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| Debates
May Impact Close Presidential Election |
Posted:
09.29.04 | |
| History
suggests that the three presidential debates and one vice-presidential debate
could help determine who will lead the world's one remaining superpower for the
next four years. Printer-friendly versions: HTML
/ PDF | |
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| President George Bush
and Senator John Kerry will first square-off Thursday in a debate on foreign policy
moderated by the NewsHour's Jim Lehrer. The second debate, October 8, will focus
on domestic policy and the third, October 13, will be a town hall format. The
vice presidential candidates face each other October 5. "Generally
debates are decisive when it's a close race or when the lead has gone back and
forth," says Andrew Kohut, president of the Pew Center for the People and
the Press. "This is a high-stakes election. This could be one of the defining
moments of the campaign, if not the defining moment of the campaign." | |
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| Defining
moments | |
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|  Presidential
debates have played a pivotal role in elections over the last few decades, but
it wasn't always that way.
Before the advent of radio and television, presidential
debates were practically nonexistent. Throughout much of the 18th Century,
debates were not a campaigning tool in elections. Instead, presidential candidates
used the partisan newspapers of the time, pamphlets and a few public meetings
to get their message out. In 1858, however, U.S. Senate candidates in Illinois
Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas changed the course of political campaigning,
inaugurating a series of debates. The seven clashes, which became known as the
Lincoln-Douglas debates, occurred only after Lincoln doggedly followed Douglas
to many of his campaign events, shouting from the crowd for a debate. At
that time, however, senators were elected by state legislatures and despite the
large crowds that came to watch the two men, debates did not become a fixture
of the election season. It would be another 100 years before a debate drew
an equal amount of national attention. | |
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| Television's
effect on debates | |
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| In
1960 Democratic Senator John F. Kennedy and Republican Vice President Richard
Nixon became the first presidential candidates to hold a nationally televised
debate.  And
its impact was huge.
Both the Nixon and Kennedy campaigns saw an advantage
to a television appearance, but it was the Kennedy camp that thoroughly planned
for a calm and collected presentation. The debate had been closely fought
on the ideas, but for those who had watched on television, Kennedy clearly won,
helped by his cool demeanor compared with Nixon, who appeared pale and sweaty
without makeup. "I was listening to it on the radio coming into Lincoln,
Kansas, and I thought Nixon was doing a great job. Then I saw the TV clips the
next morning and he was sick," said former Senator and presidential candidate
Bob Dole in a 1999 interview with Jim Lehrer. "He didn't look well. Kennedy
was young and articulate, and sort of wiped him out." Between 1960
and 1976, presidential debates took a hiatus, primarily because candidates did
not want to repeat Nixon's experience.  But
in 1976 the debates came back in full force with President Gerald Ford facing
off against former Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter in the second televised presidential
debates and the first in front of a live audience.
The debate had a memorable
audio mishap that left the two candidates live on air, standing awkwardly behind
their podiums. "I watched that tape afterwards and it was embarrassing
to me that both President Ford and I stood there almost like robots," President
Carter said in a 1989 interview with Jim Lehrer. "We didn't move around,
we didn't walk over and shake hands with each other. We just stood there." | |
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| A
chance to shine or flail | |
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| Many
analysts believe candidates can ward off political attacks, alter or affirm their
public image and reach a wider audience through debates. "The public
looks for clues about the candidates that tell them who they are, what they're
like, and if there are questions about their character, they get resolved,"
says Kohut.  Ronald
Reagan deflected attacks on his conservatism from President Carter, appearing
lighthearted and friendly in 1980, and a relatively unknown politician, Bill Clinton,
showed a charismatic and sympathetic side in the 1992 debates.
Other candidates
did not fare as well. Democrat Michael Dukakis responded in an unemotional mechanical
voice to a question about the rape and murder of his wife in 1988. And President
Gerald Ford said, "There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe,"
in his 1976 debate with President Carter, drawing much criticism from the media
for his misleading statement since it was at the height of the Cold War and Soviet
troops occupied most of the nations of the region. Third party candidates
such as Ralph Nader have criticized the structure of the debates, which have not
allowed for a third party candidate since Ross Perot in 1992 and 1996. According
to the Commission on Presidential Debates, which runs the debates, candidates
must receive 15 percent support or higher in five selected national public opinion
polls to participate. --
Deirdre Erin Murphy, Online NewsHour | |
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