Due to the propensity for analysts to replay these "bites" and dissect their meaning until they no longer make sense, I decided to focus my attention instead on the buzz before the debate. One msnbc article: Presidential debate becomes must see TV compared the anticipated viewership to a Super Bowl audience. There was so much leading up to it that the actual debate itself seemed, to me, merely satisfactory. As I mentioned earlier, sound bites were all over this event like white on rice. And I was disappointed to see that it played (at times) more like a staged convention. It appeared more like a "pseudo-event" where I was subjected to more b.s. rhetoric; which Waterman, et. al. considers, "is now more often designed to promote a desired presidential image and not to provide leadership for the country" (123). Is it wrong of me to want the full package deal? A candidate who will look me in the eye and spare me the public persona... and answers a question out-right? I don't need all of the fancy political jargon... both of them were guilty of talking to me as if I were another member of the Senate and I'm sorry, as much as I'd like to think so, I'm just not THAT informed.
In the Handbook of Communication Research, McKinney and Carlin speak to the notion of "Debates as Media Events," indicating that, "debate-related news segments are among the most frequent of all campaign stories" (214). That seems hard to believe with this election (since the Republican V.P. nominee has drummed up enough press to last a lifetime), but when you think about just this past week with all of the hooplah surrounding whether the debate would actually take place, it may prove to be true. Not to mention the fact that immediately after the debate the television was dominated by analysts trying to get their two-cents in.
Many analysts called the debate a "draw" afterwards, concluding that there were many punches thrown by both candidates, but there was no clear winner. Perhaps this led to my dissatisfaction? Perhaps I wanted to see Obama catch McCain in one of his many blatant lies? Eh, let's face it... I just wanted McCain's head to pop off. But that's beside the point. I'm sure there were many viewers who got what they were looking for... (were you one of them?)
Did anyone else feel let down by this debate? (By either candidate or by both?) Did watching the debate, or the analysis that followed, make you feel more informed about the candidates' stances on the topics of discussion? And how important are political debates to YOU in terms of helping you select or solidify your choice in a candidate?
8 comments:
I would like to start this off by saying that I am just glad the debate went on as originally planned. That in itself is a victory. I don’t know if it was cowardice or an actual drive to solve the current financial crisis, but it seemed as though McCain really did not want to visit Ole Miss and debate Obama. With that said, I was somewhat disappointed by the actual debate, in relation to the issues discussed, not the entertainment aspects of it. While I may be judged for saying this, anytime McCain and Obama are in the same room together, there are sure to be some entertaining moments. This debate did not disappoint. My personal favorite part is when Obama called McCain “Tom,” by accident instead of “John.”
Onto the issues. I sat down to watch the debate, expecting to hear about each candidate’s respective stance on foreign policy. That’s what it was billed as, right? A debate about foreign policy. I truly understand that there is a terrible financial crisis occurring in our country right now, but that does not mean that it merited the entire first half of the debate. There will be other opportunities to discuss domestic policy, but how many other opportunities will the public have to hear Obama and McCain talk about Iraq, the situation in Georgia, or any foreign policy for that matter. If people really were on the fence about the candidates, and were possibly basing their decisions on the candidate with the best foreign policy ideas, then this debate failed to deliver. While I believe it was right to touch upon the financial crisis, as it is wrong to ignore it, Jim Lehrer should have kept Obama and McCain on target. I do not feel more informed about either candidate’s foreign policy stance, if anything I feel a bit more confused. There was a lot of talking around the topics, and not a lot of direct answers. In chapter 8 of the Handbook, Kaid mentions that debates “reach large audiences—more than any other single campaign event”(204). This was the perfect opportunity for both candidates to enter confidently, state his stance on the issues forcefully, and debate gracefully. However, I do not believe that this was accomplished on by either side. After watching, I am not confident in my own ability to reiterate either candidate’s stance on the issues discussed.
I am pretty set in my choice of Presidential candidate, but I can definitely see how these political debates may be important to some people in selecting their preferred candidate. Like many others, I’m sure, I am watching the debates for reinforcement that my candidate of choice is the right choice, however if he slips-up, I will still vote for him. While the debates sometimes make people become extremely secure in their candidate choice, it will not break their decision.
Hart discusses in chapter 4 of Seducing America, that many people “often feel daunted and disoriented by the swirl of politics and they have come to accept that condition as natural” (79). This most recent debate would only serve as support for this quotation. McCain and Obama spoke a lot, but neither really offered a substantial stance on the issues. A lot of political language flew around, while the candidates did a sort of dance around the questions posed of them. This could make anyone feel daunted and disorientated by the political process. If neither candidate can firmly answer a question, or feels it necessary to “one-up” their opponent, how can they run the country? Kaid states on page 213 that “debate exposure result[s] in a significant lowering of political cynicism levels,” yet after this debate, I believe that cynicism levels may be stagnant or even elevated. As the author of this post mentioned, it sometimes felt as though McCain and Obama were addressing other politicians instead of the average American. Simplification would have been more helpful for the viewers and would have been greatly appreciated.
I also was left quite disappointed and frustrated after watching the debate. I expected to hear a clearer outline of both candidates’ plans for the economic crisis and on the Iraq way, but instead both talked around the issues. I feel that both Obama and McCain focused on the past and whether or not they agreed with George Bush’s decision on going to war, and not actually what they would do once either of them becomes president. Also with the current economic crisis, they both agreed that some sort of plan needs to be issued to try and fix the situation, but I was left very confused on what their actually plans consisted of. It seemed like neither of them actually answered the question of whether or not they agreed with the current plan.
Another issue that left me frustrated was that Obama kept interrupting John McCain in the middle of his attacks/answers by saying “that’s simply not true John”. And although many times Obama was correct, this made me very disappointed in him because it made him seem quite childish and like he could not hold his composure.
Perhaps I am disappointed because as the Handbooks says, “The most disappointed viewers are those who claim their debate viewing is motivated by a need to achieve issue simplification or clarification in making their voting decision. These viewers often claim their exposure to debates raise additional questions and point to issue areas that need further explanation” (Kaid 206). I was seeking clarification on these issues but instead both candidates refused to directly answer mostly all of the questions asked.
Also to be completely honest, towards the middle of the debate I felt myself extremely bored and lost interest in what the candidates were saying. I felt that Obama and McCain were saying the same thing in different ways and were not really arguing or debating about substantial issues. And I thought that I would absolutely die if I heard “my friends” or “Main Street” versus “Wall Street” one more time.
As far as there being a “winner” in the debate, I don’t think that this is possible. It all depends what each individual is expecting from the debate and what values are most important to them. As far as being more charismatic, surprisingly I think that John McCain did a better job. He even tried to crack a joke about his age by saying, “Are you afraid I couldn’t hear him?” But other than that I think they were about equal in actually answering the questions.
Being one of those people who is completely on the fence about who I am voting for, I was really hoping that the debate would give me some sort of clarity as to who I want vote for. I was actually heavily depending on these debates, not only because I am an unsure of who I am voting for, but also because I want to hear what each candidate has to say about many of these important issues at hand. Kaid describes me in the Handbook when he says "Debates will have their greatest influence on highly interested, yet undecided, voters who might be classified as regular debate viewers (those who view an entire debate or series of debates) (210). However, this debate, unfortunately, did not have an influence on me. There were many points during the debate I was like "huh?" or "what are they talking about?" I felt like some answers to questions were being completely danced around, and I was really having a hard time following their responses and trying to figure out whether or not they answered the matter at hand. Therefore, I did not feel more informed. I guess I was a little let down because I was expecting more from them. I was very excited for this debate, but afterwards, I did not feel that I knew any more than I did prior to watching. Due to the fact that I am unsure, I was looking foward to the debate to help me in my decision, but this debate did not prove to be of much assistance. I hope the other debates are different!
Because I am still unsure about which candidate I am going to vote for I was looking forward to the debates because I was hoping to gain some more knowledge that will help me make my decision. But unfortunately that didn’t happen. I found myself getting bored by the debate. I also found unusual that it was on a Friday night, not just because as college students we like to go out on Friday nights, but a lot of people like to go out and unwind after a long week at work. “Pfau (2003) points out that debates may be the only televised political event capable of attracting the attention of the ‘marginally attentive’ citizen” (Kaid 204). I think that if they wanted to reach such a large audience they shouldn’t have held it on the weekend, because I don’t think that the debates made that much of an impact. I know, personally, I haven’t heard a lot about what was said at the debates but I have heard a lot of talk about the upcoming vice presidential debates. I think that the debates should be held at a time when everyone is around so people like me who are still trying to decide who to vote for. It’s important that these debates be informative to help people make decisions.
I will begin by saying that I too was just happy there was any debate at all last week, as I found it highly annoying that McCain was going to be a no-show. However, in my mind, this debate did not live up to the hype. It was everything that people who are uninformed, misinformed, or apathetic towards politics, hate about politics. In the Handbook of Political Communication Research, McKinney and Carlin say that “these staged-for-TV encounters between our major aspirants for the presidency are anything but “true” debates” (Kaid 219). I very much agree with this statement, as everything about the debates seemed phony to me, so yes, I was let down by it. Even as pro-Obama as I am, I was let down by some of his responses, because he seemed like just another politician, talking about things I wasn’t quite sure of and defending his stance (a.k.a., correcting John McCain every time he said something false).
As far as the issues of the debate are concerned, I came out knowing exactly what I did going in, that John McCain knows more about foreign policy, and Barack Obama knows more about the economy. That’s where I felt the debate really fell short. I wanted to see the opposite- McCain talking tough on the economy and Obama with a developed foreign policy initiative. Both candidates fell short on that as far as I’m concerned. Unfortunately I must also note that I was determined to not be influenced by the candidate’s image and focus only on the issues, it was clear how susceptible I was. I most certainly found myself at times “[privileging] one of the message components—issue or image—over the other” (Kaid 212), and most often it was image. What the candidates were saying did not inform me at times, simply because I was distracted by how they looked.
If political debates were going to become a key influence on how I would vote, the format needs to change. Longer response times and an on-site, unbiased fact checker would be more useful to me than Jim Lehrer. Getting a real sense of the issues and more importantly, where the candidates differ on them, would make the debates influential again, and less of the same.
According to Kaid, "Citizens feel strongly that debate discussion should reflect a public policy or agenda, focusing on campaign issues most relevant to the public instead of campaign strategy or matters relating to candidate character (p.220)." I believe that quote sums up what mostly everyone was looking to get out of the debate. In my opinion, I did not and that is why I was very disappointed. The debate left me feeling very frustrated. There was no point to even having a debate if it not one of the candidates was going to take a true stance on the issues. Just like Jillian, I am unsure who I am going to vote for. I thought in the beginning that I knew but now it is up in the air. I thought watching the debate would clarify the questions that I had. It was just the candidates dancing around the issues as usual. I wanted to feel more informed but I did not. This whole 2008 election has been a crazy one with both candidates flip-flopping and just trying to make each other look bad or themselves look better. I think everyone is tired of the games in this election and just wants to know the policies the candidates stand behind.
I think I was a little disappointed with the debate; just because I didn't really hear anything new.
The best part of a Presidential debate is that we get to see the candidates demonstrate their speaking skills. But let's be honest; we all know that both of the candidates have practiced or at least thought about their responses beforehand (though they were not exactly aware of what exactly was going to be said).
For me, the most interesting part of a Presidential debate is seeing how the candidate will present themselves. Since the infamous Nixon and Kennedy debate, I think most of America has tuned into the debates hoping to spot some kind of image flaw of the other candidate. THE IMAGE IS EVERYTHING PRESIDENCY textbook states that, "presidents have surrounded themselves with pollsters, political consultants, and other professionals whose job it is to portray them in the best possible light" (47). Because of this, I don't think America will ever see any major image problems with either of the candidates again.
Once I had seen the images, I found myself, not bored, but rather expectant. I did not hear anything that surprising or new that I have not heard before. I guess part of me was hoping for some kind of revelation.
All in all, I can honestly say that I was not disappointed in the whole debate, but rather in the fantasy debate that I had perhaps imagined in my head. The one wear shocking revelations were made and amazing propositions were stated for the future.
I had some of the same thought processes as you while watching the debate. There were quite a few times that I thought to myself, “ that statement is going to be SO played out by tomorrow”, or “ wow that must have been very rehearsed.” For me, it was also interesting trying to figure out what was rehearsed, what wasn’t in regards to how well the candidates were on their feet.
You are right, the buzz leading up to these debates was incredible! Especially with McCain attempting to postpone the debates to a later date due to the financial crisis (and the failing $700 billion bailout). But, it was on with the show – and what a show it was!
Admit tingly, this was the first debate I had watched in its entirety. It was oddly both what I expected, and what I could have never expected – all wrapped up into a nice package. My absolute favorite part of the debate was how all viewers were able to see the candidates sans their rose-colored PR people, and watch as they got frustrated, uncomfortable, and caught off guard – LIVE! It very much “leveled the playing field” for me, in the eyes of the candidates. And just like you, I tried to have an optimistic and open mind throughout the hour. I was at times, confused as I sought clarification of issues, and was not very well presented with what I so desired.
The Handbook states, “The most disappointed viewers are those who claim their debate viewing is motivated by a need to achieve issue simplification or clarification in making their voting decision.” (Kaid, 207) While I also wanted to see the candidates awkwardly on their toes, I felt this quote to be true. I did not turn the channel at the end feeling more prepared to vote, or more comfortable with the candidates stances on the issues at hand. In fact, I was rather disappointed and frustrated. I guess I will just have to continue to pay attention to the subjects discussed in class – and to the media coverage and other upcoming debates and forums. I have to say – the debate really did nothing for me, and was not what I expected.
I still anticipate the day, however, ( that I thought was going to happen last week!) where a candidate refuses to debate another. As stated in the text, “ The novelty, now, would be a presidential candidate refusing to debate his or her opponent.” ( Kaid, 203) Now there’s a debate I’d like to watch!
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