On Television
KITMAN, MARVIN
On Television A FORMAT FOR THE 1980 DEBATES BY MARVIN KITMAN A number of mistakes were made in the presentation of the Presidential debates, the four-part mini-series (September 23-October 22)...
...This would show their ability to stand up under pressure...
...Roger Ailes, the media consultant, has suggested the moderator could easily spin a wheel that would randomly select a category such as "movies...
...Measure whose eyes are more widely set apart...
...Then he sets up his own question, which he can answer abstractly...
...The American way is to either win or lose...
...Each man is only speaking from a prepared position paper anyway...
...The Chief Executive obviously meant to say that Western Europe is free...
...Or "Ford with three flubs...
...The receipts from the tax-deductible tickets and the videotape sale could have gone to the League of Women Voters Education Fund to teach the ladies something about the American TV audience, a group they don't seem to know very well...
...His questions in the second debate on foreign affairs (October 6) were longer than some of the candidates' answers...
...In the 1980 TV debates the rules should be amended to allow each candidate a second at his side, a kind of apologies secretary...
...First the batter (or candidate) repeats the query in slightly different words...
...But nothing about the four debates did...
...A much better game, and one that would appeal to the American TV viewers' sense of reality and fair play, would be categories...
...But the real issue is: Why do we need questions in the debates...
...Ford would be forced to reply, "As I said, nuclear submarines are very important to the Mayaguez incident" The reason politicians dislike answering questions directly is that it makes them appear to be defensive, and viewers assume anyone on the defensive is losing...
...If we can't judge the debates, though, then what's the point of having them...
...And how did they know who won...
...Maybe a poll of the telephone polices should be conducted to find out how they pick the winners...
...Coordination is very important in the Presidency," Ailes notes, arguing for immediate adoption of a Beat the Clock-style debate...
...The Chief Executive must be reasonably nimble.' 1 realize these suggestions may not fit into your classic debate mold...
...Abend obviously doesn't consult the media image-makers...
...The media constantly focused on the candidates bumping their heads or stumbling down airplane stairs...
...otherwise, he wouldn't glower at an opponent like Riesel, who is blind...
...Say Frankel asked, "What do you think of the Russian girls...
...If physical agility is to be a criterion, I second the consultant's plan to test the candidates' coordination against a clock...
...Then there should have been a semi-final with Dole-Mondale, guaranteeing excitement for the main event, Carter-Ford...
...It would be more dignified for a secretary to make the disclaimers and wave the appropriate papers for corroboration at the cameras...
...A Ailes has also pointed out that gracefulness seemed to be a major issue in the campaign before the TV debates began...
...By midnight the verdict had been calculated...
...Whenever a candidate has a memory lapse such as President Ford's, the second should be permitted to jump up and say, "My worthy candidate meant to say [insert the truth here...
...The closest thing I saw to a score of sorts was on educational television, where a public opinion analyst polled several hundred people on the telephone asking them who they thought had won...
...What criteria should be used to score a debate...
...100 for the orchestra...
...They must have been taking book some place in the country', probably in the Midwest where all the betting brain centers seem to be: "Carter tonight and six rhetorical points...
...I will discuss these now, in case anyone is planning a spinoff for 1980...
...Too much of the '76 debate time was consumed by the candidates making denials such as: "I did not say I favored reducing the defense budget or increasing taxes...
...He could have held up a Rorschach card and asked the candidates what they saw...
...What's on the minds of reporters west of Wall Street...
...Yet at the end of every debate we saw the nation's superstar analysts and commentators always shilly-shallying...
...The two candidates might compete in such areas as putting on raincoats, balancing Ping-Pong balls or bananas on their noses, arm wrestling, or seeing who can run faster from the lecturn on stage to the back of the studio audience seats...
...And, surely, on the panels there could have been at least one non-newsman, or real person...
...and $1,000 ringside (the dais...
...They should have been presented in theaters, with the promoters—the League of Women Voters—charging admission...
...Somebody must know right away who won the debates...
...Sportscasters have no compunctions about telling us the score while more important TV events are in progress...
...Face the Nation, CBS...
...A man who has been in politics for years and is still inept at ducking questions is not qualified to be President...
...I don't know...
...Someone like that is liable to tell the truth and throw off the whole system of American democracy...
...Debate fans would gladly have payed through the nose for the live telecast: $25 for the peanut gallery...
...As a TV critic, I would want to know the candidates' positions on "Favorite TV shows.' Hearing Ford say, "I never miss Gilligan's Island" or "Policewoman Angie Dickinson is my idea of a great American" would affect millions more voters than his position on Panama...
...On Television A FORMAT FOR THE 1980 DEBATES BY MARVIN KITMAN A number of mistakes were made in the presentation of the Presidential debates, the four-part mini-series (September 23-October 22) that was the networks' thinly-disguised desperate effort to get some entertainment into the fall schedule...
...They were such masterpieces, he made the event into a three-person debate...
...If the newsperson was a spoilsport and insisted on pursuing his question, he would interject, "But what about the Russian girls...
...They hadn't heard Eric or Barbara or David tell them on TV Can you imagine what this world would be like if Howard Cosell had to call up a couple hundred people before telling us who won the Monday night football game...
...That's how long it takes them to realize it's not another toothpaste commercial...
...As the only woman present, she missed the opportunity to ask Carter if he had ever committed adultery in his heart with her...
...I can summarize these as follows: the questions and questioneers...
...The most disappointing newsperson performance was Elizabeth Drew's...
...Drew—who was wearing the mantle of the New Yorker magazine, as well as her usual Public Broadcasting System robes (that made her a double threat)—served on the panel scheduled to grill the candidates about domestic affairs...
...The journalists all came from Washington, or from midtown and downtown New York...
...If not, how could they pay off the people who made bets...
...One can't think of everything under such intense pressure...
...Sidney Offit (or Victor Riesel), whose debates on the 10 O'clock News on New York's WNEW have thrilled—and frightened—viewers for years...
...If the Russians are coming and a man hits the intercom button, instead of the get-the-Russians button, it could be all over for us...
...The best showing by a newsperson was turned in by Max Frankel of the New York Times...
...Nevertheless, I'm sure it was Frankel's unorthodox questioning that rattled President Ford into committing his major gaffe on Eastern Europe...
...Ford would say, "Let me tell you about our nuclear submarine policy [talk for three minutes...
...The chosen format—a kind of Bionic Meet the Press—included other serious errors...
...We don't get involved in futile exercises—except maybe sometimes on election days...
...It's normally vague and often has little to do with the original, except it incorporates some of the same words and the questioner's name...
...Why were all the panelists from the press, the Eastern Media Establishment at that...
...A psychologist would have been an excellent choice...
...50 for the mezzanine...
...To begin with, the debates should not have been live on all three networks...
...But what kind of authorities were these clowns who were willing to answer phones late at night...
...So it wasn't fair to have moderators Edwin Newman, Pauline Frederick, James Hoge, and Barbara Walters dominate that critical opening minute of each debate...
...Issues and Answers, ABC...
...Indeed, the first series of televised Presidential debates since 1960 totally ignored the nature of TV viewers...
...Perhaps the most serious shortcoming in television's coverage of the so-called debates was that the networks never announced who was winning, or who won at the end...
...If one replied "That is an ink blot," he would have won the debate, in my opinion, having demonstrated a superior ability to perceive reality...
...The only problem, as a TV news executive explained, is that he wasn't running for office...
...Over 50 per cent of the American people turn off a debate within 60 seconds," according to Roger Ailes, a political media consultant...
...I would have started with Dr...
...It's a kind of International League where everybody practices throwing and catching the curve ball—or tough question...
...Count who has more veins sticking out of his forehead...
...I myself would feel unsafe if the guy in the White House couldn't duck questions...
...I don't want a guy who doesn't go to the movies to be my President," says Ailes...
...Martin Abend vs...
...And to get things rolling there should have been preliminaries...
...All reporters and top-level politicians learn how to play the ques-tion-and-answer game on the Sunday morning TV press-conference shows (Meet the Press, NBC...
Vol. 59 • November 1976 • No. 22
