Tuesday
Apr292008
After 21 Debates: Debate on debates fueled by losing candidates
Tuesday, April 29, 2008 at 11:20AM
AP Debate challenges are a ploy, not an issue. They are in the playbook for the candidate trying to catch up, in this case Hillary Clinton.
Demanding that Barack Obama debate her is a guaranteed applause line at Clinton's campaign rallies. But the topic seldom makes much difference to voters, and it probably won't this time as Obama declines more debates, saying that there have been enough, meaning that he prefers to run his own campaign and go to Democratic voters on his own terms.
Candidates debate when it fits their strategies, or when they have no alternative. The latter was the situation early in this campaign, when there were a dozen faces in the candidate crowd and none of them dared risk staying away. Now that it is Clinton versus Obama, debating fits her game plan but not his, so there will be none before the next set of primaries on May 6 in North Carolina and Indiana, and probably not afterward, either.
Debate challenges hinge on the campaign situation. When Vice President Al Gore thought he was on a glide path to the 2000 nomination, he didn't express much interest in debates. That changed when former Sen. Bill Bradley emerged as a formidable challenger. Then Gore challenged Bradley to virtually nonstop debates. He said they should scrap TV advertising and debate twice a week instead. While Bradley knew better than to accept that Gore maneuver, he lost in the end.
The Clinton campaign is hammering the topic, telling Democrats in North Carolina, Indiana, Oregon and Montana that they deserve to have debates of their own, in their own territory, before their primaries. It sounds good at campaign rallies, but the location of debates doesn't really make any difference because one stage set up for television looks just like another.
In the April 16 ABC-sponsored debate in Philadelphia, the questions seemed chosen to unsettle and embarrass the candidates, particularly Obama, rather than to push them to discuss dealing with the crunch of problems the next president will face.
Obama said afterward that the questioners were playing "gotcha games," an understandable reaction since he was the prime target.
"You know, I've got to say, tough questions in a debate is nothing like the tough decisions you've got to make in the White House," Clinton told a rally in Wilmington, N.C., saying that Obama is trying to avoid them.
But the really tough debate questions aren't the needling ones, they are reasoned and fact-based, forcing a candidate to explain a change in course or to deliver details on a sketchy campaign promise. Both Obama and Clinton have said they would end the U.S. role in Iraq by gradually withdrawing American forces; what they haven't said is exactly how that would work and how a new administration would deal with the fallout. There may be no answer at this point. The voters are entitled to know that.
Obama's answer to the Clinton challenges is to say, "I'm not ducking; we've had 21." He said he wants to spend his campaign time talking to as many voters as he can and taking their questions directly.
Clinton pressed the challenge; with Obama's rejection, it is a handy talking point. "I've said I will debate anywhere, any time, and I think you deserve your own debate," Clinton said, as her campaign gathered 4,500 North Carolina names in an online petition demanding that Obama debate her.
Clinton wanted Obama to show up for an April 27 debate in Raleigh, N.C., but he never agreed to be there and it was called off, supposedly because it didn't fit his schedule. He was not campaigning that day, he was at home in Chicago. What it really didn't fit was his strategy.
Clinton's "any time" claim doesn't mesh with her campaign's rebuff of a North Carolina debate on April 19. The campaign explanation was that it was the first day of Passover. But her professed concern for the Jewish holiday did not keep her from campaigning that Saturday night in Pennsylvania.
As the race stands, it wouldn't make much sense for Obama to bow to the repeated Clinton call for a new round of debates in the final primary states. So there probably will be no more of them. But there is one certainty: There will be no letup in the debate about debating.
Demanding that Barack Obama debate her is a guaranteed applause line at Clinton's campaign rallies. But the topic seldom makes much difference to voters, and it probably won't this time as Obama declines more debates, saying that there have been enough, meaning that he prefers to run his own campaign and go to Democratic voters on his own terms.
Candidates debate when it fits their strategies, or when they have no alternative. The latter was the situation early in this campaign, when there were a dozen faces in the candidate crowd and none of them dared risk staying away. Now that it is Clinton versus Obama, debating fits her game plan but not his, so there will be none before the next set of primaries on May 6 in North Carolina and Indiana, and probably not afterward, either.
Debate challenges hinge on the campaign situation. When Vice President Al Gore thought he was on a glide path to the 2000 nomination, he didn't express much interest in debates. That changed when former Sen. Bill Bradley emerged as a formidable challenger. Then Gore challenged Bradley to virtually nonstop debates. He said they should scrap TV advertising and debate twice a week instead. While Bradley knew better than to accept that Gore maneuver, he lost in the end.
The Clinton campaign is hammering the topic, telling Democrats in North Carolina, Indiana, Oregon and Montana that they deserve to have debates of their own, in their own territory, before their primaries. It sounds good at campaign rallies, but the location of debates doesn't really make any difference because one stage set up for television looks just like another.
In the April 16 ABC-sponsored debate in Philadelphia, the questions seemed chosen to unsettle and embarrass the candidates, particularly Obama, rather than to push them to discuss dealing with the crunch of problems the next president will face.
Obama said afterward that the questioners were playing "gotcha games," an understandable reaction since he was the prime target.
"You know, I've got to say, tough questions in a debate is nothing like the tough decisions you've got to make in the White House," Clinton told a rally in Wilmington, N.C., saying that Obama is trying to avoid them.
But the really tough debate questions aren't the needling ones, they are reasoned and fact-based, forcing a candidate to explain a change in course or to deliver details on a sketchy campaign promise. Both Obama and Clinton have said they would end the U.S. role in Iraq by gradually withdrawing American forces; what they haven't said is exactly how that would work and how a new administration would deal with the fallout. There may be no answer at this point. The voters are entitled to know that.
Obama's answer to the Clinton challenges is to say, "I'm not ducking; we've had 21." He said he wants to spend his campaign time talking to as many voters as he can and taking their questions directly.
Clinton pressed the challenge; with Obama's rejection, it is a handy talking point. "I've said I will debate anywhere, any time, and I think you deserve your own debate," Clinton said, as her campaign gathered 4,500 North Carolina names in an online petition demanding that Obama debate her.
Clinton wanted Obama to show up for an April 27 debate in Raleigh, N.C., but he never agreed to be there and it was called off, supposedly because it didn't fit his schedule. He was not campaigning that day, he was at home in Chicago. What it really didn't fit was his strategy.
Clinton's "any time" claim doesn't mesh with her campaign's rebuff of a North Carolina debate on April 19. The campaign explanation was that it was the first day of Passover. But her professed concern for the Jewish holiday did not keep her from campaigning that Saturday night in Pennsylvania.
As the race stands, it wouldn't make much sense for Obama to bow to the repeated Clinton call for a new round of debates in the final primary states. So there probably will be no more of them. But there is one certainty: There will be no letup in the debate about debating.
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