For all of their hype, the debates have only rarely provided moments of vintage political theatre or been significant in shaping the outcome of the race. Two exceptions stand out. The first was in the debate held on 28th October 1980 in Cleveland Ohio, between President Jimmy Carter and his Republican challenger, Ronald Reagan. At the end of their 90-minute debate, each candidate was given 3 minutes to make a closing statement. President carter went first and made remarks that were well-meaning but eminently forgettable. Governor Reagan however, cleverly posed a series of questions to which he knew the majority of voter would answer in the negative. With election day less than a week away, he managed to shape the way voters would make up their minds in these vital last days of the campaign. Support for President Carter fell away badly following the debate, and on election day he won less than six states, plus the District of Columbia, for a total of just 48 electoral college votes. Ronald Reagan also features in the second memorable debate moment. Four years on, almost to the day, President Reagan was taking part in the second and final debate of the campaign with his challenger, former Vice resident Walter Mondale. By this time Reagan was already 73, and age was becoming an issue in the campaign. Henry Trewhitt, diplomatic correspondent for the Baltimore Sun, one of the four panelists asking the questions that evening in Missouri, posed a question on Reagans’ age and therefore, ability to function in such circumstances as the Cuban missile crisis. Reagan shot back a jokey response, mocking his opponent’s youth and inexperience. The audience erupted into laughter and applause. That was the end of the age issue and Reagan went on to a 49-state victory in the election. However, most debates are not ‘game-changing’ events. True Al Gore probably lost some support by rolling his eyes and sighing, while George W. Bush was speaking during their first televised debate in 2000. John McCain’s body language was heavily criticised in both the first 2008 debate 0 when he refused to even look at his opponent during the entire 90-minute encounter - and in the third debate when he was caught on camera ‘smirking and googling his eyes whenever Mr Obama got a chance to speak.’
The evidence suggests that, as with televised adverts, debates do more to confirm what the voters already feel about the candidates than to change many voters’ minds. They might also help to convert passive supporters into active voters. In 2004, the debates clearly helped John Kerry more than George W. Bush was deemed to have performed particularly poorly in the first of the three debates. The Gallup polling organisation, which has Bush 8 percentage points ahead of Kerry just before the debate, found the face a dead heat immediately after the debate. Viewing figures for the debates vary significantly from one election cycle to another. The all-time high point for debates viewership is still the 1980 debate between President Carter and his Republican challenger Reagan, which logged nearly 81 million viewers. The debates of 1984, 1988 and 1992 averaged around 66 million viewers while the debates in 1996 and 2000 were watched by an average of only 40 million viewers, 2004 with 62.4 million watching the first debate. Traditionally the first debate has the largest audience out of the three. In 2008, the figure declined again to around 45 million, with just 52.4 million watching the first debate. What was extraordinary in 2004 however was the over 73 million who watched the vice-presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin. Some commentators put this down to the anticipation of Governor Palin’s implosion, which failed to occur. It is worth nothing that in only four of the last seven elections has the candidate judges to have won the debates done on to win the election. Mondale (1984), Dukakis (1988), and Kerry (2004) were all judges as debate winner, but condemned by the voters to be election losers. But debate performance seemed to be key to Barack Obama’s surge in the polls in early October 2008. Furthermore ‘debate performance’ was given as the most common reason, in the New York Times CBS poll in October 2008, as to why likely voters’ opinion of Obama has changed for the better during the closing weeks of the campaign.
Whilst televised debates are crucial, they have become anti-climatic in recent years. Due to the stakes being so high during debates, candidates are well prepared and often ‘play safe’ when answering questions or responding to opponents. One could argue that presidential debates test characteristics that are not necessary for a president to thrive. If a candidate is not particularly good at reeling out off-the-cuff sound bytes, does that make him ineligible to govern a nation? However, equally it can be said that the image you convey in debates, is paramount to to who you portray yourself as and un turn how the electorate view you. The unexpected is part of the job as president and, particularly in times of disaster, you are the face of a nation and therefore your reaction when under pressure, communication skills and body language become consequential. It would be wrong to assume that if you win the debates, then you win the white house: issues/policies, conventions, trust, credibility and track record to name a few. What we can stress however is that in the new age of technology, debates are becoming slightly more prominent. This is largely due to the introduction of websites such as YouTube that allows people to view debates repeatedly, allowing deeper analysis and particularly pivotal if a candidate is crippled by a disastrous debate. In this sense, there is no doubt that the role of televised presidential debates has increased, yet the impact still remains slight.
by
tapunawahine (student)
