Debates!
Ok, so we’re going to try to be informed voters, so A. and I are actually going to watch all the debates, starting tonight.
Just to get started, here at the top 10 secrets they don’t want you to know about the debates.
(10.) They aren’t debates!
“A debate is a head-to-head, spontaneous, structured argument over the merits of an issue,” Rice says. “Under the ridiculous 32-page contract that reads like the rules for the Miss America Pageant, there will be no candidate-to-candidate questions, no rebuttal to your opponent’s points, no cross questions or cross answers, no rebuttals, no follow-up questions — that’s not a debate, that’s a news conference.”
Jay Rosen reports that more and more professional journalists are eschewing the spinmeisters and watching the debate from home.
