Module 5 Part 1

 Module 5: The Debate for fans of policy.

The presidential debate was unfortunately the chaotic mess everyone in the American public feared that it would be. Well not everyone, as debates can serve as a form of “ideological pep rally” for the most hardcore on either side of the election. An example of this kind of debate would be the Sanders  V Clinton Democratic Primary debates of 2016, that were ideological slugfests. The same could not be said of the last Presidential debate that left anyone with ears reaching for the remote to turn down the volume. That was in fact the difference between the types of debates being discussed, Ideological debates have a lot to say  while the Biden v Trump debates make a lot of noise.

****To  be perfectly clear President Trump's behavior and conduct on the debate stage  cannot be defended. His choice to combat and ignore the impartial moderator was exactly how things began to devolve. That has to be said within the context of this specific debate, as we have absolutely zero other examples of Presidential candidates conducting themselves as such.***

The difference between these two kinds of debates in what can be learned from them. From this debate I seriously reviewed my and a few articles notes to see if any substantive policy had been debated. For his part Biden attacked Trump on many things but overall kept his attacks on Trump's record as a whole, slamming him with carefully worded attacks. Example: “Under this President, we’ve become weaker, sicker, poorer, more divided, and more violent.” While it is an excellent 14 word way to score points against Trump, it's about as unspecific a critique one could give. While we know the references and allusions there's zero actual policy found within this argument Biden made against the Trump presidency. While other attacks later in the night focused on the mishandling of the Pandemic, Biden seemed wary of being policy driven. 

Let's compare this with a 2016 Politico article about the Clinton V Sanders Democratic debates. In it Politico labeled the “9 most interesting moments of the night” and of those nine, five of them are Policy driven. One of them was actually Senator Clinton apologizing over her support and advocacy for the 1994 crime bill. Let's break this down, in the 2020 debate mentioned above, the current incumbent President refused to debate the merits of his own policies. While in the 2016 debate the candidates were actually acknowledging a change in their own position over time. The praise should be heaped onto the debate over minimum wage, they actually argued over whether it should be $12 or $15, first and why. Just another example of how a debate should aspire to educate its voters, by going into the meat of the differences of the candidates.

In truth, I do not know why I expected the debate to be anything other than what it was. In this current election cycle it seems that persona and personality are much more important than policy. While one could argue that this is the case every election, there can be little debate this is certainly the height of that feeling. Since this is a blog, I will end with my own opinion on the subject. This is simply what you get when an election as divisive and controversial as this before any policy is debated. Since people were already in one of 2 camps neither candidate seemed to be making a pitch to the middle based on policy, and that is really too bad. The American people need good policy, whether it's conservative, liberal or in-between. 

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