When is a debate not a debate? When it’s televised, media-umpired, poll-monitored, spun to death and endlessly second-guessed. Then it’s less a debate than a spectator sport.
The rules of formal debate, with its scorecard of categories to judge, don’t apply. This is a combination quiz show, beauty pageant and sparring match in which talking points are repeated as if they were actual thoughts.
The whole country looks on, waiting for the clouds of rhetoric to part and give us, as they inevitably and unfortunately say, A Defining Moment. It’s got to be there somewhere, we tell ourselves, like a needle in a cliche stack.
The winner is the debater who breaks through all the hokum long enough to give the proceedings a touch of reality. And puts a human face on politics. Which is no small challenge. How best meet it? By recognizing that political debate is a branch of drama, of theater, of showbiz. As the great modern presidents — one thinks of Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan — well understood.
Having suffered through more hours of political debate than is good for either mind or body, or soul, I take the great liberty of offering five simple — maybe too simple — tips to any aspiring political debater:
1. Be happy to be there, be honored to be there. Think of it as an outing. Take control from the first. (“Nice to meet you. … Hey, can I call you Joe?”) The winner approaches a debate not as something to be endured but enjoyed. The loser looks at his watch and just wants it to be over. Continued... |