The Republican National Committee sent a letter today to NBC in which it states that it will no longer hold a presidential debate on the network in February of 2016. CNBC, which held the third debate, is, of course, part of NBC. The chair of the RNC said in the letter that absent some sort of assurances of proper behavior by the moderators, there is no way that the RNC could return to an NBC network for the February debate.
The reactions to the news have been quite humorous. The far left is going crazy pointing out that the Republicans just can't put up with serious questions about their policies and the facts on which those policies are based. That leads to one of two conclusions: either the people making these statements did not see any of the debate or, like their leader Hillary Clinton, they don't care about sticking to the truth. The CNBC debate moderators were nasty, smug, intrusive, and bent on doing anything they could to disrupt and demean the candidates. There were no hard fact based questions. Instead, there were questions like the one when John Kasich was asked something that went like this: "The other day, you had some rather harsh and nasty things to say about two other candidates. Could you repeat that now here to their faces?" There are no fact, no policies, and no real content in that question. There is only the hope that Kasich would take the bait an insult his rivals for the nomination.
There are also people from the left who are pointing out how NBC will now be able to avoid having two plus hours of lost revenue because there are no commercials during the debates. I am not making this up. With these people we know for certain that they did not watch any of the debates or even read about them. The ratings for the GOP debates have been sky high, and there are indeed commercial breaks. Losing the debate in February will cost NBC about $2.5 million in lost profits because they will be stuck with their usually low rated shows in place of the debate blockbuster.
Then there are people on the right who are upset that the RNC did not cancel all the debates. That is also idiotic. The debates allow literally tens of millions of Americans to see what the candidates have to say. It is the best way for these candidates to get their message to voters without having to filter it through biased media reports. Sure, there are bad questions at some of the debates, but they are nothing like the CNBC debate usually. And even at the CNBC debate, voters got to see candidates like Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Chris Christie demolish the moderators and their smug and nasty questions.
The real question moving forward is what will replace the NBC debate. I suggest that we have a two hour debate split into four parts. In each half hour, fifteen minutes will be split equally among all candidates to discuss an issue like jobs and the economy. The remainder of the time will also be split equally among the candidates to reply to the others or to amplify their own remarks. The moderators will be limited to announcing the topic under discussion and minding the time limits for each candidate. It will be easy enough for American voters to see who is sticking just to talking points and who is actually discussing the issue in detail.
The reactions to the news have been quite humorous. The far left is going crazy pointing out that the Republicans just can't put up with serious questions about their policies and the facts on which those policies are based. That leads to one of two conclusions: either the people making these statements did not see any of the debate or, like their leader Hillary Clinton, they don't care about sticking to the truth. The CNBC debate moderators were nasty, smug, intrusive, and bent on doing anything they could to disrupt and demean the candidates. There were no hard fact based questions. Instead, there were questions like the one when John Kasich was asked something that went like this: "The other day, you had some rather harsh and nasty things to say about two other candidates. Could you repeat that now here to their faces?" There are no fact, no policies, and no real content in that question. There is only the hope that Kasich would take the bait an insult his rivals for the nomination.
There are also people from the left who are pointing out how NBC will now be able to avoid having two plus hours of lost revenue because there are no commercials during the debates. I am not making this up. With these people we know for certain that they did not watch any of the debates or even read about them. The ratings for the GOP debates have been sky high, and there are indeed commercial breaks. Losing the debate in February will cost NBC about $2.5 million in lost profits because they will be stuck with their usually low rated shows in place of the debate blockbuster.
Then there are people on the right who are upset that the RNC did not cancel all the debates. That is also idiotic. The debates allow literally tens of millions of Americans to see what the candidates have to say. It is the best way for these candidates to get their message to voters without having to filter it through biased media reports. Sure, there are bad questions at some of the debates, but they are nothing like the CNBC debate usually. And even at the CNBC debate, voters got to see candidates like Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Chris Christie demolish the moderators and their smug and nasty questions.
The real question moving forward is what will replace the NBC debate. I suggest that we have a two hour debate split into four parts. In each half hour, fifteen minutes will be split equally among all candidates to discuss an issue like jobs and the economy. The remainder of the time will also be split equally among the candidates to reply to the others or to amplify their own remarks. The moderators will be limited to announcing the topic under discussion and minding the time limits for each candidate. It will be easy enough for American voters to see who is sticking just to talking points and who is actually discussing the issue in detail.
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