I’m not really concerned about the dictionary definition of moderator. What I’m interested in is debates which actually fulfill their purpose of helping voters make up their minds about candidates.
I think the crux of the question is really what role should moderators have when candidates’ positions are actively contradicted by basic reality. You seem to be suggesting their role should be ‘none’, but I don’t agree. I want moderators to help voters understand the candidate/reality disconnect when it’s there.
Sure, of course. Until voters demonstrate they care that candidates are lying to them, candidates will continue to lie. Journalists should still point out when this is happening.
Just wondering, did they give Carly a choice between Ms. and Mrs? “Mrs. Fiorina” grated my nerves every time I heard it.
I was amused at all the intense anti-government rhetoric, especially since most of the candidates are career politicians. It seemed kind of like going to church and hearing the preacher ranting about how much God sucks and he isn’t real anyway and we are fools to believe.
And, I admit my attention was wavering, but was it Huckabee whose great health care reform plan involved curing cancer?
Lastly, there were lots of statistics bandied around about how much the economy had tanked since “the day Barack Obama was elected”. I noticed they didn’t say “took office” and I figured that was because the economy was in free fall (due to being driven of the cliff by Republicans) during the 10 weeks or so between the election and inauguration.
But there’s a difference between flawed ideas, and ideas that are batshit insane. And AFAIAC, it’s anyone’s and everyone’s job to point out the latter.
YMMV, and clearly does.
This was a trap?? Sounded to me like he was just checking to make sure Trump hadn’t changed his mind on any of that batshit stuff.
Also, when you don’t like the question or don’t have a good answer - the fallback is to attack the question and the person asking it (media). This has been going on forever.
The clowns at CNBC certainly earned the shitstorm they created for themselves. It will be interesting to see if/when any of these “alleged” moderators are replaced at their regular CNBC jobs.
After watching that, I’m really questioning whether Jeb even really wants to be president.
Also, at this point, it’s clear the truth just doesn’t matter in the Republican primary. It’s one thing when you can stretch the truth a bit and count on the viewer not following up with a fact check. Now it’s to the point where they can flat out out lie, get called on it right there in the same program, and it doesn’t hurt them at all. Ben Carson called himself out! He said he had “no involvement” with Mannatech and in the same breath said he did paid speeches for them. Then he actually endorsed their product in his response. The audience’s response was to boo the moderator for suggesting that involvement with snake oil dealers might speak to his judgement.
Yes, the moderator should have had a cite about the visas ready from Trump’s website, but I doubt it would have made any difference. The audience would have probably booed her for playing a “gotcha”.
I think you and BobLibDem both have a point. The statements that Harwood was quoting were all things that Trump has said repeatedly, to the point that they are essentially themes of his campaign. I do think that then leading into the question “Is this a comic book version of a presidential campaign?” was unnecessarily hostile, but it’s only the wording and not the substance of the question that was, arguably, problematic.
What if Harwood had itemized those same quotes and then asked something like, “Did you mean those statements seriously? Can you explain why voters should take them seriously?”. Would that have been acceptable? If so, was there really much of a substantive difference?
When the “alleged” moderator Harwood’s leadoff question is asking if a candidate’s campaign is a comic book campaign, asshole Harwood is attacking the candidate. Nobody cares what Harwood’s opinion is. Nobody attended, or tuned in, to hear Harwood say anything. Real moderators are supposed to be impartial.
CNBC ended up looking like a 3rd-rate circus, and their moderators acted like 4th-rate, extremely biased, clowns. I wonder when CNBC will again be allowed to host a debate?
Can someone point to a crazier political debate involving actual politicians? One that doesn’t take place in America.
I’m envisioning some post-colonial developing democracy where the literacy rate is like 20% and they’re talking about the scourge of witches and evil spirits, or how condoms cause AIDS. But they might believe in evolution and worker rights, so it’s a balance.
Yes, it was in response to the moderator prodding him to say something negative about Trump, so he basically refused to play that game.
They went back to it later, and she cited his website, but he just answered a different question and moved on.
What’s really messed up is in this debate, he said he approved of bringing in foreign workers under whatever you want to call it, “visas” or “work permits”. But in the cited article he’s arguing against increasing these permits. Somehow that got glossed over.
Rubio picked up the ball and said increase the permits, but first require the jobs be offerred in the USA for 120 days and that the salary has to be higher for the foreigners and that if any company abuses the policy they be barred from using it again.
Wait, doesn’t that mean more government overseers and inspectors and whatnot? Big government?
He picked an inopportune time to make a very valid point. He used up all his allotted time and more to point out the poor behavior of the moderators, and then argued he should have more time to answer the actual question because… liberals.
I think his criticism was valid to a degree. The problem is he just got asked a substantive policy question, what he was arguing they should be asking, and he didn’t answer it. So that kinda undercuts his point a bit.
Yeah, he denied involvement, admitted giving paid speeches to them, and endorsed their product.
Yes, she should have had that cite at hand. Later she did return with it from his own website, but the impact was less.
But this debate he said he supported it.
While I appreciate the simplicity of the set up and then the stinger, I think it could have been phrased less attack. He could have said, “Do you think the American people take these positions seriously?” or “Do you think you can win the general election advocating these positions?” or even call for some specific.
Yeah, but when Carson Daly tried it at the Town Hall, he just pushed it off by saying he could get into specifics but then wasted all his time with his “Bing bing bing” nonsense.
She actually said that.
Why? She is married.
His plan to save Medicare is to cure cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and alzheimers.
Now it’s true that chronic illness, especially those related to aging, are the biggest medical costs. But it’s not like we’re sitting around “Oh, we should try to cure these diseases!” Tons of money is going to research to cure all of these. We could throw the entire Medicare budget for the next 5 years at them and we can’t guarantee any results. In the meantime, we have a bunch of people who are sick and needing financial assistance to pay for their medical care.
Ridiculous!
They want to be elected President so they can eliminate the position.
All this fucking crying about how the CNBC moderators didn’t suck up to the candidates is ridiculous. CNBC is, more or less, a channel that does not support Republicans. Any of the Republican candidates that were not prepared to answer barbed questions are complete idiots.
I’ll add that I’m sick and tired of the attitude that moderators of a presidential debate are supposed to be “impartial”, which as best I can tell from the posts in this thread, means “lob softballs”. I want the moderators to ask serious questions in the hope of getting serious answers. It appears that only the latter part of the equation did not happen last evening.
Because it is outdated to use an honorific that codes a woman’s marital status when we have a widely accepted alternative. Her husband, or lack thereof, is totally irrelevant to her presence in the debates, even more so than her imaginary qualifications. She should be Ms. Fiorina, unless she has stated a preference for Mrs.
If elected president, this CNBC moderation would be a doddle compared to what they would face as President. Gonna act like a whiny child and complain about the questions then?
This post mischaracterizes criticism of the moderators and illustrates a gross misunderstanding of what a debate is supposed to be. A debate is not an interview. If you don’t know why moderators are supposed to be neutral, maybe do some research.
The Commission for Presidential Debates says:
“Above all, choose a moderator or panelists whom you and the debate participants trust to be professional and fair.”
The CNBC team is pretty much getting universally lambasted. Even some pretty liberal commentators thought Ted Cruz was right.
