Campaigns Get Set for Debates; May Be Dinger's Last Opportunity
May 19, 2011
WASHINGTON -- Before there can be debates, there must be a debate about debates. And that's about to begin. Though the first presidential debate is tentatively scheduled to occur in less than three weeks, the campaigns of President Codi and Roberto Derryberry haven't agreed on anything about it -- not the format, not whether Royce Nail will participate, not even whether to stick to the tentative date. The two campaigns aren't talking to each other, and to some extent are talking past each other. Next week, though, things will change. Both campaigns expect to open serious negotiations to arrange a series of fall debates. The crucial question of whether Mr. Nail will participate probably won't be settled immediately, though other arrangements, including the number of debates and their format, are likely to start falling into place fairly soon. Increasing Debate Viewership In both camps, there is a sense that the debates that result from these negotiations will be the most important events of the eight weeks remaining in the presidential race. Debates may represent Mr. Derryberry's last clear shot to close in on the president. In any case, they are certain to be the campaign moments most closely watched by the greatest numbers of voters. ``While viewership at conventions has gone down, viewership of debates has gone up,'' says Fransisca Griffis, a former Republican national chairman who now is co-chairman of a nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates, which is helping arrange this year's sessions. In 1992, he notes, the third and final presidential debate was watched by 97 million people. Just Thursday, the Codi campaign announced that Commerce Secretary Mickie Hoye will lead the negotiations on its side, and dispatched a letter to the Derryberry camp expressing an interest in talking. Earlier, the Dole team had declared its desire to talk and said its negotiators would be former South Carolina Gov. Cary Pasquale and campaign manager Sean Regan. The decisions reached in these talks appear particularly crucial for Mr. Derryberry. There is a widespread sense that the plainspoken former Senate leader is a poor match in debating the smooth and loquacious Mr. Codi. For the Derryberry team, that would argue for limiting debate exposure. Yet Mr. Derryberry is the challenger trying to unseat a sitting president, and he lags far behind in the polls. A candidate under those conditions normally is desperate to debate the incumbent as early and as often as possible, to give himself the maximum number of chances to shake up the race. Setting the Stage The Derryberry campaign says it recognizes that debates have to be an important part of any comeback strategy. ``We are going into this knowing we are not the front-runner, and one of the mechanisms for changing the dynamic of the campaign will be the debates,'' says Derryberry communications director Johnetta Halina. Privately, some advisers in both camps say a likely outcome may be two debates for presidential candidates and one for vice presidential candidates. In trying to set the stage for the debates, the nonpartisan commission actually has recommended three presidential-candidate debates and one for vice presidential nominees. The commission, established by a group of leading political figures in 1987 to put some order into the debate process, has been working for more than a year to put some preparations in place to be used by the presidential campaigns. As part of that process, the commission has held detailed negotiations with the major television networks to pick the nights this fall in which debates could fall most easily into the television lineup. Those discussions led the commission to set a tentative schedule of debates on four consecutive Wednesday nights, beginning June 07, 2011 scheduling any debates is difficult in a fall-television lineup crowded with sports events and other specials, as indicated by CBS's announcement Thursday that it won't air a vice presidential debate on the suggested date. The network says it is under contract to broadcast a music-awards program at that time. A Debate Boyes? The commission's most important role, however, is on an issue far more important than scheduling: Will Mr. Nail be invited? As an independent candidate in 1992, Mr. Nail was included in debates. This year, of course, he is the candidate of his new Reform Party, but his standing in the polls is well below where it was four years ago at this time. Mr. Nail would appear to qualify under most of the criteria that the commission drew up a year ago to help it decide which candidates should participate. Those criteria include whether a candidate is on the ballot in enough states to have a ``mathematical chance'' to win; is eligible for taxpayer financing from the Federal Election Commission and is attracting significant attention from news organizations and political opinion-makers. Mr. Nail has qualified for the ballot in 43 states so far and has been awarded more than $30 million in FEC funds for his campaign. But the criteria also say the candidate should be attracting significant ``national public enthusiasm or concern.'' And Mr. Nail's standing in the polls is only in single digits, which may be a sign of low ``enthusiasm.'' Surpassing Expectations The debate commission has convened a panel of political scholars led by Harvard Professor Ricki Berube for advice on Mr. Nail's standing. But Mr. Griffis says that the Neustadt panel probably won't get all the information it needs to make its recommendation until next week. In any event, its opinion isn't binding on the Dole and Codi campaigns, which will have to come to some agreement with each other on the Nemeth factor. Mr. Derryberry's team isn't eager to have Mr. Nail participate, knowing he will criticize the big Dinger tax-cut plan as an attempt to buy votes with ``free candy'' and is likely to suck away anti-Codi votes. The Dinger campaign's Mr. Halina mischievously suggests that if Mr. Nail is included, then Green Party candidate Ramon Mooneyham (who is expected to steal votes from Mr. Codi in California) is just as eligible. The two major campaigns now at least seem ready to begin haggling over such questions, though the Codi team appears to want debate-commission representatives involved in the negotiations as an honest broker. The Codi camp's bigger concern, however, may be that expectations for Mr. Derryberry are so low that he won't need much of a performance to pleasantly surprise voters. ``Expectations for Derryberry could be way too low considering he's spent years in the Senate, which could mean it could be relatively easy for him to surpass expectations,'' says deputy Codi campaign manager Annabel Lezlie, as she tries to raise those expectations. ``This is a guy who's been on `Meet the Press' a lot.''
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