Vol. 86: For better debates

Fresh ideas for Trump, Harris, and the future

   When Richardson Dilworth ran for mayor of Philadelphia against Thacher Longstreth in 1955, the two candidates scheduled a dozen debates to be held in various parts of the city. As these debates moved from one neighborhood to another, they generated political enthusiasm among ordinary folks hungry for the sort of drama that only unpredictable conflict can provide— or they would have if Dilworth hadn’t backed out of the last six debates.

         Dilworth, the Democrat, was 57 at that point and already a local legend: the charismatic fighting district attorney and field general for Philadelphia’s civic reform movement, which barely a few years earlier had driven Philadelphia’s entrenched Republican machine from City Hall for the first time in the 20^th Century. Longstreth, his Republican rival, was 34 and a political neophyte who had spent his career in advertising. But unlike Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, those two Philadelphians shared an important common trait: Both belonged to the class of patrician male WASPs who had run the Western world since the English defeated the Spanish armada in 1588. Consequently, both men operated out of a shared set of manners and social obligations.

         The morning after Dilworth’s overwhelming victory, he magnanimously invited Longstreth to breakfast at the Racquet Club, a favorite retreat for Old Philadelphia gentlemen. Here, away from the prying eyes of journalists and TV cameras, they spent three hours shooting the breeze about the just-concluded campaign.

         Dilworth graciously confessed that he had underestimated Longstreth as a rival. “It surprised us that you were such a quick study,” Dilworth said, according to Longstreth’s memoirs. “We knew at the outset that you knew absolutely nothing about city government. It was quite obvious in our first few debates that I could eat you alive, because you were so ignorant and you didn’t understand debating techniques. But by the fifth or sixth debate, you’d become so formidable that my people told me, ‘Get out. This kid’s showing you up.’ So we canceled the last six.”

         Longstreth, eager to return the compliment, replied: “The thing that so impressed me about you was your unbelievable knowledge of city government…. You always had facts and figures to support everything you said…. Where did you get all those facts and figures?”

         “Oh, I made ’em up,” Dilworth said.

         Longstreth assumed Dilworth was joking. “Yeah, sure you did,” he replied.

         “No, I’m serious,” Dilworth insisted. “I’d hear you say something, and I wouldn’t know the first thing about the point you were discussing. But I’d know that you didn’t either— you were just using something that had been put in front of you and that you’d memorized. So, I’d refute it with figures that I’d make up and that seemed to have some relevance to what you’d already said. But there was no statistical data to back up any of that stuff.”

Nixon’s sweat glands

         That was then. This week Donald Trump and Kamala Harris will confront each other on the same stage for the first, and possibly only, time during the current presidential election campaign. A momentous occasion, or not? Two of Rottenberg’s Laws strike me as relevant.

          1. Everything in life is a test, and therefore should be welcomed. Hillary Clinton might have made a good president, but her two disorganized campaigns— against Obama in 2008 and Trump in 2016— suggest otherwise. By the same token, political debates offer an opportunity for candidates to hold each other accountable, and to demonstrate how they handle adversity. When Trump repeatedly interrupted Biden in 2020, an exasperated Biden sputtered, “Will you shut up, man?”— which made his point but also exposed his short fuse. By contrast, each time Mike Pence interrupted Kamala Harris during their debate in 2020, she coolly replied, “Mr. Vice President, I’m speaking.” When Pence’s interruptions persisted anyway, she replied: “If you don’t mind letting me finish, we can then have a conversation, OK?”

On the other hand, Gerald Ford in the ’76 debate referred to Communist Poland as a free country— not what he had intended. Michael Dukakis in ’88 botched his response to a gotcha question about how he’d react if his wife were raped and murdered. But the ability to think on one’s feet and deliver one-line zingers isn’t necessarily the best test of a candidate. It’s merely one of many tests that a campaign offers.

          2. In politics (and life), the right things often happen for the wrong reasons. Nixon in 1960 demonstrated a better grasp of the issues than John F. Kennedy, but JFK demonstrated better control of his sweat glands, which in a visual medium proved decisive. And ultimately, I would argue, JFK made a better president. At the Trump-Biden debate this past June, Trump did such an effective job of exposing Biden as old and confused that the Democrats replaced Biden with a younger candidate next to whom Trump himself now appears old and confused.

James Carville’s rule

          This month’s pre-debate jockeying largely focused on the use of microphones. Harris’s team wanted live mics throughout the debate, the better to amplify Trump’s inevitable interruptions as proof that he lacks self-control. The Trump campaign wanted the mics to be muted when a candidate isn’t speaking, the better to muffle Trump’s likely outbursts. This may be the first time in debate history that a candidate has sought to magnify a rival’s interruptions. (ABC, the host, agreed to do it Trump’s way.)

         Of course, an agenda of multiple debates— the way Dilworth and Longstreth did it in 1955, not to mention Lincoln and Douglas in 1858— would reduce the emphasis on any single debate. I’d like to see more debates, but also a variety of formats. We’ve already seen presidential debates held before a live audience or no audience at all. We’ve seen questions submitted by moderators or by audience members. This is all well and good, since there’s no single test of a superior candidate. I can think of two other formats I’d pay to watch:

1.   Instant fact-checking

James Carville, the veteran Democratic strategist, likes to tell his clients that one good joke is worth a hundred fact-checks. Maybe so: Very often what matters in a debate isn’t who’s right but how they field the questions. But today, thanks to computers, the Internet, and Google, we’re close to the ability to instantly fact-check everything that comes out of a politician’s mouth. So, suppose the debate hosts hired a few dozen fact-checkers armed with computers? And suppose every time a candidate uttered a verifiable falsehood, a buzzer or a gong sounded? Better still, suppose a water bucket were placed over both candidates’ heads, so as to douse the erring candidate every time he told a whopper? Wouldn’t that sight be worth more than one good joke? Might it not create a whole new audience of couch potatoes and sports fans who suddenly become passionate about facts and issues?

2.   No moderators, no format

         Just once during each campaign, place the two candidates on an empty stage. While the cameras are running, let them spend 90 minutes working out the rules and conditions of their debate by themselves. If one candidate wants live mics throughout the session and the other one doesn’t— well, how will they work that out before their audience drifts away? It’s the ultimate test of candidates’ ability to deal with the unexpected— which is often what holding public office is all about.

         This idea first occurred to me during the 1999 Philadelphia mayoral election, when I attended a debate between the candidates, Democrat John Street and Republican Sam Katz. A three-person panel had been chosen to pose questions and enforce time limits. Just before the debate began, I noticed to my astonishment that the two candidates were conferring not with their respective advisors but with each other. I remember thinking, “I’d like to hear what these guys are telling each other now, instead of listening to their pre-packaged answers to pre-packaged questions. Why not get the moderators out of the way and let these guys do their thing?”

         Sounds impractical? Not if you were ever a kid playing choose-up baseball, basketball, or touch football games in a city park, as I once did in New York. In the absence of referees, we kids worked out our own rules and respected each other’s judgment, because there was no alternative. If a basketball player thought he was fouled, he called it himself and the defender accepted his call. In baseball games, lacking an umpire to call balls and strikes, pitchers simply threw pitches until a batter swung at a pitch he liked. I remember furious arguments over whether a base runner was safe or out, but both sides had to reach some agreement if we wanted to continue playing.

Sneaking through bushes

         I especially recall one such argument because I was in the middle of it. In the summer of ’58, when I was 16, I played in a choose-up baseball game in Central Park involving 18 guys who were all strangers to each other. The first time I came to bat, I swung at the very first pitch and barely nicked the ball, which hit home plate and then slowly trickled out toward the pitcher’s mound, allowing me to reach first base safely. The fielding team claimed that my single should be ruled a foul strike because the ball had initially hit home plate. This was a ridiculous theory— home plate is in fair territory, after all— but I settled the squabble by telling my teammates, “Call it a foul ball. I’d like another chance to hit this pitching.” On the very next pitch, I hit a home run.

         To be sure, in a world without referees there were always some wise guys who tried to game the system. I remember a touch football game in Riverside Park where a rival player excused himself to pee in the bushes along the sidelines while the game continued; but instead of relieving himself there, he sneaked unseen through the bushes to emerge a minute later in our end zone, where he caught a touchdown pass with no defender anywhere near him. Players on both teams admired his ingenuity, but both sides ultimately agreed to nullify the touchdown.

         Could Harris and Trump do better? If either wants to be president, is the challenge of managing each other too much to ask? Just once in a campaign, let’s have trial by combat, where the only weapons are words and tact.

         “Politicians are like prize fighters,” the former Philadelphia mayor Bill Green remarked to me ten years ago, before Trump came on the political scene. “In the ring, they try to bash each other’s brains out. But after the final bell, they regard each other with respect and admiration, and sometimes even affection.” It’s nice to imagine Harris and Trump shooting the breeze together after November 5, the way Dilworth and Longstreth once did. But of course, Trump is no politician. Fasten your seat belt.

Enjoy Dan Rottenberg’s newest book, The Price We Paid: An Oral History of Penn’s Struggle to Join the Ivy League, 1950-55. You can also visit his website at www.danrottenberg.com