Debate Performance I: A Report Card Checklist

How they do depends on eight factors

Entering into the final stretch of the 2012 Presidential Campaign, the debates are upon us.  Debates are common place in State and Federal elections at all levels.  Presidential Campaign Debates are an opportunity to see well-funded and well-prepared candidates bring on their A game in the most watched political debates of the year.  

The value of the debates derive from the format.  Two candidates meet in an unscripted, uncontrolled environment without tele-prompters, notes, or back up.  The debates often provide an insight into the candidate's temperament under pressure.  In truth we elect a candidate less because of their positions on past issues, but rather their character to handle unforeseen future issues.

Exploit your Opponents Gaffes Part II:
Turn them into Fund Raising Opportunities
Updated 8/24/2012 9:51AM (See below)

Barely twelve hours had passed after GOP Missouri US Senate Candidate Todd Akins swerved into a political maelstrom with his "legitimate rape" comment, when Debbie Wasserman Shultz, the Democratic National Committee and Florida House Representative sent out emails to party faithful encouraging donations.

During a Sunday Morning show, The Jaco Report, on the Fox Station in Saint Louis, Candidate Akins was asked the predictable hard-facts-make-bad-law question about abortion in the event of rape.  It is a question asked of every Pro-Life candidate and should, according to Ann Coulter, be expect.  Rather than giving defensible prepared answers, Akins went completely off-script:

“From what I understand from doctors, that’s really rare,” Akin said. “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. But let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work or something, I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be of the rapist, and not attacking the child.”

Within twelve hours, the Democratic Party turned the gaffe into a fundraising opportunity.  Rep. Wasserman Shultz wrote:

In a year that has brought us no shortage of stunningly backward statements from Republicans on issues affecting women's health, the GOP Senate nominee from Missouri may have just taken the cake.

This morning, Rep. Todd Akin, explaining his opposition to abortion even in cases of rape, said that victims of "legitimate rape" don't get pregnant because "the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down."

What exactly, Rep. Akin, is an "illegitimate" rape? And what are these unnamed "ways" women have of avoiding pregnancy after being (legitimately) raped?

Now, Akin's choice of words isn't the real issue here. The real issue is a Republican party -- led by Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan -- whose policies on women and their health are dangerously wrong.

The email then invites recipients to donate to the Democratic Party.

Romney immediately disavowed Akins' statement, “Congressman’s Akin comments on rape are insulting, inexcusable, and, frankly, wrong.   Like millions of other Americans, we found them to be offensive.”

Akins for his part sought to quell the furor over his remarks, "This weekend I made a mistake. I used the wrong words in the wrong way. What I said was ill-conceived and it was wrong and for that I apologize. I’m a dad of two daughters and I want tough justice for sexual predators and I’ve always had a compassionate heart for the victims of sexual assault. 

The people from Missouri that elected me know I’m not perfect. We all make mistakes. When you make a mistake what you need to do is tell people you’re sorry. Don’t try and hide it. That’s why I have repeatedly said that I am very sorry for my comments.  Just because somebody makes a mistake doesn’t make them useless. We need a conservative in the United States Senate, and I am running to replace Claire McCaskill and get our country back on track.”

Unfortunately for Akins, what President Ronald Reagan said to Walter Mondale during the 1984 debate, in politics "if you are explaining; you are losing."

Akins' opponent, vulnerable US Senator Claire McCaskill, has also seized upon the gaffe seeking to raise money on the issue.  "Akin's record is riddled with policies and votes that hurt women. He thinks many forms of contraception — including the pill — should be illegal and voted against equal pay for equal work.  Together, we can make sure that Missouri has a Senator who has a proven track record of fighting for women."

A good gaffe, as discussed earlier, should further a perceived negative stereotype of the politician.  Here, an ardently pro-life Republican is painted as ignorant and hostile toward women.  This particular gaffe is so critical, in a swing state they may determine the balance of power in the Senate as well as Missouri's Electoral Votes, that Conservative leaders and pundits have called on Akins to withdraw so that another conservative candidate can face McCaskill.  

Negative Campaigning I: It's Nothing New
Yet, we will be told it's the worse mud slinging ever

Vice President Joe Biden lurched into all-too-familiar gaffe-territory when he went off the teleprompter and told the mostly African American Audience in Danville, Virginia, "[Romney] said in the first 100 days, he's going to let the big banks once again write their own rules. Unchain Wall Street. They're going to put y'all back in chains."  Later in his speech, Biden assured the Virginia crowd, " "With you, and I mean this, with you we can win North Carolina again."

The Romney campaign responded quickly, pulling out what appears to be well-honed theme, "[Obama's] campaign and his surrogates have made wild and reckless accusations that disgrace the office of the presidency," Romney said. "Another outrageous charge came a few hours ago in Virginia, and the White House sinks a bit lower. This is what an angry and desperate presidency looks like."

Along with kissing babies, campaign rallies, and unrealistic promises, we are assured that the media and casual observers will decry how the political discourse has sunk to a new level of mud slinging.  Don't believe it for a moment, contested presidential political campaigns have always gone negative.

Political Historian Joseph Cummins, the author of "Anything for a Vote" said, "After researching every presidential contest from 1789 to 2004, my answer is that elections are not getting dirtier. They’re just as dirty as they have always been. " 

Cummins provides the following examples:

• 1836: Congressman Davy Crockett accuses candidate Martin Van Buren of secretly wearing women’s clothing: “He is laced up in corsets!”
• 1864: Presidential candidate George McClellan describes his opponent, Abraham Lincoln, as “nothing more than a well-meaning baboon!”
• 1960: Former president Harry Truman advises voters that “if you vote for Richard Nixon, you ought to go to hell!”

The 1828 Election between John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson descended into baseless charges, such as:

• John Quincy Adams was a pimp to the Czar of Russia; and
• Andrew Jackson was engaged in adultery.

1964 - Lyndon B. Johnson claimed challenger Barry Goldwater would start a nuclear war sending the world into "darkness" in the infamous Daisy Attack Ad.

The Presidential Election of 1800 was the first hotly contested race pitting John Adams against Thomas Jefferson.  At the time candidates campaigned through surrogates.  The campaign got ugly quick.  Jefferson had others claim that Adams had a "hideous hermaphoditical character, which has neither the force nor firmness of a man."  Adams' supporters called Jefferson "mean spirited, low lived fellow, the son of half-breed Indian squaw, sired by a Virginia mulatto father."

Anyone who tells you that political campaigns have grown too negative as if in earlier years we had a more elevated discourse about the issues, simply is ignorant of history and has a short memory.  So long as negative campaigning works (and it does) - we will have it.

QUESTION:  I believe that this is a problem that does not have a real solution.  Do you agree? If not why not?

Political Marketing:  Tell a Story
Voters Connect with Stories not Policies
But a good story doesn't change bad outcomes

Photo: AP

President Obama came under fire this past week when he identified his inability to "tell a story" as the biggest mistake of his Presidency.  The President said, "When I think about what we’ve done well and what we haven’t done well, the mistake of my first term – couple of years – was thinking that this job was just about getting the policy right. And that’s important. But the nature of this office is also to tell a story to the American people that gives them a sense of unity and purpose and optimism, especially during tough times.  It’s funny – when I ran, everybody said, well he can give a good speech but can he actually manage the job? And in my first two years, I think the notion was, ‘Well, he’s been juggling and managing a lot of stuff, but where’s the story that tells us where he’s going?’ And I think that was a legitimate criticism."


The reaction diverged along the partisan divide.   


Mitt Romney reacted, “President Obama believes that millions of Americans have lost their homes, their jobs and their livelihood because he failed to tell a good story. Being president is not about telling stories. Being president is about leading, and President Obama has failed to lead. No wonder Americans are losing faith in his presidency.”


Arianna Huffington defended Obama arguing that "telling stories, casting a narrative, is an essential element in communicating ideas and values, and an integral part of leading -- especially leading from the Oval Office."

Famed litigator Russ Herman teaches trial lawyers that "when you stand before a jury, you will tell a story. Every trial lawyer tells a story — with characters and themes and plots. Whether the story is one of murder and intrigue, of commercial disruption, or of a breach of contract, the elements of the story remain. It is, then, the art of the storyteller that determines if the jury “gets it.”"


The best stories, whether in politics or in the court room is when the listener gets to play a part as the hero.  Here, the Politician says, is the evil in our land, and here is your struggle, and together we can beat it.

Ronald Reagan, quoting from John Winthrop's 1630 Sermon, talked about America being the shining City on the Hill.  When he ran for re-election Reagan's story was that it was Morning Again in America.  Reagan was the Great Communicator simply because he could tell a story.  It helped immensely that by 1984 the economy was doing much better. Reagan wove his story into the fabric of American lore, inviting us not be as we are, but rather as we would like to see ourselves become.

Bill Clinton was a masterful story teller simply because his stories were also about us.  Yes, he was the man from Hope - a wonderful blend upon his personal history and campaign theme.  However Clinton's greatest stories were about average Americans struggling with problems that his policies claimed to help.  While Clinton's detractors mocked his  "I feel your pain," he understood the importance of stories.  He wrote, "Perhaps most important, I learned that everyone has a story – of dreams and nightmares, hope and heartache, love and loss, courage and fear, sacrifice and selfishness. All my life I’ve been interested in other people’s stories. I wanted to know them, understand them, feel them. When I grew up into politics, I always felt the main point of my work was to people a chance to have better stories."


In the end, both Romney and Huffington are correct.  The Presidency and politics is about story telling in order to gain support for policies.  However if the policies get implemented and don't work - don't blame the story.