Bill Dog's Journal: exactly why the debate sucked

I couldn't put my finger on it until now. I watched the varsity one live that evening, and then later that night the JV one that I had recorded while at work.

My thoughts 2/3rds into the varsity one were:
* Am I watching MSNBC?
* I'm not getting useful information.

I thought FNC was supposed to be a pro-Republican network. They seemed like all gotcha questions, having not thought much about it by then. Apparently the FNC "personalities" at least were all gushing in the days prior and following, thumping themselves on the back about what a fabulous job they did, and how carefully they came up with these perfected questions, and if we only knew how much went into it. And apparently the rest of the news media were ecstatic at the job FNC did. Now I know why.

And why I learned very little:

1) Part of it is that there were so many candidates, even with over 3 hours of time. That meant very limited time for each anyways. But the aggravating things are:
a) The candidates were limited to 30-second "answers", which is not enough time to explain anything, with any substance.
b) The moderators were not limited, and by far did more talking than any of the candidates.

Someone from another network kept track of candidate speaking time:

FINAL Talk Times:
1 Trump 10:30
2 Bush 8:33
3 Huck 6:32
4 Carsn/Crz 6:28
6 Kasch 6:25
7 Rubio 6:22
8 Chrste 6:03
9 Walkr 5:43
10 Paul 4:51

This totals just under 68 minutes of time. The show was 130 minutes long. With limited commercial breaks (thankfully). I found a report that the avg ad time per hour on cable for 2013 was 15 minutes and 38 seconds (up from 14 minutes and 27 seconds per hour in 2009). Let's say in the last two years it grew at double that rate, to 18:12 per hour, which would be almost 40 minutes in a 130 minute timespan.

So, approximately, the moderators yapped for 130 - 68 - 40 = 22 minutes of the time. While it definitely felt like much longer, from watching it, that's still more than twice the time for the candidate who got the most time amongst the candidates, and either way it still means that there was only 52% candidate content in the program.

But it's not even that, because:
i) At the time limits per answer they were only soundbite-quality, and
ii) They didn't originate with what the candidates thought was important to convey (i.e. some of their time was wasted in their having to segue).

So this afternoon I saw a re-capped clip of one question from the debate, and hit me why exactly I learned very little, aside from the math on the time. They're weren't "tough questions" (like posing to each, how do we keep Iran from getting the bomb), or really even "gotcha questions" (designed to catch you unaware of the trick in the question, to get you to screw up), what they were were "negative spin". I.e. as misrepresenting of things as possible, customized for each candidate's circumstances.

That's why I learned basically nothing from the 3+ hours. Of course the candidates are going to try to misrepresent their weaknesses, spun positively. The way around that is for the moderators to stick on a candidate after their answer and grill them, not let it stand and move on to someone else, like Fox did.

So I got misrepresentation in the answers, and also (maybe even more) in the questions. And that's why the Left thought FNC did such a knock-up job this time. Because it's what they would've done.

But if FNC was really a network for Republicans, they would've picked topics important to Republicans, and sought to bring out the differences between the candidates on them, to inform. Instead we got crap about things like Trump's bankrupties. That'll all come out in the campaign, with all other news orgs being solid Left. My problem is that FNC now talks about income inequality and racist police etc. So their (news division) being moderate Left, is that what is defined as catering to Republicans nowadays? I fear maybe it is.

Well

[smittyoneeach]

I think your points are valid. In particular, Walker seemed to have crosshairs on him every time they went to him.
OTOH, I don't see how it was supposed to be any better, given time & resources.

Re:

[Bill Dog]

I guess that just means you favor Walker. I thought Trump got the worst of it, but I'm a Trumpster this election (so far).

As I said in my JE, it could've been a lot better if the moderators didn't make it about FNC and the spectacle of it all, and long questions weaving the worst possible misrepresentation of the situation for that particular candidate to try to "answer". And if they asked the same questions of each candidate, instead of making it personal for each them.

Re:

[smittyoneeach]

I'd only vote Trump as a heckler veto of JEB.
While I don't mind offering respect for Trump's business acumen, I'd rate him as "only slightly better than BHO" in terms of actual leadership capacity.
Let me back that up. Per the Stockdale Model, a leader is five things: moralist, jurist, philosopher, steward, and teacher.
Trump is on the low end of the GOP field in pretty much all those areas.

Re:

[Bill Dog]

I'd rate him as "only slightly better than BHO" in terms of actual leadership capacity.

You have an amazing capacity to be godawful wrong. Trump built a business empire, and is the definition of success in America. BHO's accomplishments number in the single digits, in binary; he hornswoggled the dumbass American people into letting the Left put us on a path to socialized medicine. That's it. That's all he's accomplished as a leader. "Only slightly better" is asinine.

Per the Stockdale Model,

I couldn't find a hit on Google for this that wasn't an external file type, so I didn't look it up, but will say that if you

Re:

[smittyoneeach]

I'm willing to cast a ballot for Trump in the case of a JEB nomination, but that's about it. He's a bull, a lout, and a discredit to the concept of "gentleman".

Re:

[Bill Dog]

So what "gentlemen" have got us is eighteen trillion in debt, and merely managing the decline of the country, and you want more of that?

A talking head on the idiot box last weekend noted that Trump raises issues others are afraid to. It occurred to me at that moment that that is what my definintion of leadership is.

p.s. On my previous post in this thread, s/Trump or Carly/Trump or Carly or Carson/, of course, since Dr. Carson is not of the political class as well.

Surprised?

[chill]

Why is this a surprise? It is *exactly* what Fox has always done, except they normally limit it to the Democrats. When have they ever done anything else other than spin things in the worst possible way for whomever their target is? They are in it to make their audience be able to feel smugly superior, without anyone having to actually have any critical thinking skills.

They are a partisan hack network, it is just the side they chose is the side of money. They have no loyalty to Republicans. But if you want t

Re:

[Bill Dog]

This wasn't a debate, it was aTV contest for best zinger sound bite.

Well you're absolutely right about that, and I probably haven't been looking at FNC with as critical of an eye as you have. (Frankly, they advertise so much, it's hard to catch any programming on that network, when I'm flipping around waiting for the ads on something else to finish.)

I heard something on the radio on the way home today that pins this debate down for me even more: The moderators aren't supposed to debate the candidates, they're just supposed to ask the questions and let the candidates debate

Re: Surprised?

[chill]

I've given up on TV news. They are all biased, pandering to the least common denominator and devoid of anything that resembles journalism.

I know what you mean about the commercials. I sometimes try to listen on Sirius/XM which just seems to be a rebroadcast of the TV channels and all I end up doing is channel surfing trying to find content and not advertisement.

I usually end up on Bloomberg or CNBC for a few minutes before going back to a music channel. Maybe BBC World if they are on a news segment.