There are
several reasons why this is destructive. First, few intelligent
arguments can be made in such a short time span. Once you have
shared time with your opponent and the host puts in his two cents,
you may only have at most two one-minute segments in which to
make your case.
Under these
circumstances, you cannot even begin to do much of anything except
make a couple of sound-bite points. These must necessarily be
broad-brush in nature, devoid of any nuance, and must avoid anything
remotely technical. This tends to make one's arguments sound simplistic,
even if they are not.
Moreover,
some arguments require a chain of logic to reach a valid conclusion
and may demand background knowledge or factual information to
be appreciated and understood. Needless to say, time constraints
prohibit the former, and decreasing educational standards mean
that one cannot assume the latter even about such basics as the
nature of the federal government or our nation's history.
Consequently,
one is usually forced to jump straight to one's conclusion in
a cable news debate and assert one's points without being able
to develop them or provide essential facts or the logical steps
that might convince the open-minded, ignorant or undecided on
your issue.
Another
problem is that almost everyone who appears on television is now
trained to control the agenda when appearing on camera. They know
that when the camera is on them, they can pretty much say absolutely
anything they want to say. Often, this means rote recitation of
talking points that may have nothing to do with the issue at hand
or anything the host or one's opponent may have said.
It is also
easy to make outrageous claims and cite bogus facts or statistics
in support of one's position, knowing that your opponent may not
have time to correct you. And even if he does, it prevents him
from making the points he wanted to make and forces him to argue
on your terms. In one case, my opponent accused me on camera of
lying. Off camera, he conceded that I was right. I won't appear
with that person again.
Further
degrading the usefulness of cable debates is the fact that participants
are often mismatched in terms of stature. On one side, you might
have a college professor or think tank scholar who is a recognized
expert in his field. On the other, you might have some nobody
with no real expertise from an organization that exists only as
a cell phone number to a booker. The debate format tends to make
people believe that the two are of equal stature, downgrading
the views of the true expert, while elevating those of the hack.
For this
reason, I now demand to know who I may be debating before agreeing
to appear in a cable debate. If it is not someone I recognize
as a competent peer, I won't do it. Many others in my position
feel the same way, which is one reason why there tends to be fewer
and fewer real experts engaging in cable face-offs, and more and
more nobodies labeled as party "consultants" or "strategists."
This also
results from the fact that genuine experts will too often agree
with each other on basic points, even if they come from contrasting
philosophical perspectives. They will at least agree on the facts
and the proper analytical framework. Their differences are usually
over orders of magnitude, rather than on fundamentals. This makes
bad television from the point of view of cable news channels,
which crave fireworks and sharp differences. Shouting matches
are encouraged, agreement is discouraged.
Unfortunately,
this leads viewers to think that that there is no real truth and
everything is just a matter of opinion, leaving them free to choose
whichever side is most conducive to their own personal beliefs,
prejudices or preferences.
One reform
I would propose is to cut back on contrived debates. Why not interview
those with opposing views separately, and give each more than
a minute or two to make their point without having to respond
to another person's debating tactics? And how about encouraging
interviewers to intervene when blatant errors or falsehoods are
offered as facts?
I think
these reforms would raise the level of discourse and the quality
of those willing to appear on cable programs by weeding out some
of the hacks whose only knowledge on a subject comes from their
party's talking points.
