About Those Obama/McCain Debates

The Commission on Presidential Debates has announced the schedule and formats for the Presidential and Vice Presidential debates, which gives me the opportunity to address several issues surrounding the topic of the debates.

There will be 3 Presidential debates and 1 Vice presidential debate, as follows:

First presidential debate: Friday, September 26 at The University of Mississippi, Oxford, Miss. Moderator: Jim Lehrer, Executive Editor and Anchor, The NewsHour, PBS

Vice presidential debate: Thursday, October 2 at Washington University in St. Louis, Mo.
Moderator: Gwen Ifill Senior Correspondent, The NewsHour, and Moderator and Managing Editor, Washington Week, PBS

Second presidential debate (town meeting): Tuesday, October 7 at Belmont University, Nashville, Tenn.
Moderator: Tom Brokaw, Special Correspondent, NBC News

Third presidential debate: Wednesday, October 15 at Hofstra University, Hempstead, N.Y.
Moderator: Bob Schieffer, CBS News Chief Washington Correspondent, and Host, Face the Nation

Each debate will begin at 9:00 p.m. EST.

Several things spring immediately to mind. What happened to ABC News? Who's going to win? And what was up with Barack Obama turning down McCain's invitation to 10 pre-convention town hall debates?



First things first. There has been no explicit reason given for the omission of ABC News from this round of debates, but their travesty of a performance in the last Democratic Primary debate, during which they used smears for question fodder, makes their exclusion a welcome non-surprise.

Next, I'd like to tackle the question of those town hall meetings. In June, John McCain "invited" Barack Obama to join him in the loosey-goosey affairs, one per week until the convention. It was an idea that Obama had expressed interest in before. His initial reaction was tentatively positive.

Obama made a counter-offer of one such meeting, with a longer format. McCain made some hay out of it, painting Obama as running from debates.

Given Obama's expressions of support for the idea, it's fair for him to take some kind of hit for this. Without knowing the ins and outs of the negotiations, it is difficult to completely assess the merits of the decision.

However, at worst, it was a smart political calculation on Obama's part, and a nifty bit of maneuvering by McCain. Obama's decision to forgo the string of pows-wow was doubtless heavily influenced by a desire not to give his out-funded opponent 15 hours of free TV time.

Also, regardless of Obama's confidence level, it would be foolish for a frontrunner to risk ABC-style curveballs for 10 weeks. In that format, over that span of time, the questions could easily have overshadowed the answers, as they did on ABC.

Having said that, the debates themselves could be a real game-changer in this election, and the pitfalls for Obama are numerous. McCain is positioned well as the underdog in the debates, further raising the bar for Obama.

Here's a brief overview of the format for the first, third, and VP debates:

Each of those debates will be divided into 8 ten-minute issue segments; the moderator will introduce each segment with an issue on which each candidate will comment, after which the moderator will facilitate further discussion of the issue, including direct exchange between the candidates, for the balance of that segment. Time will be reserved for closing statements by each of the candidates in each debate.

The first debate will be on domestic policy. This area favors Obama, as he leads McCain overwhelmingly on most domestic issues. The format will work in his favor here, as Jim Lehrer is likely to keep the discussion substantive. McCain's only real chance is in direct exchanges with Obama. Unless McCain can land a knockout, like the one Ron Paul laid him out with at the Reagan Library, this should be an Obama route.

A big win in the first debate could also give Obama an out-sized bounce, as the first such contest will be intensely covered and exhaustively analyzed.

The third, and final, debate is on foreign policy. McCain is the current favorite here, as foreign policy is McCain's perceived strength. Obama will benefit from lowered expectations, but he really needs to score big against McCain here. It won't help him much if McCain stumbles, because he seems to get a pass from the press on foreign policy gaffes. Obama really has to shine, and he needs to be ready for McCain to come at him 6 ways on "the Surge." He needs to put his policy papers onto bumper stickers for this one.

McCain's challenge on foreign policy will be explaining his continued support for invading Iraq in the first place. Whichever candidate can land the best punches on Iraq might take the whole thing.

Winning the third debate will be a huge advantage if the polls are still close, but anything short of a blowout will do little for a badly trailing candidate.

The second debate is a bit of a wild card. The format for the town hall is as follows:

The participants in the town meeting will pose their questions to the candidates after reviewing their questions with the moderator for the sole purpose of avoiding duplication. The participants will be chosen by the Gallup Organization and will be undecided voters from the Nashville, Tenn. standard metropolitan statistical area. During the town meeting, the moderator has discretion to use questions submitted by Internet.

Barack Obama is very strong in this kind of setting, and has demonstrated the ability to graciously handle a bad hop. McCain is more of a mixed bag, having been thrown badly off his game by friend and foe in this setting. The questions could be a pitfall for Obama, as the ABC debate showed. If he is asked a string of loaded questions about Reverend Wright, or other such nonsense, the questions will echo more loudly than even the best responses.

On the other hand, Obama will have a chance to debunk some of the less accurate knocks on him. If he is asked about so-called flip-flops, or to provide detail on his policy positions, I would expect deft handling.

McCain should be pretty safe in this format, as the deficit in news coverage will work to his advantage. Voters' skin-deep knowledge of McCain could shield him from any real probing on his major weaknesses.

The biggest worry for McCain will be if the audience decides to pile on the questions on the economy, or are really well-versed on energy policy.

Overall, I think that if you look at the primary debates, these debates should be a route for Obama. He held his own against Hillary Clinton, as worthy an opponent as you could hope for. McCain, on the other hand, struggled to distinguish himself from a lineup of clowns, and was routinely owned by so-called "lower tier" candidate Ron Paul. McCain should be studying those tapes now.

As for the Vice-Presidential debates, Hillary Clinton will pull Mitt Romney's sweater up over his head and take his milk money.