one of the better ones, for sure, if only for the Bloomberg disaster. How could he have not known what he was in for, and prepared for it better? Unless he benefits from a huge outpouring of voter sympathy (For a multibillionaire? Among Democrats?) he is done, and deservedly so.
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Debates are useful for "culling the herd," so to speak, in primaries. Or for helping to defeat a candidate in the general election. For the first, think of Marco Rubio's weak performance in the '16 Republican debates, and Chris Christie's take-down of Rubio. For the latter, Kennedy/Nixon 1960 is the most famous example. I've been told that people who listened to the debates on radio thought Nixon did much better than the TV viewers thought, but they couldn't see Tricky Dick's 5 o'clock shadow and sweaty upper lip. Reagan/Mondale would be another, though it was mostly Reagan's humor that won out - as in his tongue-in-cheek statement that he wouldn't exploit his opponent's "youth and inexperience."

Remember the Vice-Presidential debate between Sen. Bentsen of Texas and Dan Quayle...1988? Quayle compared himself to JFK, and Bensen replied something like "I knew Jack Kennedy, and sir, you are NO Jack Kennedy.". That one is being quoted and paraphrased to this day 32 years later.

In the 16 GOP debates, I remember being surprised at how short Trump was, but that was because they had him standing next to Jeb Bush, who is something like 6'5." I imaging Bloomberg - who really is short - had that problem, as well.

These are the sound-bites and visual impressions we remember, not the policy-wonk statements.
 
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TheBigA said:
They would be useful if both parties had them But when only one party debates, the other one uses it for fodder.

I predict the current president will attempt to avoid all debates. No upside for him at all.

In the meantime, last nights debate was a ratings winner, as 20 million watched.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/las-vegas-democratic-debate-draws-record-viewership-n1140076
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Trump avoiding national tv? Nope. My prediction he will be very willing to debate the dem nominee this Fall. His ego won't allow anything else.
 
TheBigA said:
They would be useful if both parties had them But when only one party debates, the other one uses it for fodder.

I predict the current president will attempt to avoid all debates. No upside for him at all.

In the meantime, last nights debate was a ratings winner, as 20 million watched.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/las-vegas-democratic-debate-draws-record-viewership-n1140076
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Meanwhile, Trump's appearance in Phoenix garnered local coverage only on Fox's second station, KUTP Channel 45. The main reason being that they air a newscast at 7 PM anyway, and preempted Judge Judy reruns at 8. The other stations aired coverage from outside during their newscasts, before and after, ran regular programming during the speech, and some streamed his speech live (KPNX/12 did not, since they aired the Democrats' debate opposite it).

I have no idea if Fox or the other cable noise channels aired it live. Wasn't worth my time to check.
 
TheBigA said:
Very risky, given his propensity to drop obscenities without warning.
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I watched only a few parts of his speech, but AFAIK, he kept it clean. There were no reports of F-bombs or other bleepable language. That was not the case outside the arena, where the local reporters were. KTVK, who was on a 7 second delay, had to cut off their audio several times during their live reports because of language.

But my point was that, despite the large Trump following in metro Phoenix, none of the local TV stations would interrupt their regular programming to air it. That includes Fox, who dumped it to its "secondary" station, KUTP.
 
KeithE4 said:
I watched only a few parts of his speech, but AFAIK, he kept it clean. There were no reports of F-bombs or other bleepable language. That was not the case outside the arena, where the local reporters were. KTVK, who was on a 7 second delay, had to cut off their audio several times during their live reports because of language.

But my point was that, despite the large Trump following in metro Phoenix, none of the local TV stations would interrupt their regular programming to air it. That includes Fox, who dumped it to its "secondary" station, KUTP.
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Fox's Phoenix affiliate shows every Trump rally on YouTube, with a wide open, unmoderated chat running alongside that is often more entertaining and jaw-droppingly outrageous as the president's remarks. Diehard Trump fans mixing it up with outnumbered liberals, with various fringe players rooting each side on -- unreconstructed Maoists from the left, neo-Nazis from the right, and of course a healthy helping of folks whose only contribution to the "discussion" is New Testament verses.
 
Don't there have to be some Old Testament verses to refute the New Testament verses? At least that's been my experience.


CTListener said:
Fox's Phoenix affiliate shows every Trump rally on YouTube, with a wide open, unmoderated chat running alongside that is often more entertaining and jaw-droppingly outrageous as the president's remarks. Diehard Trump fans mixing it up with outnumbered liberals, with various fringe players rooting each side on -- unreconstructed Maoists from the left, neo-Nazis from the right, and of course a healthy helping of folks whose only contribution to the "discussion" is New Testament verses.
Click to expand...
 
Trump had a rally in Battle Creek the day the House voted to impeach Trump Wood TV, WXMI Fox17, WZZM all aired the rally, WWMT just had a scroll saying you could stream the rally on the website.

I don't watch debates since it's just everyone saying the same talking points as in the ad's and personal attacks as well don't hear anything new why I just don't watch any of the debates and I already know who I'll be voting for as well.
 
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