The biggest complaint about the Presidential debates is how damn boring they are. Nobody says anything new, they just cling to their talking points like barnacles to a ship and recite their lines.
That's probably your fault. Because most of us are, secretly, watching the President jog.
An interesting fact: Whenever the President jogs, the reporters want to come along. They'll trail behind the President, watching him bob down the trail flanked by his Secret Service agents, generally not talking at all. It's boring work.
Why do they follow? Is it because the President is a graceful as a gazelle and they can't take their eyes off of his stunning physique?
No; it's because they're hoping he'll have a heart attack on film. If the President's going down, it's most likely during exercise, and who wants to miss that? So they'll show up like vultures, day after day, waiting patiently for the President to infarct or maybe just sprain an ankle.
Now, time was not so long ago that a candidate had some off-hours in between journalistic appearances, where they could say whatever sprung to mind and be human. These days, candidates are continually on-camera; from the moment they step out of the limo to the moment they go to bed at night, they're surrounded by cell phone camera, videorecorders, and all sorts of recording devices. Anything of even the remotest interest will be on YouTube within the hour.
In some ways, that's good; I think the Transparent Society helps keep everyone honest. I think the days of making private speeches about awful things are over, and that's a fine thing. But let me also ask you a question:
If we recorded every word you said to your friends, family and co-workers, every week, day in and day out for years, do you honestly think you'd never say something breathtakingly stupid?
Like the President, we're all human. We say things that sound terrible when taken out of context, and we sometimes misphrase things that put our beliefs in the shittiest possible light, and we say things that we didn't even mean, we just tangled up the words. And because our friends know us, they cut us some slack and go, "Okay, I knew what he meant" - or, if what you said was sufficiently assholic, they'll follow up and go, "Whoah, did you mean that?" And they'll give you a chance to clarify - and when you do, they'll take your clarification at face value.
That doesn't happen in politics. Both sides do it - a candidate will say something that sounds bad, and they'll jump on some one-paragraph excerpt and say, "SEE? THIS! THIS IS PROOF THAT THE CANDIDATE REALLY WANTS TO $X!", where $X is either to destroy the rights of women, or to collapse the capitalist market as we know it, or to become the next Hitler, or whatever other terrible thing people want to believe.
And if the candidate goes, "Wait, I wasn't thinking how bad that sounded - what I really meant to say was this," the inevitable response is to keep riding his initial words, ignoring any clarifications or additions.
Every time someone does that, they're encouraging a society where the first words out of your mouth are the last words. There's no slack to be given, no assumption that sometimes people say stupid things they didn't mean to say - no, every word a candidate speaks is the purest truth formed from the depths of his psyche, the absolute reflection of his inner thoughts.
Everything else a candidate has ever tried to say is worthless, the thousands of other speeches he's gotten correct are irrelevant - no, what's important are the gaffes he makes. That, my friends, is what you should be looking for, because in the daily screwups you'll find their true character.
So with that assumption in mind - and recognizing that a candidate is going to be absolutely slaughtered in the polls for making a statement, and not given a chance to adequately rebut his own momentary lapse of judgment, what do you think you'd do?
That's right - you're gonna shut up. Stick to what you know works. Driven by public pressure - a backwards encouragement - you're going to become the most artificial son-of-a-bitch alive, never saying anything you didn't plan for weeks. Because "He's artificial" is offputting, sure, but one misphrased comment might kill your career.
In other words, we're rewarding slick actors and punishing those who speak their minds.
Now, don't get me wrong: I'm not saying that a consistent series of statements doesn't reveal inner character. Yet we don't listen to every word a candidate says, just the excerpted screwups, so there's no context to their errors. Every day, on both sides, I see people seizing upon what's probably just someone stammering and botching their "Oratory" roll, which is to be expected occasionally, when you're talking to people for twelve hours a day, and going, "This is what they really meant."
No - what I see is someone who screwed up. And I try to take it in a charitable light and say, "Okay, I dislike this guy, but I think he was trying to say this." And until you can cut some slack for your enemies, we're just going to get increasingly boring debates and meaningless speeches.
Because the vultures and the reporters? They're always circling now. And no politician wants to give them the benefit of the kill.
That's probably your fault. Because most of us are, secretly, watching the President jog.
An interesting fact: Whenever the President jogs, the reporters want to come along. They'll trail behind the President, watching him bob down the trail flanked by his Secret Service agents, generally not talking at all. It's boring work.
Why do they follow? Is it because the President is a graceful as a gazelle and they can't take their eyes off of his stunning physique?
No; it's because they're hoping he'll have a heart attack on film. If the President's going down, it's most likely during exercise, and who wants to miss that? So they'll show up like vultures, day after day, waiting patiently for the President to infarct or maybe just sprain an ankle.
Now, time was not so long ago that a candidate had some off-hours in between journalistic appearances, where they could say whatever sprung to mind and be human. These days, candidates are continually on-camera; from the moment they step out of the limo to the moment they go to bed at night, they're surrounded by cell phone camera, videorecorders, and all sorts of recording devices. Anything of even the remotest interest will be on YouTube within the hour.
In some ways, that's good; I think the Transparent Society helps keep everyone honest. I think the days of making private speeches about awful things are over, and that's a fine thing. But let me also ask you a question:
If we recorded every word you said to your friends, family and co-workers, every week, day in and day out for years, do you honestly think you'd never say something breathtakingly stupid?
Like the President, we're all human. We say things that sound terrible when taken out of context, and we sometimes misphrase things that put our beliefs in the shittiest possible light, and we say things that we didn't even mean, we just tangled up the words. And because our friends know us, they cut us some slack and go, "Okay, I knew what he meant" - or, if what you said was sufficiently assholic, they'll follow up and go, "Whoah, did you mean that?" And they'll give you a chance to clarify - and when you do, they'll take your clarification at face value.
That doesn't happen in politics. Both sides do it - a candidate will say something that sounds bad, and they'll jump on some one-paragraph excerpt and say, "SEE? THIS! THIS IS PROOF THAT THE CANDIDATE REALLY WANTS TO $X!", where $X is either to destroy the rights of women, or to collapse the capitalist market as we know it, or to become the next Hitler, or whatever other terrible thing people want to believe.
And if the candidate goes, "Wait, I wasn't thinking how bad that sounded - what I really meant to say was this," the inevitable response is to keep riding his initial words, ignoring any clarifications or additions.
Every time someone does that, they're encouraging a society where the first words out of your mouth are the last words. There's no slack to be given, no assumption that sometimes people say stupid things they didn't mean to say - no, every word a candidate speaks is the purest truth formed from the depths of his psyche, the absolute reflection of his inner thoughts.
Everything else a candidate has ever tried to say is worthless, the thousands of other speeches he's gotten correct are irrelevant - no, what's important are the gaffes he makes. That, my friends, is what you should be looking for, because in the daily screwups you'll find their true character.
So with that assumption in mind - and recognizing that a candidate is going to be absolutely slaughtered in the polls for making a statement, and not given a chance to adequately rebut his own momentary lapse of judgment, what do you think you'd do?
That's right - you're gonna shut up. Stick to what you know works. Driven by public pressure - a backwards encouragement - you're going to become the most artificial son-of-a-bitch alive, never saying anything you didn't plan for weeks. Because "He's artificial" is offputting, sure, but one misphrased comment might kill your career.
In other words, we're rewarding slick actors and punishing those who speak their minds.
Now, don't get me wrong: I'm not saying that a consistent series of statements doesn't reveal inner character. Yet we don't listen to every word a candidate says, just the excerpted screwups, so there's no context to their errors. Every day, on both sides, I see people seizing upon what's probably just someone stammering and botching their "Oratory" roll, which is to be expected occasionally, when you're talking to people for twelve hours a day, and going, "This is what they really meant."
No - what I see is someone who screwed up. And I try to take it in a charitable light and say, "Okay, I dislike this guy, but I think he was trying to say this." And until you can cut some slack for your enemies, we're just going to get increasingly boring debates and meaningless speeches.
Because the vultures and the reporters? They're always circling now. And no politician wants to give them the benefit of the kill.
