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Presidential Debates In The Internet Era
by Heather Greenfield
It has been nearly 50 years since the first televised presidential debate between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon in 1960, when people who watched the debate thought Kennedy won and those who listened on the radio considered Nixon the winner. Since then, debate sound bites have grown shorter, the post-debate spin longer, and the technology more sophisticated and interactive.
Instead of print or television journalists polling three to 10 people after debates or telephone surveys that may not catch actual debate watchers, viewers now can vote instantly for winners through text messages. Many mainstream media, meanwhile, broadcast the debates live online, and some debate hosts are loosening rules on who can use video clips so bloggers and others can post excerpts to illustrate their points or send them to friends.
While the full impact of such changes is still unclear, some political scientists and activists see easier video-sharing and an explosion of online hosted debates, with questions coming more directly from viewers, as the biggest change to the debate format since the Kennedy-Nixon clash.
Web Video Wants To Be Free
Presidential candidates are making more of an effort to engage bloggers this election cycle -- so much so that conservative blogger Robert Bluey, who writes for RedState and RobertBluey.com, said he received YouTube clips of the second Republican presidential debate from the leading campaigns while the May 15 debate was in progress.
Bluey sees more online involvement as good for the election process. "You have so many voices offering commentary and declaring winners and losers," he said.
Those many voices may be disagreeing loudly about who is the best candidate or whether former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani or Rep. Ron Paul had the better zinger at the latest debate. But they are united in their fight for open access to debate footage. Their coalition, including everyone from the liberal MoveOn.org to the conservative RedState, has asked the Democratic National Committee and Republican National Committee to demand public access to the footage.
So far CNN has volunteered to release its June 3 debate. MSNBC did not do so a few weeks ago.
"I am very hopeful that both the Republicans and the Democrats will help encourage the extraordinary public discussion around the election that the Internet has enabled, by removing any uncertainty about the right of the people to comment upon the speech of presidential candidates," said Lawrence Lessig, a Stanford University law professor leading the Free Debates coalition.
Democratic candidates including Sens. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut senator and Barack Obama of Illinois, along with former Sen. John Edwards, have joined the 75 online activists pushing to ease the restrictions.
"There is no job more important than that of the president, so it is critical that both parties conduct the discussions and debates between candidates in a transparent way," said Michael Turk, the 2004-2005 e-campaign director for the Republican National Committee. "Allowing unfettered access to footage of the debates is a step in the right direction."
Neither the RNC (Turk's former group) nor the DNC have officially responded to the request, so the battle currently is being wages against each media outlet planning to host debates.
Taking The Political Clashes Online
Online news groups and bloggers are doing more than debating the debates, though. They also are hosting them.
People who think the debate podium is crowded need only look at the venues, including many virtual ones this year. The liberal netroots group MoveOn.org led the way with a Democratic audio debate in the spring, with a contest for write-in questions for the candidates. The conservative Internet forum Townhall.com will host a debate this summer. And the MySpace online social network plans to host "debates" this fall featuring one-on-one meetings with candidates on various college campuses.
The liberal blog The Huffington Post is teaming with new media "old-timers" Slate and Yahoo to hold presidential debates moderated by PBS's Charlie Rose. Candidates will appear via satellite, and viewers will submit questions via e-mail or upload videos of themselves asking questions, according to Yahoo spokesman Brian Nelson.
The MySpace Debate also will make a greater effort to generate questions from voters. Jeff Berman, MySpace's senior vice president of public affairs, said that instead of recreating a debate like the kind that typically would precede the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses next year, the goal is to create an Iowan living room. He plans to offer an instant-messaging feed to supplement questions to candidates from the audience.
Republican online media consultant and blogger David All is among those questioning whether a debate hosted by Yahoo will be fair.
"Independently, these organizations and individuals serve as a valuable voice to their audience," All wrote. "But, that audience is neither objective nor balanced, which means the 'first online presidential debate' will fail to effectively penetrate the conservative sphere. And that's a dynamic Yahoo needs to explain (and hopefully, amend)."
Bluey said he sees a risk if the average voter does not recognize an ideological leaning that some hosts may have, but he expects a group the size of Yahoo to shoot for balance.
Berman, meanwhile, said conservative and liberal groups on MySpace are fairly balanced, with a few thousand more MySpace Democrats than Republicans. "I fully anticipate these [debates] will be balanced and right down the middle," Berman said. "The questions will be ones the MySpace community cares about."
How Influential Are The 'Influentials'?
Observers of technology and politics agree that this presidential debate season will be the most interactive ever. But will "more interactive" really impact voter interest and actual votes?
Berman is among those arguing that the different, longer debate format will impact what questions get asked and how they are answered. Steve Moore, director of Yahoo's news and information service, likens the format change to the 1960 debate. "It's a really significant, historic opportunity for the candidates to test their debate skills in a brand new format," he said.
But Curtis Gans, director of American University's Center for the Study of the American Electorate, is skeptical. "I don't know how much these online debates contribute," Gans said. "They [voters] have to be interested to access these online sites." He noted that 105 million to 110 million people will vote, and even the most-read blogs and YouTube videos get only hundreds of thousands of views at best.
Berman countered that MySpace has 65 million unique visitors a month, and 80 percent of them are voting age, according to Comscore. "To suggest MySpace isn't going to play a role in future elections, misunderstands what MySpace is about," Berman said.
Carol Darr, the departing director of George Washington University's Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet, had a different take than Gans on the numbers about online politics and debate consumers. She said they are the "right" readers and viewers. "Previous studies show people paying attention to politics online tend to be influentials," Darr said, and influentials tend to have social circles that are twice as big as others and give advice to friends and family -- whether or not they are asked.
Bluey and many bloggers have argued that more information and sources means more democracy. "The more information voters have," he said, "the better off they'll be."
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