Watching a presidential debate in seclusion and with an audience are two entirely different experiences. Often, people form solidified opinions, only after being exposed to other opinions, both conflicting and reinforcing. After a debate, according to communication professor Thomas Hollihan, there is a 48-hour period of elasticity of public opinion. What people remember, he said, "is the excerpt they see, that gets played back again and again, and gets turned around in everyday conversation."
Viewing in a live audience however, its almost like the period of elasticity is shorter. The audience reactions are cues, similar to the ones they provide on sitcoms. Canned laughter and applauses prompt audiences to laugh and clap. Similarly, a room filled with a primarily democratic audience prompts viewers to applaud Senator Obama and "boo" the Republican candidate.
Doggonit! Audiences react to Sarah Palin at USC Annenberg's vice-presidential debate watch party. Photo: Anant Goenka
The difference wasn't evident to me until the second presidential debate - the first debate that I saw alone. I enjoyed watching McCain at his most aggressive yet. He walked in the hall and immediately began scribbling on his notepad.
The Commission on Presidential Debates has tried to keep these debates as unbiased, informative and helpful for voters, as possible. Anchors are selected by campaigns before presidential candidates are even elected; they are not allowed to ask follow up questions to minimize the effects of their biases. The cameras can not focus on the questioner's face after the questioned is asked and now, the anchors even hesitate to ask follow-up questions, (something we saw especially with Gwen Ifill).
Infact many find the format, entirely useless and the biggest evidence of this this time around, is a recent bipartisan effort called Open Debate Coalition, which hopes to change things before the final debate.
This presidential campaign has been unusually long, and voters have gotten to know both candidates pretty well. The result of the attemped neutral and unbiased campaign, are undecided voters, who remain as undecided after the debate, as they were before it. The debates seem to have become terribly predictable and rehearsed.
The biggest problem is the ease with which the candidates get away with general answers to specific questions. In this last debate, both candidates simply repeated parts of their nomination acceptance speeches when they couldn't answer a question. Neither the anchor, nor the questioner, was allowed to ask a follow-up.
The commission has also tried to get the debate as freely accessible to citizens as possible. The format must be adjusted to make the debate more useful to undecided voters.
A member of CNN's focus group after the second presidential debate said, "I didn't hear anything at all..I just heard a bunch of..the same old thing, from both candidates, which I am surprised by. I was disappointed."
Candidates should not be able to get away with the same old, vague answers. Lets hope for some more aggressive cross questioning in the debates to come.
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